Viña del Mar: home sweet seaside home

6 March 2014 and onward

We arrived in Viña del Mar around 9 or 10 p.m. by way of a ride from Jaimie, our boss/local contact. She had arranged for us to stay with her mother-in-law for a week or so while we looked for a more "permanent" place to live. Cecilia is a very active 70-something with two extra bedrooms in her 16th-floor condo. It wasn't a bad first view of our host city by night:

The lights of Valparaíso

Or by day:

Or at sunset.

 

The condo complex, Gran Océano, looks down from a barrio called Recreo and a little bump of land pushing into the bay, so you can see lots of ocean to the north (Viña), the south (Valparaíso), and the west (hello, Pacific). Gran Océano, indeed.

We were in the tower on the right

Valparaíso got rich in the 19th Century as a port of call for ships heading around the Strait of Magellan, and Viña is the spot up the coast where the rich folks built their rich houses. Valpo has mostly declined in wealth since 1914 when the Panama Canal diverted their gravy train, but Viña is still the newer, cleaner weekend resort half of this twin city. Here's a little photo tour.

There are beaches and ocean-y bits.

There's a mall. In Spanish, it's called el Mall.

Lider is actually Walmart. Hiper Lider is Walmart after too much coffee.

There's a Metro line from Valpo to Viña and beyond, handy for our commute.

There are hills,

Barrio Recreo

...and more hills.

Here's part of my morning commute. The green wall keeps us all from falling into a big underground parking-shaped hole in the ground. The church beyond is called Our Lady of Agony, which always reminds me of Lake Woebegone's Our Lady of Perpetual Responsibility, except with more Latino flair and less Midwestern understatement.

Another sidewalk leading to work: wide, clean, and always with a sleeping dog or five. After all, this is Chile.

Castillo Wulff. Yep, a little castle by the sea. Mostly it just looks cool and hosts cultural events.

Viña is famous for the Reloq de Flores (flower clock). See, it's a clock...made out of flowers. That's it, really.

Look, it's tourist-o'clock

I saved the best for last. The archaeology museum two blocks from our school/workplace is the home of a bona fide Moai, an Easter Island (Rapa Nui) statue that was relocated to Chile. I don't know when or under what circumstances, but he's here now, and there is a constant train of tour buses that stop by to get pictures with him-- saves $700 in airfare getting from Santiago to Easter Island!

 

Here ends the random photo tour of Viña. More on our school another time.