Valparaiso

I awoke yesterday and after a very leisurely breakfast made an attempt to orient myself to the town of Valparaiso. The city is laid out like an amphitheater. The residential districts built into the hills are the seats and the Pacific ocean is the stage The city was developed vertically. Public transportation is good. There are San Francisco style street cars and 15 funiculars to take you up the hills at regular intervals. The funiculars are particularly fun to ride. Its a 45 degree angle ascent up that lasts about 2 minutes. The cost of the ride is 10 cents. Almost any destination in the hills affords a sweeping view of the port and ocean. From the downtown area below I imagined everything past the funicular ride was strictly residential much like the Hollywood Hills. However in walking around the hills it became apparent that there were many galleries, bed and breakfasts, restaurants, kioskos and locuturios on almost every block. The neighborhoods on the hills are a challenge to navigate. They are a veritable labyrinth of endless stairs, funiculars, retaining walls, hidden shortcuts, street murals, concrete and corrugated aluminum houses which are painted in the most vibrant of colors. After an afternoon of walking I settled in to the Brighton Cafe overlooking the ocean for an early dinner. Being a port town the selection was obvious - Patagonian Toothfish i.e Chilean Sea Bass. However here they don't call it Chilean Sea Bass here but rather just Sea Bass. Ha! There was little doubt that the fish had been swimming in the Pacific earlier that day. It was one of the best pieces of fish I have ever consumed. Two large fillets in a simple butter sauce with a squeeze of lemon. Divine.


Yesterday I visited La Sebastiana which was Pablo Nerudas house and now a museum. Photography was prohibited but if you would like to see the house the Neruda Foundation's website can be found HERE On the way back from the museum I walked through the Sky Museum which is a culturaly protected four block area where the house's facades are painted up in gradiose murals. Color really is is everywhere in this place.
Later I stopped into to a small restaurant to try another local specialty called Chorrillana. This a small mountain of food which consists of a base of french fries topped with beef sauteed in red wine, cheese, egg and onions. The dish resembled a small feeding trough. I managed to finish most of it and for dessert I had a long nap.


An interesting fact of Valparaiso is that although it is not the Capitol of the country it is where the Congress meets and legislates. It sounds like someone wanted to appease the most populous city of Santiago and assure them of their superiority. Oh Politics. I personally didn't care much for Santiago and thought it had little in the way of character, just a big dirty city. I thought that it had all of the charm of Newark New Jersey on a cold and rainy day.


I have some pictures of Valparaiso that can be found HERE.

I am out of here today and not sure where I am headed I am going to get back down to Santiago and see what happens.

C.