Smog, Coffee with Legs, Pinochet and Wine Tasting

Santiago is not the most picturesque of cities. Viewing it from the window of our 13th floor AirBnB apartment, or from the top of the nearby Santa Lucía hill, the main impression is of ugly, high rise concrete tower blocks and the all pervading smog. Yet as we have explored the city from the ground, we've realised there's more to it than we'd first perceived and it is actually an interesting and lively place to be.

The entrance to Santa Lucía hill 

We have spent much of our time here checking out the city's highlights with Louise, my friend who is in South America for a few weeks. On our second day here we did a free three hour walking tour around the city centre. This was well worth doing; our guide took us not only to the obvious places but to some more interesting ones - some of the city's most famous street art, for example. Perhaps the weirdest thing we learnt about is a popular style of coffee shop in Santiago - 'café con piernas'  or  'coffee with legs'! Type 1 of these cafés look like normal coffee shops. They are open from 9-6, and don't serve alcohol... but all the waitresses are dressed in exceedingly short skirts and high heels. Type 2 is a step up - they are still open daytime only and don't serve alcohol, but have blackened out glass and loud music playing. As we stood outside one of these listening to our guide, one of the waitresses emerged and waved - let's just say they were somewhat more scantily clad than type 1(bunny ears wouldn't have gone amiss)! As for type 3 - you don't get them in the city centre...

Smoggy view from the top of San Cristóbal, with the Andes just visible

We've also taken the funicular railway to the top of Cerro San Cristóbal, the highest hill in Santiago, from where you get a great, if hazy, view of the city. We could even see the tops of the Andes emerging from the smog. Nearby is La Chascona, one of the three homes in Chile of the nation's Nobel prizewinning poet Pablo Neruda. Neruda built the house in 1953 for his secret lover, Matilde Urrutia and named it after her (Chascona means dishevelled hair, a reference to Matilde's wild red curls). The house has been left much as it was and is evidence of Neruda's quirky taste and his love of the sea: the long, narrow downstairs dining room and bar with low ceiling are designed to look like a ship.

Walking up towards the Immaculate Conception statue at the top of San Cristóbal hill

Kev and I visited the Museo de la Memoria y los Derechos Humanos (Musuem of Memory and Human Rights), which was an absorbing insight into the 1973 coup, the death of the socialist president Salvador Allende and the following Pinochet regime that lasted until 1990. Some of the images of the torture and human rights abuse that took place were shocking, as were the figures we learned as to the impact of the dictatorship on the Chilean people - over 3,000 deaths, nearly 40,000 people tortured or imprisoned and 200,000 people exiled from the country. Controversy continues today as to the legacy of both Allende and Pinochet.

Wine tasting at Emiliana winery, in the Casablanca Valley

We escaped the city for a day with some more wine tasting in the Casablanca region, an hour or so away. Getting here by bus and then walking to three wineries was easy and a lot cheaper than all the advertised tours. We sat in the sun sampling wines and admiring the beautiful vineyards. Casablanca is known for its whites and the Gran Reserva Chardonnay at Quilmay winery was my favourite of the day - the reds were pretty good too!