Next up was Santiago. We had been warned that the flight between Mendoza and Santiago is the bumpiest in the world as you go up the Andes in 50 minutes (the two cities are virtually parallel on the opposite sides of the mountain). Fortunately it wasn’t particularly rough and the skies were clear. As it had rained the prior day there apparently was new snow on the mountain and it was beautiful.
We checked into the Sheraton which is a large hotel as it is also a convention hotel. The upside is that it has both an outdoor and indoor pool for my Mark Phelps. It was a quite pleasant hotel with a good gym and a good vibe going on inside and by the outside pool. But the air conditioning didn’t work initially so we had a hot nap before we had the hotel fix the situation.
That night we had dinner at La Calma by Freddies https://lacalma.squarespace.com with Alexey’s friend Franco, and his good friend Sofi. It was a nice neighbourhood restaurant focused on fish, and we all had a great laugh.
The next day we took a tour of the city with Freddy Crump from Pride Tours. We ended up with another couple from Palm Springs, Dale and Richard.
· The Seat of Power: We begin at the iconic La Moneda Presidential Palace, exploring the historic
civic quarter that includes the Old Congress and the majestic Supreme Court building.
· The Heart of the City: We'll stand in the bustling Plaza de Armas, the historic centre of Santiago.
· A Hilltop Oasis: Ascend the beautiful Santa Lucía Hill, a rocky park that offers stunning panoramic
· views and a unique origin story of the city.
· Bohemian Charm: We'll finish by wandering the charming, European-style streets of Barrio Lastarria, a hub of art, design, and culture. And also peek into the adjacent, edgier Barrio Bellavista.
It was a walking tour and walking we did over 4.5 hours. The tour gave us a very good perspective of the older part of the city. We stopped at Wonderland Café https://www.wonderlandcafe.cl for a break from the heat. It is a super cute place based on an Alice in Wonderland theme. It’s a coffee house with comfort food. Very eclectic and we thought that the idea would transfer well to other cites.
The climb up Santa Lucia Hill was a little more aggressive than we expected and the stones and infrastructure need attention. David made a slight spill- not me for a change.
And lots more walking ensued- by the gay bars, restaurants, boutique hotels and even the base of the funicular for the San Cristobal Hill. Again, it was a very helpful overview of the city.
After a quick lunch David had another massage.
Then we went to dinner at Borago. https://borago.cl
It is a World Top 50 restaurant (Michelin hasn’t reached Santiago) and we had one of the most incredible dining experiences of our life.
My Facebook write-up was:
Barnacles, bamboo and cactus, oh my! David and I have eaten our way around the world. We love innovative and creative foods. That said tonight was a pinnacle. We ate foods we would have never considered as an edible option and each of the 16 courses was incredibly presented. Words truly fail me as to how mind blowing we found this experience. (Virtually everything was edible). Borago Restaurante. Santiago, Chile. 🇨🇱. With David Ashworth
This is not a restaurant for meat and potatoes people. Each course was beautifully curated and always a surprise. Who would have thought we would eat barnacles and mushroom ice cream!
The next day David and I walked to the entrance of the park, took the gondolas up and the funicular down to the top of San Cristobal Hill. The Sanctuary of the Immaculate Conception on San Cristóbal Hill is one of the principal places of worship for the Catholic Church of Chile, as well as being an icon of Santiago, Chile. It is notable in particular for a large statue of the Immaculate Conception, which is located at the summit of San Cristóbal Hill, some 863 meters above sea level. The statue of the Immaculate Conception measures 14 meters tall, and the pedestal on which it rests, 8.3 meters. It weighs 36,610 kilograms. On the pedestal there is a small chapel in which John Paul II prayed and blessed the city of Santiago on April 1, 1987.
We spent time here enjoying the sites of the monument, the park, the people and the views.
Later we had lunch with Franco at Ambrosia. https://www.ambrosia.cl We sat outside (under cover in the beautiful garden). We chatted for a couple of hours until the sun got the best of us.
That night we had dinner at Bocanriz, a cute wine bar/ restaurant in a cute eclectic neighbourhood. It was a very pleasant dinner. https://bocanariz.cl
The next day Freddy picked us up and drove us to the Maipo Valley, about 1.5 hours from Santiago. We first went to LOF Wines. https://vinoslof.cl, then lunch and then Haras Wines. https://haraswines.com/wines/albis/
It’s a very dry valley as well except they do have a river and canal with waters that flow from the Andes. It is dry because it is surrounded by hills that block the rains from the Pacific. The wines are all reds due to the heat.
LOF is a cute little winery, that maybe produces something like 10,000 bottles. Everything is done by members of the family, and the family lives in various homes on the farm. They wax seal the bottles by hand and label by hand. (they don’t have the machinery to do otherwise). They use cement tanks and must bottle on a schedule as they need the space for the next harvest. There is a cat that dominates the winery and she followed us everywhere adding to the charm. Then we had a nice tasting with little snacks on the upper terrace. The wines are pleasant and it was very nice to see such a labour of love.
The lunch was at a very local restaurant (but I found that the price for 3 of us at about 75 USD with only 2 glasses of wine not so local). It was open air and reminded me of many of the roadside restaurants we find in Thailand. David had salmon but I had a local dish with was like Shepard’s Pie but with a pureed corn topping instead of potatoes. It contained ground meat AND chicken as well as eggs. Very tasty.
Then we went to the larger Haras Wines. This was also a pet project for a local Chilean family. They won the Kentucky Derby and are big horse people. This was evident everywhere including the shape of the building, which was horseshoe shaped, the wines were named for horses, etc. As they grew, they formed a partnership with the Antinori family in Italy. Later the Antinori’s bought out the property and have been taking the winery to the next level. They now make something like 400,000 bottles.
After a thorough tour of the facilities, climbing stairs following the opposite manner of the gravity flow concept of the winery, we went underneath the water fountain in the cellar for our tasting. We had more sophisticated wines here. And here we first tried without food and then with. What a difference the correct pairing makes on the taste and feel of a wine. The Cab Sav was 17 USD, the Cap Franc was 34, but the high-end blend, in a more European style was close to 80. We wondered the draw of this wine over a European at that price point.
We drove by Concho y Toro and Santa Rita wineries. There are two of the biggest wineries in Chile, and Santa Rita was just voted the 41st best winery in the world by Forbes (Winery Vik in the Millahue Valley, Chile was voted number 1, but it was too long a drive for a day trip). Perhaps the next time?
We were exhausted so had a very simple dinner at the hotel.