Dec 2023 – Page 3 – B' on Tour

Sightseeing Santiago de Chile

On Saturday evening, Betza went to a Hen Party which she organised as maid of honour. After the girls had their party, she said their partners will join later and meet all together in a night club. She said I’m also invited, and if I come before midnight the entrance is for free. So, I thought alright, let’s have a look how Chileans party. In that club, there were only locals as it was quite a bit outside of downtown. The whole evening only popular music and reggaeton was played. Oh how I love the simplicity of reggaeton, and its constantly repeating bass rhythm never gets boring with its Umm, ta, ta, ta, Umm, ta, ta, ta in permanent loop from the can. I had a few beer, and it was interesting to observe this scene, but it wasn’t as crazy as Shanghai. The next day with some hangover Betza and I went to the Persa Biobio to meet her friends again for lunch. It’s a huge (mainly) second-hand weekend market with (yes, literally) thousands of hawkers in several old factory buildings. You can buy there everything what you can imagine. Without Betza, I wouldn’t have experienced this at all. On Monday I said farewell to Betza, her mother Rosa and her daughter Vanessa.

Food Corner at the huge Persa Biobio market

I was surprised that the University of Heidelberg affords itself such an impressive building in the Providencia suburb of Santiago…nothing compared to the 1970’s style buildings in the Neuenheimer Feld

On a sunny day you see the snow covered mountains from Santiago, even though the ski resorts are an hour drive away, and Cerro El Plomo didn’t had enough snow for a ski ascent.

On Wednesday 26th July, I strolled through the city. By accident I got out of the new metro station at the former building of the National Congress of Chile. It housed the Chilean parliament until the Coup d’etat in 1973, after that, a parliament became unnecessary in a dictatorship. The current parliament resides in a new building in Valparaiso. I walked another block to the main square in Plaza de Armas, which houses the Catedral Metropolitana, Central Post Office and a big statute of Pedro de Valdiva (you remember, that bloke who got killed by Mapuche, while he tried to invade their country). Somehow I didn’t think of walking over to La Moneda, the president palace of Chile, which was bombed by Pinochet forces during his Coup d’etat. I stayed the for a few nights with Nahuel in the Recoleta suburb of Santiago in his small house at the northern front of Cerro San Cristobal. He was quite busy with his own stuff, and thus, we didn’t shared too much time.

Former Building of the National Congress of Chile

Plaza de Armas with the Mapuche Memorial on one side…

…and Pedro de Valdiva diagonally at the other end, with the Catedral in the background.

On Thursday I went to Cerro Santa Lucia. It’s a another hill in the middle of the city. I started from the South at Terraza Neptuno with its fountain and then made my way up via various stairs and cobblestone tracks to the Terraza Caupolican from where I had a nice view of the house canyons. I reached the summit from where I had another nice view over the city, before descending on its Northern Slopes. Afterwards I headed to the Parque Quinta Normal. It was populated with lots of school kids, which just enjoyed their afternoon. I walked passed the lake and it got much quieter. On the other side of the park is a large railway museum, but that was already closed, when I passed by. It got slowly dark so I walked back along Catedral street. To my surprise there were still tram tracks on the road. Until the late 1950’s Santiago de Chile had an extensive tram network, but due to neglect and fierce competition of new buses trams ceased to operate by 1959. Now buses are stuck in the same traffic jams than cars, good old days of progress.

