Santiago sketches

We begin the day with a visit to Isla Negra, Neruda's rambling old beach house built above the high waters of the Pacific.  It is a wonderful layout, the rooms flowing into one another, and filled with the fascinations of a man's life.  The beauty of his eye matches that of his verse.  It is the perfect place for an artist to finish out his life, surrounded by his memorabilia, and with a lovely view to ponder.  It reminds me a great deal of Bergman's estate on Fårö.  We were lucky to arrive at opening, and have the place to ourselves for a short time.  But even as others joined us, there was still a sense of quiet repose here, in these houses beneath the sweep of trees leaning away from the wind.  

Our driver seems to have no idea where he's going, and I watch again and again our vehicle turn broader loops on the Galileo Pro map on my iPhone.  It is lovely countryside though, through pine forests and classic little beach towns.  The main thoroughfare from Valparaiso to Santiago passes through Chile's wine country, and I find myself wishing I'd budgeted a day to stop along the way.  As it is, we only have this one day in Santiago, which is why the driver's indecision frustrates me.  I feel this way often while guiding in Japan, when my drivers ask me which way to go.  These guys have a single job to do, and aren't doing it. It wouldn't take more than five minutes to confirm the route before setting out.  

Our visit in Santiago too begins at Neruda's house there, the third in two days.  This one is almost a hybrid of the others, with the crowded decor of Isla Negra, but  built more vertically like La Sebastiana.  I like how each of the little houses is interconnected by courtyards.  The weather here must be better than out on the coast.

Santiago itself is modernizing quickly into the usual cold faceless city, but still bears plenty of monuments to its fading colonial glory.  (Valparaiso on the other hand was going beyond faded and running more to wilted, but at least they had the street art, and bit more charm.) The city's main appeal was its plentiful green spaces, and the funky bohemian vibe to BellaVista and La Starria.  We follow a walking course in one of my guidebooks, which takes in all the old buildings, and we break awhile from the 35 degree heat in the Pre-Columbian Museum.  I am mesmerized by the old statues in the basement, and while wandering the rooms above I feel a little sadness and surprise in the number of cultures that died after the Spanish came.  As Americans, we are taught that our history began with Columbus, but in growing up I learned that his name is synonymous with genocide.  It is inherent in the name of the museum, his surname now serving as a definition for colonization.  

Santiago's glory is in the outdoor museum that is the Plaza de Armas, but I have to say my own highlight is Iglesia San Francisco, whose thick boxy exterior has the look of the fortified adobe cathedrals of my native New Mexico, yet whose interior is almost Byzantine.   

We fly off to Rapa Nui for a few days, but return to Santiago for 12 hours.  At dawn I climb up Cerro Santa Lucia, and scramble to the top of the fortress there, which could easily be found in Rajastan.  Santiago is infamous for its smog, but this day is reasonably clear, and lingering summer snow can be barely made out on the mountaintops just outside town.  (I'll get a better look a few hours later as we fly over these Andes, the high valleys not many dozen meters below us, and not that far north from where the Uruguayans crashed in 1972.) Upon arrival the previous night, flames crept up the hillside above the zoo and Neruda's home.  The smoke lingers in the morning air.


On the turntable:  Jefferson Airplane, "Last Flight"