The vertical city: Valparaiso

We passed through the Andes, and it was spectacular.  We rode along the banks of a brick red river, and I was reminded of being in Arizona when I was 12.  The mountains were capped with snow and small houses and remote communities dotted the valley.  We crossed the border and descended rapidly along unnerving switchbacks.  From there it wasn’t far to Valparaiso.

Valparaiso is an original city.  Its houses rise over the port on 42 hillsides which are all connected and named.  It’s only 3km away but very different from the neighboring city of Vina del Mar which has a similar population (think Pittsburgh or Mokpo) to Valpo.  Our hostel (Hostal NuevaMente) was located near the bus station so we walked there through a street market.  It was a great hostel, it felt like home for 3 days.  The proprietors had hired a Swiss couple to mind the desk for 6 months and we arrived after they had only been in Valpo for a week.  Both they and the owner, Pilar, were very welcoming.  Our room was huge and we had the whole place practically to ourselves; it’s a small hostel.

I must admit, when we got there I was a bit sketched out.  The city has a gritty, run down appearance.  In the flat part, El Plan, where we were staying, there were signs of economic hardship, burnt out buildings, businesses with steel rusted steel curtains, graffiti, trash blowing everywhere, cheap goods being sold on the street, unkempt grass growing out of busted sidewalk cement, and the famous packs of roving street dogs.  We arrived on Saturday afternoon and needed Chilean money.  The banks were closed and the first ATM I tried refused to do the transaction as if it were a discerning diner.  We couldn’t find another bank so we found another hostel and asked if they knew where we could get money, they told us to go to the pharmacy.  ATMs at the pharmacy, imagine that.

When we retrieved the money we sat down and ate one of the more expensive meals we’ve had on our trip: a mountain of Chinese food and beer.  We’d been craving that since Montevideo, the South American diet of bread, meat and cheese had been making me feel like there was molasses in my veins and this got things moving again.  Satisfied we turned in at the hostel before dark.

The next day we walked over to where all the fuss is about.   Cerros (hills) Concepcion and Alegre.  We climbed them without the famous elevators because they’re not all that tall.  The scenery was beautiful.

After that we took a walk around the street that bends with the hills and snapped a couple photos overlooking the city sprawling up it’s slopes.

Pablo's house.

We took that street over to Pablo Neruda’s house.  A poet and a senator, Neruda is a national icon almost 40 years after his death.  He received the Nobel Prize for Literature and from his house in Valparaiso it’s easy to see why.  His thin house named La Sebastiana rises five stories overlooking the whole city of Valparaiso.  The house is decorated with taste and eccentricity and all of the walls that could afford a vista are outfitted with floor to ceiling windows. 

Nothing much happened that night, we ate in.  The next day we rode up an acensor and rode a bus around the hills for a more thorough tour of the area.  The bus wasn’t as large as the buses we think of, it couldn’t be it would be too unwieldy for the tiny, curvaceous streets.  It was however old and on the cobblestones it felt like it would simply fall apart by the screws at any moment.  We saw the inequality of the city.  On one hill adobe or wood homes with gates and fresh paint, on the next one shanties with corrugated tin roofs supported on the side of the hill with two by fours that look precarious but must be able to handle the strain.  We got off the bus at a university out by the far cape of the city.  It was a grand vista.

That night we went out for Chinese food again.  Chilean food is ho hum with the bright spot being their excessive use of avocado and tomato in things.  Other than that it’s mainly cheese and bread, burgers and meat, and french fries.

The next day we left in the afternoon for Santiago.  But before we did we walked along the oceanfront and I bought a watch.  I haven’t worn a watch for quite some time but I really needed something to show me the time now that I don’t have a cell phone.  It’s such a novelty I can’t stop looking at my wrist.

There you have it.  Valparaiso is an inspiring city, as I’m sure you can tell from the photos.  It’s edge takes a couple days to dull, but a visit is indispensible to any South American backpacking adventure.

How to Prevent a Bread Baby: Staying Healthy on the Road

A bread baby is not actually a baby, this blog is not about safe sex and contraception (although you should use that on the road as well!!), a bread baby is my nickname for the extra five pounds 2.3( kilos) you gain as soon as you take the first step on a trip or vacation. It could also be a rice baby (I had one of those in Asia) or a pasta baby (I heard this is common in Italy) or even a taco baby (this baby is prevalent in Mexico and Central America).

