Food in Chile

We've not eaten out in Chile as much as in other countries, choosing instead to cook for ourselves. Chile is not particularly famous for any type of cuisine but it does have great beef, good coffee shops, decent, cheap wine and plentiful mashed potato, with Peruvian and German influences in many restaurants.

There was a great fish market surrounded by fish restaurants and cafes packed with locals at lunch time. This is a hearty fish broth.

We enjoyed a delicious meal in a Peruvian restaurant in Santiago. The raw baby octupus pictured above was very tender and came with a black olive dip. The drink is a Peruvian pisco sour - pisco spirit and tart lemon with whipped egg white and a blob of angostura bitters on top. 

Fish and mash with beetroot salad in PuconBeef stew and mash in PuconGiant pork steak with spicy mash in OsornoBattered fish with spicy mash in Osorno

Mmmmmm....mash

Cooking pancakes in our lovely house in Pucon.

Not just cooking our own food but picking it too. It's blackberry season in Patagonia.

Osorno

This was our bus interchange town three times. It’s the capital of the province and the centre of dairy and meat. We certainly never planned it as a destination but were stranded here for a night when we missed the bus to Chile by 15 minutes. It had a plethora of gigantic supermarkets, (one of which looked suspiciously like ASDA, it could well be WALMART’s doing - boo).Most of Osorno isn't much to look at, but this very modern church on the town square caught our eye.

The town also had a nice, pedestrianised road and will be remembered by us mainly for its good coffee and strudel – German influence in the area.A recent addition, in December 2008 to the town square.  The bull symbolises productivity, virility and celebrates the town's position as the centre of Chile's beef and cheese industry. 

A lovely farmhouse by a lake

Scott, the American recommender, had done a fine job so far, so we were confident enough to commit to five nights in a place he loved, staying on a lakeside farm, reachable only by a small, local ferry service.The lake is beautiful, flanked by forest-covered mountains, with waterfalls, streams, crystal clear pools and hot springs. The accommodation was brilliant again – we stayed with elderly couple Edith and Tolamis, who were really friendly and helpful. We cooked our own food but Edith baked fresh bread every day for us. The farm was a lovely smallholding with pigs, piglets, hens and turkeys roaming around an old apple orchard. It being autumn, there were plenty of apples for us to pick, along with blackberries on lakeside rambles. We enjoyed eating apple and blackberry every day and sharing it with our hosts and a nice English truck driver called Geoff who was staying there too.We did some really pleasant walks around the lake and nearby river and went by boat with Tolamis to natural hot springs which we dug from the beach on a deserted part of the lake. The water coming up from the sand was scorching hot. We dug channels into the lake to let in cold water. It was a tricky balance, which generally lead to cold feet and a burnt bum. It was an odd leisure activity which at times seemed more like a punishment (having to dig in boiling water and freezing air, bare footed on a gravely beach wearing only trunks/bikini), but was overall really enjoyable, mainly for the novelty value and the beautiful setting.We also took on a mammoth 21 mile trek through beautiful rainforest.   We climbed up past lakes, to great view points across forested valleys and down to natural hot springs that had been channelled into two lovely baths fashioned out of logs in a little cabin by a river. We relaxed in the baths and ate our lunch by the river before slogging back to the farm again. 

Maicolpué

Still going by the recommendations of our American hostel-owning acquaintance, we headed to an almost deserted village on a hillside around a big bay and sandy beaches on the Pacific coast. We again struck lucky with the weather as it’s now autumn here and yet we enjoyed two warm, sunny days.Our cabin is amongst this lot, perched on the hillside.

The local bus dropped us by the beach, we weren’t entirely sure we were in the right place. We then lugged our bags up the hillside on steep tracks and wonky steps following a roughly hand-written map to find a slightly run-down but comfortable cabin with superb views across the ocean. The view from our cabin terrace at sunset. We spent our time paddling, jogging along the beach, clambering around rocks blackberry picking, walking and watching the sunset from our terrace. All very pleasant! Bird on beach

Pig on beach

Tourists on beach

Pucón

We planned our remaining 12 days in the Lake District, northern Patagonia, in Chile around the recommendations of a very helpful American, Scott, who ran the hostel in Santiago where we stayed. First stop was the picturesque tourist town of Pucón where we stayed for a couple of days, by a lake and overlooked by a snow-capped volcano. It was really quiet because it is low season – post summer and pre skiing, which is due to start in a month or so. We stayed with a lovely lady and her family in a wooden house. We had a comfy room with a balcony overlooking the volcano and as there was nobody else around we had the whole comfy, cosy house to ourselves, cooking each evening and relaxing by a wood burning stove.Studying an old copy of OK, left by previous tourists. How intellectual.

