Badlanders MCC Website

 

Nights over Valpo

 

After a visit to view La Vinoteca I caught the train out to Valpariaso. On the train I was asked by this rotund jolly guy in front of me where I was going. His name was Marcos and he had spent most of his life in California. He was ejected, with his Green card torn up because he beat his wife. “Just for beating my wife” he said in a tone of amazement! He went onto say indignantly “I was drunk at the time”, but the authorities weren’t interested in what I had to say..... Drunk, I thought, ...oh well that’s ok then! He had been here for three years and was clearly still flabbergasted at the judge’s decision. I asked him, would he have preferred if they had jailed him. “Jail” he said.... FOR BEATING MY WIFE! I explained that he would most likely have been jailed in the UK, to which he responded, “here too”! I was already starting to get a lesson in the Chilean man’s psyche ...at least one that had left his home country and returned some thirty years later. Though clearly unacceptable, but real nevertheless, domestic violence was most likely tolerated back then in the Pinochet years. It clearly isn’t now. There is a lesson here for immigration and what can best be described as gaping holes in cultural norms, but this is no place for a lecture!

 

As we got off the train, Marcos insisted I joined him for an hour’s trip round the bays in his friend’s boat. I politely, but firmly declined the invitation and asked him to direct me to the nearest internet cafe and any Museums. He pointed me towards the main square where the statue of Arturo Prat stood- ( an unfortunate name .....for a national hero!). He also explained that Lord Cochrane was another famous national hero of Chile and was from England. I corrected him, explaining that he was the 9th Earl of Dundonald, in Scotland and was Scottish. He expressed amazement.” I did not know that”, he said. I left him and wandered along Cochrane street- to hear the sound of a loudspeaker, peeping horns and throngs of people shouting. I walked past the Bar Ingles to take a closer look. There was a bus parked across the road thereby stopping all traffic from getting through and it was covered in posters. You will see one of the pics! I asked someone what it was about and why the police were letting the bus block the road. “Manifestato politico”was the response as far as I could make out from the noise.

 

As you will see from a picture I took....”28 months without solution, of this we tire”... Now I wondered what I would have been expected to do in similar political campaigns.... as Returning Officer! I’m certain that I would have expected the police to unblock the street. It was causing complete chaos, with cars having to be redirected down another narrow lane and a female carabineiri trying desperately to direct the traffic, while the male officers took the easy job of watching the bus!!! “Nothing new there!”, I hear you say. When the loudspeaker died, no doubt having made a profound point, I saw one woman clap, others listened, shaking their heads, I assume in disagreement and one or two policemen were trying hard to hide a grin. I assumed that the campaigning was against Bachelet, though it may have been local politics. I suspect there was also a time when such political protest would have been quelled quickly and possibly even brutally......Marcos..... things are definitely changing!!!!

 

Anyway, I wandered up the hill to try and find a hostel and came across a rather tasty restaurant called Montealegre. Whilst I wasn’t really prepared to spend any money on an expensive menu, I thought that the view alone merited a coke! However, I succumbed to a small lunchtime risotto of mussels and prawns and left, all the better for the tranquillity and beautiful view.... and £9 lighter in my pocket. The restaurant was linked to the only Boutique hotel (or at least first of its kind in Valpo) called Casahigueras. Having looked down on the pool and spa from the restaurant, I decided that I’d check out the cost of staying here. The receptionist said “You are lucky this is low season-the price is only 350 dollars”. Mmmmmm I said..... maybe next time ehh. I proceeded along to Alimente Montt to find the Valpo Hostel. This hostel owned by Carolina was still being refurbished, and her boyfriend having just made all the beds, was busy making lockers at the time I arrived. I asked if she had a private room....for the sake of others...( I snore; remember). “No I’m afraid not” she said, “but you can have a dorm to yourself, because there is no one else staying here just now”. She went on to explain that she had just taken over the building and was in the middle of converting it. It was a restaurant previously. At a total of £8.80, including kitchen privileges, breakfast and Wifi, I gladly accepted.  Turns out Carolina was a single mum who escaped a good job in banking in Santiago so as to change her lifestyle and see more of her daughter.

 

Unfortunately, the museums were all closed on Monday, so I wandered down to the Brighton hotel to enjoy another great view over the bays....(see the pics) and then down to the town to see if I could find the Irish bar (El bar Irlandes) I did, and there I tried one of their “Puerto” local ales! It wasn’t bad at all. I left, to go to Lider and buy myself some food so that I could cook my own meal- the first in a while. I was entertained by the lovely 18 month old Macerena, Carolinas daughter and then retired for a relaxing night’s sleep.

 

I enjoyed breakfast with Carolina and her boyfriend, Carolina doing the translation, as her boyfriend didn’t speak English, and my Spanish simply isn’t good enough for breakfast table conversations, or, indeed any conversation come to think of it. He asked, through Carolina, whether David Beckham and his family are British people’s view of the ideal family? I paused and said to Carolina... for some, it probably is! But for many more, I don’t think so.

 

Carolina explained how she and her cousin were in the middle of trying to develop “alternative” tours; That is, alternatives to the stuff you read in guidebooks. She felt that many guidebooks, like the lonely planet, miss the really interesting things,... the beauty of an area. She said “It is people, not guide books that are your friends when you are travelling” An immortal quote if ever I heard one!