Parque Quinta Normal was popular amongst young people…

Alexander von Humboldt statue in front of the National Museum of Natural History

There are still old Tram Tracks visible along Catedral Street

Bouldering Santiago de Chile

On Saturday afternoon, 22nd July, Betza, her daughter Vanessa and I went to the Bhanga Boulder Gym. It’s a bit hidden at the rear end of a Mall. The outdoor top-rope climbing area was closed, as it was raining (very rare in Santiago I know, but it happened). I did some research before about potential boulder gyms, and most of the boulder gyms have quite restrictive entrance conditions. Either your stay is limited to 2 h, which might be ok, or not, depending on how many people are there. Sometimes, I’m done after 2 h, sometimes I like to stay 3 h or 4 h, depending how much I like it. Or even worse, you’re only admitted in strict time slots of 2 h or 90 min. I don’t want to spend my money like this, and then being kicked, because the next wave of people comes in. I understand, if there’re lots of people, then you need to coordinate a bit, but this appears to me overrestrictive. In Australia during the pandemic you also needed to register to get a spot, but still you could enter in a certain time slot, but stay as long as you want. And when we entered the Bhanga Boulder gym, the guy also told us, the entrance ticket is only valid for 2 h, but that he wouldn’t kick us out, if we would stay longer. The boulder gym is half open, maybe it’s good in summer time for extended ventilation, but in the Winter rain it was a bit chilly. The routes were clearly set, and the walls were not overcrowded with holds. It had two separate areas, and in the end I stayed even a bit longer than I expected, as I managed to sent a few routes. But then towards the end, I could feel how I knew the moves, but didn’t have the juice to make the actual move. It was a nice experience though.

Vanessa and Betza entering the Bhanga Boulder Gym

Talca – Santiago de Chile

On Thursday, 20th July 2023, early morning I walked back to the train station. The repairs of the Lircay bridge after the June flooding was just finished, and train services from Linares to Santiago de Chile started a few days prior. I was in a lucky position, and used a small time frame, because in the August flooding, the Lircay bridge was washed away again, at the same location, as well as other bridges. You can see in the latter video that the Northern river bank was cleared from trees to allow a higher through flow. Nevertheless, that didn’t prevent the washout of the southern foundations. The service on the main line from Chillan, Linares, Talca is still suspended currently, as the other bridge repairs are ongoing. The train departure was at 7:18 o’clock and a few other people were waiting in the train station. A few minutes before the train arrival, we were admitted to the platform. When I wanted to get in the train, the conductor spoke to me. First I didn’t understand, but then she was adamant that I need to checkin my bag. First I thought, she meant also my big backpack. But no, this was somehow OK, but I needed to handover my bag with my camping and mountain gear. It was the first time in all my travels, that I was not allowed to take my belongings with me onto the train (except for the tourist trains in New Zealand). I think she even wanted to charge me something in the beginning, but I could avoided that. It’s also a bit of hypocritical, as in all other trains (in Chile) I could just carry my belongings. And furthermore, even the train was far from being booked out, so there was enough space for all my luggage. Anyway, I made it onto the train, and we finally started to move. We crossed very slowly the Lircay bridge, which I was already able to sea during breaking dawn.

We’re slowly crossing the Lircay River over the repaired bridge (which shouldn’t last long)

Despite the low visibility, it was a very nice train ride through the Central Valley

It was a pleasant train ride for the next 3 h through the Central Valley of Chile. The landscape slowly change from fertile soils with green agriculture, into the more arid area and smog prone Santiago de Chile. There are not many rainy days in Santiago, and as its located in a bowl, there’s a lot of smog in particular in Winter. I enjoyed the early morning ride for about 300 km, except that the windows had been quite dirty. So the view was not the best, but the electric train was quite smooth on the tracks. In the last hour we already reached the satellite towns of Santiago and the settlement got more dense. And in the late morning we arrived at the central station of Santiago, and my phone stopped working punctually, as I was now 30 days in Chile and still hadn’t registered my phone.

Identical Housing Colonies along the way

The train was not the newest (but new trains from China arrived and will be put into operation by the end of this year). I don’t know what the fuss was about my bag, there was still plenty of storage space.

Crossing Rio Maipo, the last big river before entering Santiago de Chile

After arrival in the main station, I needed to buy a plastic card for the metro and charge it. It’s my first time to take a subway since Singapore in 2019 (yes, more than 4 years ago, as Australia is not in the possession of one). Despite not being in a rush hour, it was quite full, so again people are more than happy to use public transport here. I walked to my hosts place, but as I was a bit early my host Betza was not yet available. Hence, I needed to wait a bit outside, but it wasn’t an issue, as the neighbourhood was save and the weather was nice.

