Desierto Florido to Valparaiso

Capel Pisco distillery. Right. Well we decided to go the pisco distillery because to be honest that's really all we drink here (pisco sour, piscola, pisco con Canada Dry...) and we should know how it's made right? We arrive to the distillery, in the middle of NOWHERE, and get a guided tour of how Pisco is made. My understanding was a little shotty because the tour was in Spanish and the lady spoke pretty fast, however it was still interesting to learn about the process (what I understood) because I had no idea how alcohol was made before this tour. Basically the pisco-wine process differs (they are both made from grapes) because of the time the pisco ferments and the vapors they use instead of the gunk on the side of the gigantic wooden barrels. Apparently, 90% of all Pisco is consumed in Chile, which would explain why it is uncommon in the rest of the world. I'll try to bring some back and make you all pisco sours.

side note: we identified ourselves as gringo alcoholics when Dan asked 'podemos terminarlos?' and pointed to the free samples we were given...basically we just drank a lot of free samples and the tour guide laughed at us.

Vicuna is a pretty small town, but was all decked out for the upcoming bicentennial so there were lots of little vendors to see. Marina and I spent some time talking to them while the boys digested in the park where Gabriela Mistral's 'death mask' is (Apparently it's a tradition for Nobel Prize winners to have a caste made of their face...weird). We debated going to the Mamalluca Observatory, but realized we couldn't get a bus back to our campsite if we did that, so we did our own star gazing.

Upon arrival to our campsite we had to plan out how we were going to sneak tons of firewood into the campsite so that the crazy Duena didn't see us since fires are most definitely 'prohibido'. We also didn't want to pay again. So after gathering a ton of pointy sticks from the side of the road we 'snuck' behind the cabins to our site. Then we waited until 10 o'clock when Juan would be on duty to get our stuff from the office, since he definitely didn't care what we did. 1.5hrs later we had a fire/dinner. check.

The next morning we busted out of the campsite at 6:30am so that a) we didn't have to pay b) we could get up to Caldera in time to make our 2pm tour of the Desierto Florido. We managed to get a bus up to Copiapo (about an hour from Caldera) for 7 luca, but couldn't secure a return ticket, no big deal right? ha. Anyways en route to Copiapo our bus breaks down in the middle of the desert, literally. The engine overheated (big surprise) and they were unable to get a hold of anyone from the company to either send another bus or come and fix our broken one.We had no service so I couldn't call the flower man to tell him we weren't going to be able to make it, which turned about to be an ordeal in and of itself. Fortunately, we broke down in a beautiful place where the Desierto Florido had crept down so there were fuchsia flowers all over the cerros. Second stroke of luck after 1.5hrs was getting on a bus that supposedly had 20 open seats, but really had 6 that was headed towards Copiapo. Only casualty was my nalgene got left on the first bus, oh well.

Upon arrival to Copiapo we start trying to bargain our way back to La Serena for the next day. Funny story about the bicentennario, everyone travels so there were literally NO open seats and we talked to every single bus company. Eventually we gave up and headed to Caldera, vowing to come back immediately after the flower tour to try and find our way back somehow. The only reason we were pressed about the issue was because we had already bought tickets from La Serena to Valparaiso to leave at 6 am on Friday, September 17th. All that aside we get to Caldera and then hop a ride in the back of pickup truck to Bahia Inglesa.

Bahia Inglesa was so un expectedly beautiful. The bay was a tropical blue and the beaches were all white, though not sandy. It was definitely a summer resort destination (My host family told me when I got back that they went there for summer vacation this past year), so was basically a strip of restaurants and hostels right up on the beach. We crashed on the beach to watch the sunset and eat a little bit. Turns out we picked the one town in Chile that doesn't have a panaderia (NO HAY PAN!) so I went into a hostel and asked if we could buy day old bread and the lady just gave it to me, which was really great. Then we started wood gathering round two. We went behind all of the restaurants and collected a bunch of sticks and palm fronds to carry to wherever we were camping and picked them up on our way out of town. A bunch of restaurant workers were out back chilling when we went to pick up our kindling and literally almost bust a gut upon seeing the gringos struggle with the HUGE palm fronds...I also was dying of laughter per usual, if I had had a free hand I would have taken a picture.

We walked up the beach and camped out by some tiny dunes. It was so beautiful. The moon was only half full but so bright we didn't really need our flashlights and I saw more stars than I've ever seen in my life. We crashed pretty early that night and got up to head back to Caldera for our long awaited flower tour. Dan and Marina went in search of water while Max and I waited for the mysterious flower man and this guy just came up to us and was like 'flower tour for two?' and Max and I look at each other and were like 'uhh there are 4 of us..." And I pulled out the piece of paper with the guys name on it and I was like 'Do you know Alberdino..." "Gallardo, si si" he says as he reads the name over my shoulder...right. So Max was like 'I don't trust this guy at all' so we were like 'ok gracias' and then waited for Dan and Marina. I call the flower man and lo and behold this mildly sketchy man was in fact our driver. check. We piled in a van to tour the desert and let me tell you, it was entirely worth the effort it took to get there. Just miles of flowers completely covering every inch of the desert. My pictures in no way do justice to the beauty.
Our driver, Claudio, told us that we were only 30km away from where the mine collapsed, which was pretty crazy.

So I'll spare you all the details of our INSANE trip back to La Serena and Valpo. Long story short is:
almost got on a really sketchy bus to get to La Serena
an old blue eyed Chilean told us not to so we got on a different bus, mildly sketchy but our only option.
Spent three hours with a bunch of Rastas in Copiapo, absolutely hilarious and the best time.
Got on our bus. Dan and I were sitting underneath the only lights left on.
Get to La Serena at 2:15am and decide to go bar hopping.
Meet some 'chorros' (gangtas) who all rapped in a bar run by guys who were literally too high to function and gave us free french fries.
Got on our bus at 5:55am, heads up to those planning on traveling by bus in Chile, the buses are the ONLY things that run exactly on time in Chile. Every bus I've taken leaves exactly at the time the ticket says.
Get back to Valpo at 12:15pm and get a call from Pablo (the Brooks' exchange student) telling me he is coming to Vina that night to celebrate Independence Day!
I'll save that story for the next installment.

Fotos: Capel Distillery; GIGANTIC wooden barrels for fermenting; Dan, Max and Marina having some free samples; Marina waiting on the side of the road after our bus broke down; Bahia Inglesa; Desierto Florido; Desierto Florido.

p.s. HAPPY BIRTHDAY CORY!!!! miss you.