Dear Friends and Family, Hola!
This is a view we had of the Andes when we flew over them from Buenos Aires.  We spent two days in this capital city and then went to Easter Island.  Now we want to recap our visit to this lovely mountain city.  Santiago is the largest city in Chile and is at 1, 706 feet high.  It was founded in 1541.  The Andes can be seen from the city, in fact the city is ringed by the mountains which can be a problem for smog much like LA. In 1540 Valdivia came to Mapocho valley where Santiago is located. He was sent by Pizarro to establish a city in the valley which was originally named for St. James.  Today the population is over 6 million.  There are 80 million in the entire country but 40 % of the population lives in the capital city, Santiago and its environs. This is our 3rd visit to this city and so we looked to try to do different excursions. We walked around the center and found a lovely fountain in a park nearby.  We also found some fine outdoor dining

We took a full day tour out to two wineries. One Santa Rita which is a very old winery started as a farm in the 1700”s. We had an excellent tour of the making of wine on the site.It also includes a bottling section which was fun to watch.

The owner of the winery in the early 1800’s helped some military freedom fighters and in the end the rebels won independence for Chile.  The old house is still on the property as well as a new Andes museum.  We had a lovely wine tasting of some of the winery’s best wines.

Concha Y Toro is the largest winery in Chile and 2nd biggest in the world. They produce wine under different labels and you have probably seen there wines throughout the world.  Chile is the 4th largest exporter of wine in the world. “Cave of the Devil” is also one of their wines. The cave was created to spook thieves from stealing the families’ most important wine stock.

On our return to Santiago, we decided to see the city again on a hop on hop off bus. Our first stop was the center of the city, Plaza De Armas.  Here is the beautiful cathedral that would rival any in Europe. Next we visited the National Museum and finally the Pre Columbian Museum which was excellent. Here are some photos.

In the museum, we found an original “Starving ones” from Easter Island. We also found that the Mapuche people also carved statues out of wood, but not as polished or ornate as the Rapa Nui people. The ancient people in Chile also had mummification way before the Egyptians.

Our last day, we traveled out to the coast again, south of  Valparaiso to Pablo Neruda’s home in Isla Negra. He was Chile’s celebrated poet who also received the Nobel prize for Literature. He had three homes in Chile, but his home in Isla Negra was his favorite.  It was like visiting Carmel. The house was very eclectic and interesting. It contained many of his passions, like figureheads from ships, childhood toys and mementos, glass bottles, and many more of his treasures. No photos were allowed inside, but the views outside were spectacular.  He and his third wife are buried in the “backyard” in front of the sea.

After lunch we visited a fairly new winery in the Casablanca valley between the coast and the Santiago valley. Vinamonte winery was lovely and we had an informative tour again of the process plus a lovely wine tasting of some of their best wines.

We returned to Santiago via the new part of the city which is modeling Manhattan and which the locals call, “Sanhatten”. It was so different from old town. Plus, they now have the tallest building in South America