Back in a subway after more than 4 years…

…taking the Line A in Santiago de Chile.

In the late afternoon, I walked to the San Cristobal Hill, it’s like a landmark in Santiago and it’s popular among locals who use it for recreation, as well as for tourists. First I followed the Canal San Carlos and then crossed the Rio Mapocho to walk to the lower station of the cable, which for sure, I didn’t take. Instead I used the Sendero Gabriela Mistral to walk to Jardin Mapulemu. Lots of cyclists use the road to cycle uphill. I crossed the garden and had a nice view to the city from the upper end. I continued to Plaza Gabriela Mistral, which seemed to be popular for kids, and then reached the Tupahue station and the Piscina Tupahue next to it. It’s the Inca name of the hill.

…to cross Rio Mapocho, as well as masses of cars.

Cable Car to Cerro San Cristobal in front of the downtown of Santiago

That’s maybe just halfway through the walk. And it got slowly dark. So I further walked along Sendero Anahuac and reached Terrazza de Baile Roof Garden or the Lookout Casino Cumbre. The casino was closed in 1975 and demolished in 1980. Now the area is slowly regained by natural vegetation. It’s close the actual summit of the Cerro San Cristobal, which is not the Jesus Cristo statue. I descended to the Plaza Mexico and then took the wide cobble street to the next lookout, where most of the tourists were. I passed the Funicular and eventually made my way to the Jesus Cristo statue, just perfect in time for sunset. I enjoyed a few minutes there, and then continued to walk down along Zorro Vidal. First I was a bit scared, because it was already dark. But the track is still popular during (early ?) night, and lit in several places. I reached the base of the mountain and walked through the party mile back to Puente Pio Nono at the Rio Mapocho to get into the subway. It was a nice walk of about 10 km and 2 h for my first day in the city.

Wide Pedestrian Street from Plaza Mexico towards the Main Lookouts

Benches of the open air church just below…

Even though the metro is packed during rush hours, the same holds true also for the streets in Santiago (you’re quicker by walking here).

Walking Vilches Alto

On Tuesday morning, 18th July 2023, I went with my host Pia to the rural bus terminal in Talca to catch a local bus to Vilches Alto. There are not many buses to Vilches Alto, so we needed to make sure we’re able to catch that last one for the morning. Talca is a at about 100 m above sea level, while the bus stopped at about 1,200 m above sea level in Vilches Alto. Thus, it’s quite a climb in between in those 1.5 h of the trip. It seemed to be that Vilches Alto is quite a tourist spot. There’re several hostel and cabins to rent (mainly in the main season, no necessarily now in the Winter, which appeared to be low season). The bus ends at the end of the (sealed) road. The bus driver said, he comes back at 17:00 o’clock. Afterwards the muddy road continued. We followed that road for maybe 500 m until we reached the entrance into the National Park. Pia didn’t want to pay, as she said it was free before, and also we didn’t had much cash with us. So we changed our plans. Instead we walked back to the National Parks offices, and passed them. I don’t know why this road is for free After about 600 m following that road, you reach an archaeological site. Several old grinding holes can be observed on the rock next to the creek. Those seemed to be very old. After we crossed the creek, it seems that we left all the huts behind us, even there were still some horses on the wide track. We continued easily for about another kilometre until we reached a lookout above the rivers. It was a nice open lookout and you could even see some bigger mountains behind us, slightly covered with snow. We returned the same way as we came.

Several Grinding Holes next to the Creek in the Rocks

…and some slightly snow covered mountains behind us.

We continued along the road for about another kilometre. Then we went into the premises of an abandoned and demolished hotel. From here there are tracks to two lagoons. Despite the fact that it seems to be a private property, the tracks are well marked by the public, and also well used. We went to Laguna Encantada. It was a nice spot. We sat down at the laguna, and Pia even had a short swim into the cold water. I wasn’t interested in doing so. Pia is particularly interested in all the trees, flowers and plants around us. She was able the name all of them, I would suppose. I was a bit overflown about all this information, and if you would ask me now, I would not be able to reproduce any of those. I like to go into the mountains, but for completely different reasons. It was a nice walk though, but nothing which would get me excited. We followed the road downhill for less than 2 km until a car gave us a lift back to Talca.

