Random notes on Chile

I´ve been in Chile for two weeks now - not really long enough to be any kind of expert on the country but I think long enough to have taken in the general vibe of the place and the people, and to have noticed few things that are a bit different to what I know back home.



Firstly, the European influenced history goes back more than twice as long as in Australia so most areas are a lot older - and the Spanish influence is pretty strong, with colourful mediteranean style architecture, cobblestone streetscapes and generally chaotic street layouts all over the place. Most towns seem to have been more or less obliterated by earthquakes a few times in the last couple of hundred years (1960 being a particularly bad year for quakes) but despite this there are still plenty of interesting colonial style churches and older buildings surviving.

The Chileans seem to have a pretty laid back attitude towards rooftop construction though, while places can look really flash at ground level often when you look at the rooftops of suburbia you´ll see the standard method of repairing a leaky roof is to drop a new piece of corrugated tin on top of the old one that was leaking, then find something really big and heavy to weigh the piece of tin down. Anything like a big heavy rock, an old mouldy couch or other large heavy pieces of furniture seems to do the job quite well. I saw in the new year by jumping around on the rooftop of my hostel in Santiago trying to get a glimpse of the new years fireworks with a bunch of other mildly inebriated backpackers, and it was quite an obstacle course I can tell you.

Another thing I noticed is the crazy mess of electrical wiring that seems to accumulate on the top of every electric power pole here. I think being a Chilean electrician must be some akin to some kind of extreme sport, because the crazy mess of offcuts and live tangled wires going in every direction would make one hell of an occupational hazard for those poor blokes. I frequently come accross left over bits of wire hanging down from the poles, at head hight on busy pedestrian walkways. I'd assume they're not live but i'm not going to be the one fool enough to find out otherwise.

Generally speaking, the Chileans are a pretty friendly and warm hearted people, always with a smile on their face despite my terrible grasp of Spanish at present - or maybe that's because of my bad Spanish!

FOOD, BOOZE AND MONEY Money - generally speaking, things are a fair bit cheaper over here than in Australia, though not as much as I had expected. 1 Aus dollar is currently worth about 400 pesos, and food, restaurant meals, accommodation etc are usually about 25 - 50% cheaper than in Australia. You can go to a restaurant, get a nice meal (if you understand the menu! I've had a few 'lucky dip' meals that wern't very special) and a big glass of beer for about 4000 pesos (about $10 aus). The odd random item here is extremely expensive though - I've given up trying to find Coconut milk at a reasonable price - average seems to be usually about $7 aus a can. No more hot creamy curries for me.....

Alcohol is super cheap, particularly the wine (there are vineyards everywhere) and its usually top quality. A 1500 ($4) peso bottle of red from a supermarket is quite a cut above an average $10 or $15 bottle in Australia. Though the beer here is a bit below par.

Back onto food, there dosent appear to be as much range in cuisine here, most meals seem to consist of a big cut of good quality meat/fish or chicken, but with a fairly bland side serve of either mashed potatoes, chips, or rice. If you order a salad, you'll usually get a sliced tomato and some lettuce. But that's ok, the wine is good.

PUBLIC TRANSPORT One area where Chile leaves Australia for dead is public transport. The bus system here is brilliant - Inside cities and large towns they have large numbers of beat up old mini buses that seem to take up 50% of the traffic on the roads. While the buses are a bit old and tend to spew out a bit of smoke, they are always full of people, they are cheap and you never have to wait more than a minute or so to get one. Santiago also has a new subway, so you can pretty much get anywhere in the city for about $1 aus.

Even better than the city buses is the coach system. The coaches are clean, new, comfortable and they go everywhere and very regularly. And are also reasonably cheap. (eg - a first class 10hr trip cost me $20,000 pesos or $50 Aus) They also have a "super sleeper" type bus, with super large and comfy seats that fold all the way back so you can actually get some sleep in them. To top it off there is an attendant who runs around giving people drinks and snacks, like on a plane. If any of you travel to Chile, i recommend making long bus journeys ovenight, that way you can scrimp on a nights accommodation costs but still get some sleep.

Another novel idea is these little taxis they have that work a bit like buses (called taxi collectivos). The taxi has a set route - say between two suburbs. But it doesnt leave untill its full, so you jump in and wait untill someone else comes along who wants to go to the same place. They cost about the same as a regular bus. Its a weird system, I don't know how it works or how the drivers make any money, but it does work..... somehow.

Lava Surfer

A Highlight of Chile - I tried to climb Volcan Villarrica (2850m), which is a permanently active volcano in the Lakes District of Chile - though to be perfectly honest, is not a particularly difficult one to climb. We didn't get to the top though, it was too windy, the guides thought it too dangerous given the toxic fumes funnelling around the top of the crater (check the photos - yes that is smoke).

It was spitting pieces of ice and snow at us so I guess they made the right call, though I was a bit disappointed not to get to the top.

Other wise the weather was perfect and there was a great view from where we got to (about 2300m), so it was a semi-successful mission.

Me on the Volcan. Coming down the mountain was much easier than getting up - sit down, lift you feet and slide.... Awesome.

Pichilemu (WARNING surf content......)

These photos are of Pichilemu, a Chilean beach town which, according to the Lonely Planet guidebook, is Chile´s version of Australia's Surfers Paradise. I headed in that direction figuring it had to be more interesting than that, and also because of some vague memory from some old surf magazine that there were some extremely long surf breaks near there.

On arrival my suspicions were confirmed. This place is a long, long way from Surfers! Complete with black sand beaches, original Spanish beachside architecture, colourful Chilean holidaymakers and llama rides on the beach for the kiddies, Pichilemu is definitely a world away from anywhere I´d been before. Pichilemu is clearly a authentic Chilean holiday town - I was the only Gringo in town, and found almost no English speakers or foreign tourists there, which made a nice change.

The whole place made me feel like I´d stepped back in time, or maybe more like Id walked into the set of some funky remake of ´Happy Days´. Where we would have Video game arcades, Pichilemu has all-original pinball parlours and homemade versions of table soccer (That's La Mesa de Futbol here!) . Where we have bumper car circuits, they have these little dirt tracks and 50cc peewee four wheeler motorbikes for the kids to race around in. Crazy stuff.

Oh, and it does have one incredibly long surfable wave breaking in front of the town - actually, the wave is longer than the town! Apparently it produces rides of about 900m when it gets to its best (though hasn't broken that good for a few years). While I was there, there was a long line of about 8 or 9 100m long slightly fattish lefthanders, with some short punchy rights in between. Can´t complain! It was a bit bizarre though, despite the great surf line up, there were only about 5 or 6 guys in the water, but something like 5,000 Chileans on the beach making sand castles and riding horses, donkeys and llamas around.

I didn´t actually surf there though, I found a slightly better spot near town, called Punta los Lobos, which was about the same size but with a much less punishing paddle. Though with water temperatures straight from Antarctica, it was still a challenge for me - my shoulders seemed to fuse up after a few minutes - or maybe that was the 5mm wetsuit freezing solid? Anyhoot it was a memorable surf experience, I cant claim i got any 10 second barrels - though they were there to be taken.