Day 61. It’s the weekend! We thought we’d take the opportunity to escape the city in a car and explore the countryside and the Pacific coast. Chile is the first country we’ve visited where we’ve even considered that driving a car might be a remotely good idea.
Chile has 4000 km of coastline! We drove to the pretty-from-a-distance coastal town of Valparaiso, the not so pretty sister town of Vina del Mar, and the very pretty and very monied fishing village of Zapallar further up the coast.
Vina del Mar from a good distance
Zapallar
As recommended by Ilana, (ex?)inhabitant of Chile and friend of Anthony and Sonia, we stopped in Zapallar for a fish dinner at the famous Chiringuito. The selection of fish, shellfish and other sea creatures was quite astounding, however we had some trouble deciphering the menu. We turned to our trusty phones to help with the translations. The double whammy of seafood terms and the Chilean dialect clearly didn’t help. Here are some sample translations that our phones came up with:
Loco = Crazy Reinata = Any of several varieties of sweet round apples Macha = Mannish woman Celestina = Female pimp
We can’t exactly remember what the waiter told us the above really were, but we know that the Reinata is actually a dark grey flatfish and the others are types of shellfish!
Fancy china at Chiringuito
By the time we’d finished dinner it was getting late and we hadn’t yet arranged anywhere to stay. After a lot of searching we found a cheap and cheerful motel. (The cost of accommodation is inversely proportional to the square of the distance from Zapallar). We were asked if we would like to pay an extra 5,000 pesos (about £6.50) for the use of the jacuzzi but we politely declined.
P.S. Happy Birthday, Harriet!