Demolished Former Hotel (you need to climb a fence to get in there)

During our walk (I wouldn’t call it hike) Pía asked me constantly about “German folklore”. I’m not even certain, if this term actually exists and if it’s biased due to our history. Well I answered her that Germany is more known for its philosophers and writers. And that there is no such thing as “the” German folklore, and I also do not practise or have any knowledge of it. I mean sure you can go to the Oktoberfest in Munich and buy some cheap Dirndl and Lederhose, but than this has nothing to do with actual folklore. That’s just kitsch. Pía didn’t stop poking me about folkloristic things, but I was just not in a position to give her a sufficient answer, and that seemed to make her upset. It’s not that I didn’t want to, but it’s not anything I’m familiar with.

She also asked me about German music. And again I told her that I don’t listen too much to German artists. I also like artists e.g. from the UK or the US. And once I told her that the average age of fans from more traditional German Volksmusik is somewhere beyond 60 years, she seemed to get upset. And asked a bit angrily, why not more younger people would listen to that kind of music. Well, we’re living in a liberal society. Everyone can choose what they want to listen to. We’re no longer forcing people to listen to and practise a specific kind of music. As I said before, it was my first time in my life just a few days ago that I needed to listen to Schlager Volksmusik. And I don’t think Schlager is any kind of German Folklore at all. Thus, I don’t know, what she actually wanted to know from me.

Pia told me that she’s of Palestinian decent from her paternal grandfathers side. Her father, and also all of her siblings are born in Chile. She’s not even religious. Nevertheless, she practises Palestinian folklore dances. We also spoke about the conflict, and then I realised that she’s an extreme antisemite. She even wanted to convince me that all Jews are greedy and bad (and gave some references from after WWI). I was speechless to see this hatred. I’ve never met any person before, which is openly an extreme antisemite, and blames Jews for everything. It’s not that you coquetted a bit with Nazi symbols, or make bad jokes about the holocaust. No, this was pure hatred, just because people have a different religion. There was also no differentiation between the state Israel and Jewish people. She completely denied the right of existence of Israel, and though the slogan wasn’t popular back then, she would of agreed to: From the River to the Sea. You can condemn the actions of Israel, and it’s settlement policies, in the West Bank (like Israeli historian Omer Bartov labelling it even apartheid) and question, it’s current actions in Gaza are in compliance with international law. But that doesn’t give you any right to condemn people just by their race or religion. If already young people have so much hate in them, I don’t know if and how you would be ever able to reconcile. This conflict is already 2,000 years old, and I’m not sure, if we will sea any real peace in that region soon any time soon.

Constitucion – Talca

Monday morning, 17th July 2023, Jaime dropped me off at the train station at 7:00 o’clock. The ticket office was still closed despite that the train was due to leave at 7:30 o’clock, just 3 min after breaking dawn. Eventually the guy opened the ticket office, and I could buy again a paper ticket, no plastic cards this time (yes, it’s the same company, just in case you wonder). But you can’t pay with card only in cash. Sure, no problem. But as the ticket price was only 3000 CLP, he didn’t had immediate change for my 10,000 CLP note. He told me, that he give me the rest of the exchange later in the train. I told Jaime, and he even called a friend of him, which is also a conductor on the trains, but on this day was in the train in the opposite direction. After I got the ticket, I said farewell to Jaime and went into the tiny railbus. It’s really quite cosy inside. I think only 2 other people boarded the train in Constitucion.

Train was Almost empty when we left Constitucion

We left Constitucion on time and rattled out of town. It was quite cold though, and it would stay like this the whole time, as those old carriages don’t have any heaters nor toilets. Next year a new set of railbuses should be introduced. The distance to Talca is only about 90 km, but we needed almost 3 h for this. In the first 2 h we followed the Rio Maule closely. The tracks are not in the best condition, so top speed is maybe 40 km/h. Also sometimes (semi?) wild horses are on the tracks. Thus, the railbus need to make a fullstop quickly. It was a nice ride along the river, while the sun slowly dissolved the morning fog.

