Valparaíso’s Cerro Bellavista is home to the Museo del Cielo Abierto, or Open Air Museum. We didn’t know much about it except that it’s a number of murals throughout the mostly residential neighborhood. With bellies full of berlines, we set out. From Plaza Victoria, we took Calle Edwards up the hill. It was so steep and narrow that cars had to honk in warning...
Don’t worry, we’re alive. We’ve both just been busy with our projects! Chris is still taking Spanish classes for four hours a day and took on an online gig. I’ve been getting ready to launch my first e-book. And, we’ve been looking for a place for the next leg of our trip to the Lakes Region of Chile. I snapped the photo above because I...
Would you like a pisco sour and some ceviche? Because we know how to make that now! We took a fun Chilean cooking class in Valparaíso yesterday. Pictured on the left is our instructor, Vlad, and our new friends Laura and Chris. They’re traveling in Chile and Argentina for several weeks, and have an excellent travel photo blog called Out There Somewhere. They’re professional photographers and all...
Chile has a lot of German influence in its culture — beyond the Volkswagens on this clothesline. The biggest wave of German immigrants arrived in Chile in the late 1800s and early 1900s. And with them came an influence on a very important aspect of life: beer. The photo above was from a beer festival near Valparaíso’s Muelle Barón, a big dockyard. Damaged by...
After Chris went to class today, I grabbed some coffee and then took a long walk. Left alone with my thoughts, I was sad to realize that we’re already four months into our leap year. So I stopped by the Casino Municipal, pictured above, to see if I could extend the length of our trip by hitting the blackjack tables. Just kidding. I know...
Familiar or foreign. Which is better? That’s what we’ll tackle in this week’s Travel Tip Tuesday. It all comes down to why you’re traveling and what your goals are. We’re traveling because we want to experience things that are totally different and out of our comfort zone — that will give us perspective and memories to last a lifetime. But what is memorable? How...
Today is Chris’s first day of school. He’s taking Spanish classes — 1/3 grammar, 2/3 conversation — for 20 hours a week over the next three weeks. When we met a guy from Sacramento last week, he said he took similar classes and found them to be really helpful. There are two other people in the class with Chris: one from Canada and one...
This is Chris relaxing at the sparkling wine bar at Viña Casas del Bosque in the Casablanca Valley. Chile, because of its unique geography (Pacific on the left, Andes on the right) and climate (sunshine, sunshine, sunshine), is a great place to make wine. In fact, it’s the fifth largest exporter of wine worldwide. We’d heard these facts, but could not be satisfied until we’d tasted it...
This is Valparaíso at night taken from Viña del Mar. Summer is alive and well, so there’s no need for a jacket at night. We took a walk along the boardwalk and, despite being relaxed and “on vacation,” we simply can’t stand to walk behind people who aren’t walking with purpose. Maybe one day we’ll adjust to strolling. The one thing we haven’t had...
This week’s Travel Tip Tuesday: water bottle economics. We’ve already written about the importance of bringing a water bottle when packing for a trip. It seems obvious, but we see people with disposable water bottles all the time. Now we’ll go a little deeper and offer some extra tips and advice. (Even if you’re going somewhere with safe tap water, like here in Chile.) When...
Caption contest: What is Chris pondering as he looks out over this pond? The Jardín Botánico Nacional was a nice afternoon walk, with ponds, trees and — my favorite — hydrangeas. It’s roughly eight kilometers away from downtown Viña del Mar, and the recommended way to get there is by bus. The buses, called micros, can get you everywhere, but they’re super confusing. There are...
Valparaíso is only a quick, 10-minute metro ride away from us. So today we decided to venture over and take a free Valparaíso walking tour to get a lay of the land. We met several other travelers, including a young woman from England who decided to make the most of her layoff and travel for a year, and a guy from Sacramento who had to...