We considered climbing the volcano but remembered the awfulness of our Bolivian mountain effort and thought better of it. We heard reports that at the summit it was difficult to breathe for sulphurous gases. We opted instead for an amble around another beautiful lake in the region, a visit to impressive waterfalls and a dip in thermal baths. Beautiful autumn trees on route to the thermal baths.Wooden thermal tubs heated by a stove. We think this is a good idea. We want one in Derby.

Pucon is so lovely, that our very own queen came. She stayed here, so we were told.

Gaby, her mum and a tricky bathroom cabinet

We spent a lovely evening at Gaby’s place in Santiago; she being the school friend of Vicky, a good friend of mine from work in London. We sampled the Chilean version of pisco sour (very similar to Peru but minus the frothy egg white topping) and enjoyed some delicious beef cooked by Gaby.Gaby had just moved into the apartment and was having trouble assembling a bathroom cabinet. I volunteered Simon to assist, being the handyman that he is. Several hours later and approaching 2am he was onto the finishing touches of attaching the door. At this point he realised that the instruction sheet had been somewhat lacking and he had put another piece on the wrong way up (and glued everything together) so there were no holes for the hinges. At this stage, we gave up and Gaby drove us back into the centre. Gaby was very grateful despite the missing door as she had thought it would stay in pieces in the lounge for weeks to come. It was good to see another part of Santiago and to meet Gaby and her mum who were delightful. 

Real Coffee for Real Men

In Santiago they take their coffee seriously. There are several chains of no-nonsense coffee shops. The coffee is damn good. It's pretty cheap and it's not for silly women customers; although they are allowed in, the macho environment discourages it. They make this clear by dressing the serving ladies in ridiculously tight-fitting, high-riding outfits and even more incredibly, only providing men's toilets, much to Rachel's disappointment and disgust. The overall atmosphere is one of serious men, drinking serious coffee and smoking profusely. There are no chairs or stools, only bars to lean on, which faciliates the activity of staring at the waitresses' cleavages, legs and bums. These establishments are full of businessmen throughout the day.

Santiago

We had heard unenthusiastic reports about Santiago being a bit boring, European and smoggy. Happily though, from start to finish, we had a lovely time here in sunny weather. We found great parks for jogging and walking, a couple with vantage points over the city. Santiago from a park on a hill, Cerro St. Lucia, in the centre.

There’s no shortage of restaurants and bars, there were lots of interesting streets to explore either in shopping districts or more bohemian artsy areas.Inside the underground cultural centre, beneath the square in front of the parliament building. A gypsy punk band made up of teachers. They were playing in the main square in Santiago to promote the launch of an initiative to improve teaching and education standards for all by the year 2020. They were good.

We really enjoyed the cultural side of Santiago. We visited a couple of nice art galleries in impressive colonial buildings and went to one of the quirky houses of the famous Chilean poet, Pablo Neruda, La Chascona. The modern art museum, horse sculpture by Colombian artist Botero. Mural outside Neruda's house. 

La Chascona means something like ‘the frizzy haired lady’. Neruda built this house in 1962 originally for his mistress, who had frizzy hair. The affair went on for years in secret before he eventually divorced his wife in the 60s and moved in with his mistress, who he lived happily with until his death just after the Chilean military coup. Thousands attended his funeral, seen as one of the first occasions that people displayed en mass their disapproval of the military regime. Neruda, like most artists, was not a fan of fascism! The military flooded his home from the canal that ran through the garden whilst he lay in his coffin in the house. His partner drained and repaired the property and lived there for another 20 years.The house was split over many levels and had lots of wonderful, quirky 'surrealist' touches like these giant shoes in the bar. 

Shoeshining in the main square at lunchtime. The bandstand in the background was full of men playing chess.

Maybe Santiago is lacking some obvious landmarks or monuments to capture people's imagination, but we found it to be an interesting, modern and friendly city and it was easy to get a feel for its politics and cultural scene.

A very tall tree in Santiago

Just look at that, 11 storeys of tree. Fabulous.

Argentina to Chile

We'll be back in Argentina in a couple of weeks. From Mendoza, there is a beautiful pass over the Andes into Chile, dropping down into Santiago, which we decided to take. There are comfy buses to travel on through a lot of South America, in this one we had armchairs, just three seats across. It still temporarily broke down though through overheating - a common complaint that we are finding with most of them.
A very relaxed border crossing, with the mountains all around. The only snag was that we couldn't bring a big chunk of cheese into Chile. Simon overcame this by wolfing most of it with crackers at the customs check point; the remaining gnawed edge was picked off by our bus driver out of our rubbish bag, to our amusement and disbelief.

The dramatic, wiggly descent into Chile.  In a month or so there will be skiing in this area

From Santiago, we're heading south to the Lake District, which straddles the Argentine/Chilean Andes, for some walking. before going back into Argentina and off to Buenos Aires.