   Traveling is no time for dieting, especially when there are so many delicious new foods to try.  The key is to not allow that extra five pounds to turn into ten or fifteen pounds. If that happens you will be in a position I am well aware of, not being able to fit into the clothes you brought with you and being a little self-conscious in that swimsuit that fit you great last time you put it on.  Here are some tips to keep you looking a feeling good, all while having a great time on the road:

       1.) Don’t eat anything you wouldn’t eat at home. No, I don’t mean worm larve or deep fried mice. By all means dig into all the traditional fare you find, if you dare. I mean the things like French fries, soda, dessert every night, candy bars and corn dogs. Sometimes when you see something that reminds you of home, you just have to have one. But if you wouldn’t eat it on a normal day at home, give it a pass on the road as well.
      2.)  Fiber. This extremely important part of our diet can be hard to come by on the road.  Keep your eye out for fruits, beans, and green vegetables. These will keep your gut feeling good and keeps you fuller longer.  These can be very hard to find in abundance in restaurants though, which leads us to…  
      3.)  Eat in a least once every other day. This only really works if you have a kitchen available to you, but most hostels have them.  We shop at a local grocery and pile up on the green veggies.  This makes us feel great and really helps our energy levels. It also saves you money! 
      4.)  Plan ahead.  We always keep snacks in our bag, as well as plenty of water.  I get into trouble when I am absolutely starving and feel like I must eat something now or die. Having something healthy (like a banana, peanuts or cereal bar) can buy you a little time to find something more wholesome to eat.
      5.)  You don’t have to eat it just because it’s free.  This sounds utterly ridiculous, especially when you are on a tight budget like us.  It can be very difficult to resist a third roll and jam at the breakfast included in your fee for your room, or the warm ham and cheese sandwich they gave you on the 12 hour bus ride, but you must.  Everything in moderation of course, but believe me, the free food usually has little to no nutritional value at all.  So have bite or two, but don’t go overboard just to save money.

It’s great to eat like a local, but if the local diet focuses on bread, cheese, meat and delicious pastries you are going to have to be mindful of what you are eating.  Plan ahead, put a little extra time into meal planning and you’ll look and feel great no matter how long you are on the road.

Mendoza: Wine country is good country

       It took 28 hours and all the vegetative and geological landscapes that Southern South America has to offer to get from Montevideo to Mendoza.  We changed buses and bought new tickets in Cordoba and honestly I wouldn’t recommend doing the whole trip in one go, but when you book your hostels before you learn the  bus schedules, you’ve gotta get there.  As you can imagine we arrived at our hostel in Mendoza in a weary, zombiesque state, ready for our 2 bed dorm room and the promised free glass of wine that attracted us to our hostel.  On the glass of wine the hostel delivered admirably, on the room not so much.  We were put in a room with single bunk beds that took up over half the room’s space.  If our room was a shoebox the shared bathroom was a jewelry box.  And the wifi didn’t work all week, not our best accommodation.

The next day we wandered around Mendoza.  It’s a lovely, comparatively affluent city, with short terraced houses lining streets with irrigation ditches between every sidewalk and road.  It’s treelined, dry, and dotted with square parks.  We ate some delicious lomo (steak loin, not ground meat) burgers that made Amanda sick at what looked like a popular burger restaurant downtown.  Later we made plans with fellow travelers to visit the wineries the next day.

The next day we set off with Ethan and Hannah, a brother sister duo from Washington State, Jess, an Australian girl who had been making the South American circuit for five months and was flying home from Santiago only two days later, and Sarah, a Korean traveler who was shocked with our “fluency” in Hangul.  Ethan and Hannah lead the way as we got on the city bus to the neighboring winery town of Maipu and rented bikes for what in other places might seem like a bad idea (getting drunk and sharing a narrow two lane road with big rigs and oil tankers) but in South America is just how we roll.

Our first stop was the free wine museum which had a bunch of ancient wine making implements explained in Spanish and a house wine to sample.  Down the road was a small store with boutique liquors, spreads, and olive oil.  For 15 pesos ($3.75) each we sampled as much olive oil, tapenade, and dulce de leche spread as we wanted.  Then we each had an opportunity to take a shot of whatever liquor we wanted.  Jess, Ethan and I chose the only liquor that it was sensible to try while riding bikes around rural Argentina, Absinthe made with real wormwood at 75% alcohol.  They set it up right, with spoons on fire and all, and it burned the whole way down our esophagi but it was worth it to feel like Tolouse Lautrec. 

 
Hannah chose a girly liqueur and Sarah being the trooper that she is tried the other one I would have liked to try, the other frightening green liquid called Russian Death.  It was made with green peppers and its deliciousness was written all over her face after she took the shot.  Amanda abstained as the sandwich from yesterday was still not treating her well.