There’re several passing sidings at the intermediate train stations

Marvellous Interplay of Sun and Fog above the Rio Maule

Railbus chugs the Winding Track along the River (yes, we sit at 37 km/h here)

Basically at each stop some passengers got onto the train. Mainly farmers I would say, as some of them carried their produce into town to sell it. So the train slowly filled up, but was never crowded. Surprisingly a Robinson R44 Helicopter was parked in Toconey. I mean sure, if you’re when the pressure is on, then you need to get quickly out of here. Train only travels twice a day, and the gravel road is also not the best. About halfway in the trip we had a longer stop in Gonzalez Bastias. Here we waited for the oncoming train from Talca.

Despite that it was narrow, it was actually quite comfy to get my legs sorted out…much better than in any semi-cama shoeboxes in the buses

Afterwards the valley widens and reveals more flat plans between the bends. Thus, the track is in general more straight than before. After El Morro we left the Rio Maule valley and followed the Estero Los Puercos briefly, until we crossed it just before Corinto. Now we were finally back in the Central Valley. We left the coastal mountainous range behind us, and continued on the flat plains. Just before Talca we crossed Rio Claro and then joined the main southern railway line for the last few kilometres. The latter has a wide gauge tracks, while our train runs on a narrow gauge 1000 mm track. After almost 3 h I arrived in Talca, after a nice morning train ride.

…which were all used for various agricultural purposes.

Joining the electrified main southern railway line just before Talca

Walk through the Pedestrian Zone of Talca

Sightseeing Constitucion

On Friday afternoon Jaime and I drove along the coast to Puerto de Magullines, the local fishermen port. It’s only about 6 km out of town, and the road finally ends there. It’s popular with locals and tourists, as you pass a few beaches, a high sand dune and several outcrops, one is Piedra de la Iglesa and another Piedra del Elefante. At the end of the road you can buy some seafood, or just go for a walk along the beach. Interestingly the fishermen parked their fishing boats onto the pier. After the devastating earthquake in 2010, and the subsequent tsunami, people who lived along this strip just got out of their houses and run up the hill into the forest. This saved their live.

Several Rocky Outcrops along the Coastal Road

Piedra del Elefante – the trunk is in the water

Old and New Piers of Puerto de Magullines

Short Beach Section at Puerto de Magullines before the Forest starts

Afterwards we drove around town and up to a lookout above the cliffs of the coastline at the Puerto Mayor street. There were plans to built a hotel on that site, but nothing eventuated and now locals just use it for a walk. You’ve a nice view to the mouth of the Rio Maule and the huge Cellulose Plant in front of it at one side, and the big Piedra de la Iglesa (Cathedral Rock) on the other side. We enjoyed the sunset from here. Later on we visited José, a friend of Jaime. José is the owner of the craft beer brewery in Constitucion. He was busy on the construction site of his new beergarden, and installation of his brew kettle. He offered some of his craft beers, and told me about his recent trip to Bavaria from where he gets some of his hops. I told him about my favourite beers and so we had a nice conversation while tasting his different beer types.

View to the hilly downtown of Constitucion

Cellulose Plant with Cerro Mutrun in the backdrop

Piedra de la Iglesa (Cathedral Rock) is a popular spot from surfers

On Saturday 15th July 2023, Jaime and I made a bicycle tour along the river. First we went to the centre to get some lunch, and then we basically followed the Rio Maule and the railway line for about 5 km. After we left the big road bridge over the Rio Maule behind us, it was actually a nice bicycle ride, as there was only negligible traffic. We stopped at the railway bridge and enjoyed the tranquillity and the nice sunny weather for a bit, before we’re heading back. The road would’ve continued for another 7 km. In the evening Jaime went for a birthday party to Talca, and I went with José into a local bar for a few beer.

