February 11, 2020



San Antonio, Chile



San Antonio is the port city for visits to Santiago and Valparaiso.  I visited Santiago last year so it was Valparaiso’s turn this year.



I signed up for HAL’s “Best of Valparaiso” 7-hour tour.  San Antonio is one of the ports that you must take a shuttle bus from the ship to the terminal (takes longer to get on or off the bus than the ride itself) so my tour was called a few minutes before the “meeting time” of 9:15. As it was, we did not leave the port until 9:50.  It was a small bus that seats 28 but there were only 20 of us.  (There was another section of the same itinerary that left 30 minutes before us.)



Cesar, our guide, told us some information about the city as we made the 90-minute drive.  Valparaiso was once one of the most important seaports but that diminished with the opening of the Panama Canal.  It is the home of the oldest stock exchange in Latin America, the first volunteer fire department in South America, the oldest newspaper in Chile and Chile’s first public library.  Today the historic district is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.



Valparaiso is noted for being a very colorful city.  The buildings are painted various colors and street art and graffiti are everywhere.


Our first stop was at Pablo Neruda’s home, La Sebastiana.  He was a Chilean poet awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1971.  We were able to tour through the five stories of the house. 



We then headed to one of the 15 public funiculars.  They were started in 1883 to help people climb the steep hills of the city.   At one time there were many more.  We took one up to the restaurant where we had lunch.  It had terrific views of the city.  After lunch we went down in the funicular to drive through some of the famous places in the city including Plaza Sotomayor and Paseo21 de Mayo.



We were the last group to return to the ship.  All aboard was at 4:30 and we got back just after 5 (so I missed trivia).  One of the reasons to take a ship tour is that the ship will wait if you are late.  We finally dropped lines at about 5:20.



I spent the time before dinner sorting out my pictures.  My friend, Roy, had e-mailed me directions for putting four pictures together that was so much better than the way I had pieced together.  Thanks, Roy!



The usual four were at dinner.  The show was Jesse Kazemek with a tribute to the Beatles.  It was a great show.



We gain an hour tonight!



Four sea days ahead.




Valparaiso street scenes

 Does the "spark" after the name look familiar?  Guess who owns Lider.

 a church partially destroyed in an earthquake (they are very common in Chile)

monument to copper which has always been important to the economy of Chile - the two largest copper mines in the world are in Chile

lots of things are sold on the street

La Sebastiana - one of Neruda's homes

this is Pablo Neruda although it reminds me of someone else

the funicular we took

 one of the major cemeteries in the city

 the people are waiting in line to ride the oldest funicular in the city

Examples of street art...

...and some regular graffiti

Lunch

 an unusual salad with some fried vegetables

 I had the chicken which was wrapped in bacon and delicious

dessert was a caramel custard with a blueberry compote

Smooth sailing until next time!