2 April – 4 April, 2016

La Serena (Elqui Valley and Isla Damas)

April 2nd was a travel day so when I got to La Serena, I just dropped off my laundry and tried to find a place to eat.  I wandered around forever…you know when you get to the point where you’re so hungry that you want something really good and nothing looks good. That was me in La Serena. I can’t even remember what I ended up eating. That day was a wash so moving on to the next day…I started the day very slowly after the brutally long bus rides the day before (I hate buses…). I slept in until 8:30 and then chatted with Hibba, Mother, Chuck and Zia. Love my little Zia. She has a lot to say now. Then I finally got ready to head to Elqui Valley. The plan was to go to Elqui during the afternoon and then head to Vicuña for the observatory tour (this area has amazing views of the moon and the stars). Unfortunately, it was a pretty cloudy day so the Observatory tour was cancelled. So instead I just hung out in Pisco Elqui. I loved this little town. It’s Chile’s hippie central. There are beautiful flowers and fruit everywhere. This is also where they grow grapes to make Pisco. It rarely rains here but the water from the mountains makes the valley very fertile. Fresh juices and veggies…yay! I actually had a salad for once with a side of falafel and fresh squeezed strawberry juice. They also had great street art and doors…I liked the old doors. Pictures from my wanderings in Pisco Elqui.

That night a couple of girls checked into the dorm. One was American and the other was German. They were planning on going to Isla Damas like me so I invited myself along of course.

The cheapest way to get to Isla Damas is to take a local bus. The bus was a rickety old thing. The seats in the front were piled up with boxes of stuff and bags of onions and other vegetables. Fortunately, there were seats available in the back for humans. The ride to Isla Damas took about 2 hours and provided a great opportunity to see the area. This region is at the edge of the Atacama desert so its pretty desert like. There are cacti and dry brush all around. We saw a lot of Guanacos (one of the four camelids in the Andes – the others are Llamas, Alpacas and Vicuña – I’m learnding!) and bunnies on the way. I even had the good fortune to see a cute little fox.

We arrived in a very small bare bones town by the ocean. This is where the tour would leave from. While waiting, we started chatting with other foreign tourists there. At one point, there was a circle of 5-6 women, all traveling solo. It really impressed upon me how things have changed and I felt proud that a woman’s place is wherever she wants it to be and that women really can do anything men can…except maybe pee standing up (well we can’t do it well anyway). Makes me think of how, when I was young, my father was able to leave his wife and mother with 5 screaming brats under 10 to travel for three months. Still don’t think a woman could get away with that but hopefully it’s a little less likely that men can get away with it too.

This is where I met Lina from Germany. I overheard her say that, like me, she was heading to Easter Island in a couple of days so we started chatting and hit it off immediately. I don’t know why, but she and I ended up sitting at the front of the boat. We didn’t realize that while this would give us a great view of the islands, it also meant that we would get completely soaked. Ah, good times! The tour started with a bang as we chased a pod of dolphins around the island…even caught some dolphin acrobatics. Then it was on to see some sea lions…these guys were bigger than the ones in the Galapagos and more similar to the ones I saw on Isla Ballestas (totally slacking on blogging about Peru). I didn’t take many pics. I’m kinda over photographing sea lions. Next we saw some penguinos! Humboldt penguinos…they’re so cute. The guide wasn’t sure we’d see any since they like to climb up to the top of the island. But we were fortunate and saw several. We also saw the elusive sea otters. They’re so adorable! Next we moved on to the pelicans, cormorants and boobies…ending with the beautiful red-footed cormorants. They mate for life and help each other stay clean. Cute guys! That was pretty much the end of the tour and we headed back to land.

Once on land we went to a little restaurant nearby for lunch. At this point it was Karen, Marion, Lina and me. All of us speak/understand varying levels of Spanish but none of us could understand what was on the menu so we all got cheese empanadas except for Karen who got a fish sandwich…we’re such daredevils! The food came with a spicy salsa that was delicious…we all wanted more of that. While eating a greyhound / whippet came around begging for food…she must have belonged to someone because most dogs in South America are mutts. This one was clearly some type of Greyhound. She had just had adorable little puppies. We spent a large part of lunch talking about how much we all love dogs and wish we could take all the strays home with us.

That night I decided to walk around to see what I could find food wise and I found this adorable little cafe that really wished it was in America. They had Mumford and Sons playing, burgers and fries on the menu and fancy Belgian beer. I had to eat there even if I don’t really love burgers…it was home…even reminded me a bit of The Porter…not quite though. Also, there was a beautiful sunset outside. The burger was meh but fries and beer were excellent. I left there quite a happy camper.

On the walk back, as I turned onto the street where the hostel is, I noticed two yippy little dogs. I didn’t think too much of it because there are dogs everywhere in South America. There was a man taking out the trash so I figured they belonged to him. As I got closer they started barking at me. I looked towards the man and he signaled just don’t look at them. So I looked away and kept walking but the dogs kept following and barking at me. I felt something pull at my pants and thought I just need to keep walking since I was almost to the hostel. I noticed that one of the dogs was trying to bite my leg. It eventually registered that he actually bit me. The owner was watching this and just letting it happen. I quickly ran into the hostel thinking he just scratched me and then realized that actually broke skin. My immediate exaggerated response was, crap now I’m going to have to get a million shots, I won’t be able to go to Easter Island in 2 days and I’m going to have to end my trip. Those thoughts plus the fact that I was so worn out from the last few days just got to me and I was really upset. I knew I was being ridiculous but I couldn’t help myself. I managed to freak out the hostel staff and the guests that were eating dinner. The lady at the hostel was very kind and offered to take me to the hospital but the bite really wasn’t that bad. She did call the police to report the incident but then called them back and told them not to come because she thought I was upset because I thought they would put the dog down. I cleaned up my leg and just decided to go to bed. I found out the next day that the ‘owner’ of the dog and the house where the dog lives doesn’t claim the dog. The hostel staff have complained previously to the owner but he takes no responsibility. That just made me angry. In the end nothing was done about the situation. I left that afternoon and there really wasn’t much more to do but move on. Luckily, I have not developed rabies so the story has a good ending. Also, before I left that day I did get a chance to explore a Japanese garden in Chile!

I headed back to Casa Roble in Santiago for one more day before I flew to Easter Island. I did meet Benji at the hostel…he reappears in Easter Island.  Here are some pictures from Santiago.