The narrow gauge railway line follows the river, as we do…

…in the calm valley of Rio Maule (which still had lots of water and debris).

On Sunday afternoon, after Jaime returned, we made another short excursion through town and first went to Cerro Mutrun. From here we had a nice view over the mouth of Rio Maule with the Piedra de las Ventanas, and also the Isla Orrego in the middle of the river. The island is a very popular tourist spot on the weekends, and when the tsunami hit the land a lot of people where camping there, as the earthquake happened early on a Saturday morning in late summer. A few people survived by climbing some trees or getting into their kayaks. Also local fishermen used their boats to ferry a few people back into town, but also several people perished on the island. Afterwards we went back to Puerto de Magullines again, and went for a short walk following the coastline. The track was deteriorated and had some windfall. When the windfall was too much we stopped and enjoyed a nice sunset at the Pacific Ocean before heading back to the car during dusk. In the night, just before midnight we were hit by an intermediate earthquake with a magnitude of 5.6 to 6.6 (depending on the source). Jaime said I shouldn’t be too worried about it, as those intermediate earthquakes are actually quite normal here. And also once this maybe 30 seconds of shaking was over, it was finished for the rest of the night. I experienced the coldest nights in the Maule region, because you still can get morning frost regularly. But contrary to Patagonia, most houses don’t have heaters (or only very bad ones, sometimes only simple indoor oil or gas stoves for the room). And maybe the higher humidity also contributed to that feeling. Contrary, in Patagonia the installed heatings are much better, and even the absolute temperature is much lower, I never felt cold in Patagonia. But in the Maule region yes, several times.

…the mouth of Rio Maule, with Piedra de las Ventanas on the left.

Marvellous Sunset on the Pacific Coast just a few minutes walk south of Puerto de Magullines

Parral – Cauquenes – Constitucion

On Friday, 14th July 2023, early morning I walked to the bus terminal in Parral. The first bus to Cauquenes would leave at 8:10 o’clock just 15 min after sunrise. The bus takes about 1 h from Parral to Cauquenes. There was still heavy morning fog so early. We basically followed the old railway branch line from Parral to Cauquenes most of the time. The branch railway line already closed in 1974, only the big railway bridge over the Perquilauquen river is now a national monument. When we crossed the river, I couldn’t see anything due to the heavy fog.

Some farms and houses were along the Way

You are supposed to see the railway bridge over the Perquilauquen river here

In Cauquenes I needed to change buses. I couldn’t get any information prior my departure about the rural buses. But upon my arrival I was lucky and got a bus at 9:40 o’clock, just 20 min after my arrival. We got to the end of the Central Valley and then followed the winding road along the Rio Curanilahue valley in order to cross the coastal mountain range. Now we followed roughly the coastline. But that only meant we could get sometimes a glimpse of the ocean. After about 1 h we arrived at the small town of Chanco, and (almost ?) all passengers got off the bus. It’s about halfway between Cauquenes and Constitucion. The bus driver even asked what I’m still doing in the bus. I told him I’m going to Constitucion and showed him my ticket.

Windy Road along the Rio Curanilahue valley

The small bus was almost full on the way to Chanco

Introduced Species – Eucalyptus Trees along the Way

Bustling Plaza de Armas in Chanco at Friday midday

Afterwards the road deteriorates and the drive slows down considerably. In total it takes about 3h for the 100 km to Constitucion. Nevertheless, I enjoyed it much more than being on Route 5 on a 4 lane highway. And I was very happy to get a direct connection in Cauquenes, without much waiting time. It could’ve been worse. Los Pellines is a small seaside town, and the first real settlement after Chanco. It’s only 35 km, but it took us almost 1.5 h to get there. Afterwards we left the coastline and went up into the coastal mountain range again. This is where the forest plantations around Constitucion started, and then all the sawmills just before the city, close to the big road. My host Jaime picked me up from a bus stop a bit before the main bus terminal. I told the driver the name, and he knew where to stop. I got my big backpack from underneath, and finished my trip of the day in early afternoon. Jaime already waited for me at the bus stop, and we went straight to his house afterwards.