 
We wandered through a strangely green day on to an outdoor artisanal beer garten run by some Argentinian hippie brewers.  Then to a family farm with rabbits and birds and wine and olives and peaches and almonds all explained to us very enthusiastically in Spanish by a bright little middle-aged woman, and mostly translated to us by Jess whose Spanish abilities were by far the most advanced of the group.  For another 15 pesos we received a tour, a delicious meat empanada, a glass of wine and a tasting of some of the farm’s more olive based products.  Amanda and I ended up buying a bag of almonds from the tree in the backyard.  How quaint.

Finally, we rode up the main road for what seemed like ever to an old winery which no longer produces wine because it’s an old protected building.  We were guided for the first time through the wine making and aging process, and given the etymology of Malbec, THE grape of Argentina.  It means ‘bad grapes’ because it’s only good in a very arid environment which France does not have.  We sampled this grape of grapes and a nice oak aged Cab, ate at the winery a bit over our budget, and returned to the bike rental place for a last glass of wine.  We hope to see Ethan and Hannah again as we might end up in Bolivia at the same time.

Everyone left either that night or the next morning, and since none of the mountain tours really struck our fancy we decided to go back to the wineries with a tour in a van this time.  It was only 60 pesos inclusive and we visited two wineries, an olive oil factory, and a liqueur and spread store.  The tour in the van was entirely in Spanish and very international.  There were Argentinians, Brazilians, Venezuelans, and two other English speakers, an English/Australian couple.  The guide asked us where we were from individually and when we said, de los Estados Unidos, we got a hearty cheer from the Venezuelans; they must not have been Chavez fans.  

Dan loves Absinthe!

At each place we had either a bilingual tour guide or a separate tour guide for the English speakers, and it was pretty much a rehash of the previous day, but well worth it for the wine we were able to taste.  The second winery was a particular treat.  A boutique winery down a dusty road from an old church on a crossroads in the shadow of the Andes, it grew only red wines, Malbec, Cab, Merlot, and Syrah.  The youngest wine it let out of its doors was from 2006 and for only 25 pesos ($6.25) we were able to buy a 2004 Malbec grown and fermented on the premises.  We drank it that night because Chile doesn’t let you bring anything into their country.

                                            

And so the next day we took our leave of Mendoza and Argentina for Valparaiso and Chile.  It promises to be a wonderful ride over the Andes and I’m chuckling inside at the idea of seeing the Atlantic in Montevideo less than a week ago.  It seems premature to say goodbye to Mendoza.  It’s a wonderful city and a great travel destination for penny pinchers who love wine and tree lined boulevards.

  

Montevideo, Uruguay: Short, Sweet and Spendy

(The blog was written Nov. 1st, we haven't had wifi for a while so were catching up on posting now :)

We arrived in Montevideo after a 24 hour, three bus trip from Puerto Iguazu. We caught a bus from Puerto Iguazu to Concordia, where the bus left us at the side of a dusty highway with two other foreigners and three Argentinians, at 6am. This was a bit of a shock to us, considering we assumed they would take us to a bus terminal, especially because the bus ticket cost $50 each! There was one lone cab waiting there and the cab driver called another cab for us, while she took off with the other travelers who were going camping. Our cab driver was super nice and turned out to also be a policeman. We spent some time in the bus terminal then went across the border to Salto, Uruguay, then onto Montevideo.

Our hotel was easy to find and we were pleasantly surprised with a large room, two single beds and a clean bathroom. The hotel staff at The Splendido Hotel was INSANELY nice. They were so friendly and took care of us very well. The breakfast was great, hot fresh coffee and a full kitchen we could use anytime. There was a pretty big common area and dining room where we met an interesting fellow traveler who had many great stories to tell. Jodi, a Canadian, was a corporate lawyer in NYC until she decided to give it up to travel full time. She had some truly amazing stories, if you want to know more check out her blog at http://www.legalnomads.com/. It is also full of great advice about traveling.

Montevideo isn’t really a tourist mecca so we just walked around the city quite a bit, ate A LOT and drank a fair amount. We mostly relaxed and enjoyed the port city, trying not to spend too much money but still keep ourselves entertained. It is very expensive, and after an incident where we accidently spent $10 on two sodas and two waters, we kept a very close eye on our budget. Our anniversary was the last night we were there (Halloween!) and we celebrated by going to an excellent paradilla restaurant, El Fogon (kind of BBQ meats famous in Argentina) where we had some of the first vegetables we’ve had in South America, and a ton of delicious meat. Dan may or may not have eaten liver. It was an awesome way to celebrate one magical year together!

The next day we checked out of the hotel, walked about 9km along the seafront and people watched a bit before we had to go to the bus terminal for another long journey to Mendoza, Argentina. Overall, we thought Montevideo was lovely and would be a fantastic city to live and work in.

Here's how I roll! And we are off to Mendoza....

Dan's P.S. I wanted to name this blog Montevideo killed the monteradio star, but Amanda wouldn't let me.