Vino and Puppies

After a few days on the coast in Valparaiso and Viña del Mar, during which time our main cultural excursion was to Pablo Neruda´s house, we decided it was time to explore the wine regions. Our first port of call was the Vineyards of the well known Concha y Toro where after a tour of the founder´s house we tasted the Casillero del Diablo and some other red which was okay but not amazing. We were happy that we at least got to keep the wine glasses, although mine has already broken. Quel Surprise! Wine tour number 2, waving goodbye to Santiago we went South to the fairly uneventful town of Curico where on arrival we were lucky enough to make the final tour of Miguel Torres, a Spanish based company who have spread their vines. It was essentially a private tour which was great as we had free question time and a self tailored tasting, ie we point and our guide pours. Good setup no? And the realisation hit that Ari was more of a gastronomist than I had given him credit for, for example his poignant observation that the Santa Digna shiraz "smelled like wet dog". Good times and good wines, the best of the bunch(in our humble but thoroughly tested opinion) being the Don Miguel (Gewurztraimer/Reisling) and batting for the reds, the Cordillera (cariñena / syrah / merlot). Our third, final and by far the best tour was at the San Pedro winery. The tour began with a minibus tour of the vineyards, thats how big they were! We got to see every process of the wine making and the guide was great. And I learned that you never put wine in the freezer. Even in emergencies. Between the tours we made sure to practice ensuring that our refined palettes remained sharp...

Aside from that we spent a great day in Santiago, climbed up El Cerro de Santa Monica-a hill right in the middle of the city from which you have a great view of the city and the backdrop of the second highest mountains in the world. We also took a day trip up to the Siete Tazas (The seven cups), a series of waterfalls. We were mildly inconvenienced by the fact that we missed the one bus of the day that goes there and had to hitch/walk the 44km but I think we both agree that it was worth it. Not so much for the waterfalls, they were nice and all, but for our precious find of a beautiful 2 month old golden lab who we named Owen. She ambled past in the arms of a family as we were eating our very sophisticated lunch washed down with Don Miguel. We played with her for a bit during which time the family disappeared. We had 2 choices: to keep her (my preferred course of action) or take her back to the warden at the park entrance (sadly what we did). On arrival we found her real owner, Jaime who had his brother searching all over for her-apparently everyone he asked told him that a young couple had taken her. How rude! Anyway, Jaime had recently purchased a plot of land on top of the hill that overlooked the waterfall and is in the process of constructing a house for himself and several cabins which will be open to tourists on completion. He drove us up to his abode, currently a solar powered trailer van but it was all pretty cool and he showed us the land intended for the cabins which has a great view of the valley. He even drove us the 7km back to the bus stop where we relaxed and took a nap by the river until the one returning bus of the day arrived. All in all a good day.