Friday, November 8, 2024
When we are told to evacuate our homes,
WE EVACUATE OUR HOMES!
All the way to South American City of Santiago de Chile.
We made it!
So did Koreen and Brian FitzGerald
Our LATAM Airlines' flight from Miami arrived on time at 7:00 a.m. local time which is five hours ahead of California.
Clearing Chilean Customs was a tad slow due to a high volume of travelers from different flights that had just landed.
We got an "Official Taxi," thanks to the advice of Linda Zilisch and her Chilean friend Maggie, and we had a delightful one hour drive from the airport to our hotel with our driver, Victor.
Besides driving, he enlightened us with several insider information tips about the city. He was a great tour guide.
We arrived at our hotel at about 9:30 a.m. but could not check in until 3:00 p.m. Thus we checked our bags at the front desk and went in search of food and adventure.
We found a farmer's market in
a park near the hotel
The park was surrounded by some
interesting modern architecture
Laurie LOVES cherries!
She adores roses too
Don't go crazy over the price of eggs
One U.S. Dollar equals 970 Chilean pesos.
What are those yellow flowers?
Candles made from bees wax
BEES' WAX!
And some honey drippings to boot.
The ladies were in their element
but I was hungry
We found this little bakery/restaurant
The bread was wonderful and breakfast here was only about 60% of what it would cost in the USA.
Back pounding the pavement,
taking in more architecture
Jorge Chavez Dartnell
South American Aviation Pioneer
I love the flowing scarf!
Enzo, possible backers for the
Varese Skorpions next season?
Art and architecture go
hand in hand in Santiago
Easter Island is part of the
Country of Chile
These were not any of the original Easter Island Heads, but mere models adapted to the whims of local artists.
I really don't know what
is going on here
Our feminine companions posing
by one of those Easter Island Heads
We entered the Metro for some
quick underground travel to
Santiago Centro
On Plaza de Armas with the Metropolitan
Cathedral in the background
The Plaza de Armas is the symbolic
heart of Chile's culture
Santiago has a population of approximately 6,300,000 souls.
Spanish Conquistador
Pedro de Valdivia
Founder of Santiago in 1541
The Central Post Office
Three of my mates before
we entered the Cathedral
Laurie liked the bold stained
glass as we entered
WOW!
What a BEAUTIFUL house
of worship!
As ornate as any cathedral
we've seen in Europe
Love this golden halo
St. Santiago with piercing eyes
A former Bishop of Santiago
A more primitive sculpture
You HAD to be there
We were there and we still had no idea what we were observing.
Trinkets everywhere she looked
We continued our walk out of the Santiago Centro sector of the city and into the La Alameda neighborhood.
Iglesia San Francisco
Built in 1586. It is Santiago's
oldest structure
The inner walls of the Iglesia
appear to be well over 430 years old
A fine looking pulpit
Next we headed just up the street to
the Londres 38 Espacio de Memorias
From 1973 to 1975, this was a center of torture and extermination during the repressive military dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet.
Thousands of people who were deemed to be potential subversives including political activists, journalists, professors and trade unionists were interrogated here and many of them simply disappeared, never to be seen again.
As the purge continued, this space could no longer keep up with the volume of detainees and bigger facilities were used instead.
Pinochet's military junta ruled Chile from September 11, 1973 to March 11, 1990. A total of 1,248 Chileans "disappeared" during the Pinochet regime.
This room was used for
interrogations and tortures
Faces of some of the "Disappeared"
This museum now houses information on human rights in general and women's rights in particular.
A womb gives life and red below
symbolizes death
Placing this hanging from a coat hanger added to the symbolism.
Living in this house across from
Londres 38 must have been unsettling
A Beautiful Woman is One Who
FIGHTS!
My Body Is not a Battlefield
A Torture Room with a breeze
is so nice in the Summer
Moving on . . .
CBS TV mural?
In front of Chile's Catholic University
Gabriela Mistral Cultural Center houses
Arts & Crafts from Chilean artists
It had a colorful entryway
Interesting piece
Ode to Joe and the Volcano?
Lots of traditional clay pitchers
I liked this one the best
Nice, bright colors
Cool tea pot
Chile is renowned for its fish dishes
Sacred Heart of Jesus
Maple and Bacon donuts or the
Crème Brûlée one
Neither. We all had ice cream instead in various refreshing fruit flavors.
Catholic Church molding the minds
of the indigenous people
The entrance to Cerro Santa Lucia
Santa Lucia fountain
Excellent pottery atop Santa Lucia
A woman guarding a life
affirming water source
We returned to our hotel to officially check-in, rest a bit and then head out in search of a good spot for dinner.
Another impressive, modern
building in the Santiago sunset
Reflections
The stunning Gran Torre Costanera
is the tallest building in all of
Latin America at 62 floors and
300 meters/984 feet
All had gone along smoothly all day in this amazing, modern city as we sat down to dinner.
Wonderful sandwiches with sides of French
Fries dipped in delicious home made
mayonnaise filled the bill
We were all tired after lots of traveling followed by a good day of sight seeing and got up to head back to the hotel to pack it in for the night.
Then it happened.
Koreen realized that her purse was missing, a.k.a., stolen.
DAMN!
Brian later posited that a street performer banging on a drum loudly has distracted everyone in the restaurant except the two people sitting next to us. Brian believes that the drummer was their confederate, and that while we were distracted, the purse was pilfered.
It is a highly plausible theory with which I concur.
Koreen handled this violation quite well all things considered but still had lots of phone calls to make as the thieves had taken her credit and debit cards amongst other valuables.
DOUBLE DAMN!
In conclusion, we got tons of
exercise on our first day in the
Southern Hemisphere on a warm
Summer's day
Hopefully, Saturday will be more joyous than the end of tonight's long day.
Stay tuned . . .
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