THE OCEAN IS A MAGNET

Sunday, December 27, 2009

Luis Alberta suggested we visit to Santa Cruz which is 35 km west of San Fernando. We did not really find anything that interested us and were more amused with the mesh of wires above the ground, which obstructed the view of some very interesting buildings I wanted to take pictures of.

In almost any community with more than 2,000 citizens there is always a Rotary Club. Many of them have some sort of statue or plaque.



For some reason we decide to change directions from here on. Instead of going further south via the autopista, we continue west and drive through wine country in the valley of Colchagua.


Here it’s nothing but vine yards, orchards and farms, tucked in between the mountains. We are not in a hurry and want to enjoy this trip.
We stop here and there, buy some buns for Ramiro’s lunch and some avocadoes.

As we enter one of the villages, there are signs every where for Mote con Huesillos, a traditional drink, made with barley and dried peaches, cooked with water and sugar. Its a nostalgic moment for Ramiro which he enjoys immensely.

Most of the houses here are either made of wood or brick. From the many brick pyramids along the road we learn that here the bricks are being baked.
The brick pyramids are covered with mud and straw to keep the air out. On the bottom a few small openings are left where the wood goes in. This get lit and the brick get baked.

Cowboys or Huasos are part of the scenery. We watch a group of these cowboys cross the river. What a scene. Give me country life any time above city life.

The Mataquito river runs all the way from the middle of the country and end up in the sea. We follow it for most of the trip west and stop to walk across the suspension bridge just for the fun of it.

The ocean seems to work like a magnet. From here we are suppose to go south toward Concepcion, but in stead we continue west and stop in Iloca, a small beach area for the local people. It’s nothing more than one long street, with lots of cabins, hostels, pensions and hotels on the beach side and some small stores and simple vacation homes on the other side of the road.

We find a Residential “Lomas del Mar” with a small restaurant, right along the beach. It’s perfect for us. For $ 12.00 per person we have a nice room with private bathroom and some sort of view of the ocean. In some places you pay $200,00 per night for such a view.
Oh sure, you’ll also get nice fluffy towels and a bar of soap and shampoo, a telephone and a large TV. But we don’t need all that luxury. We’re quite content with the simple stuff and have everything we need. We do need to bring our own towels however, which is just perfect, because we just bought some beach towels yesterday. We also need to strip the bed when we leave. No problem for me, I’ll even wash dishes if is helps us with our budget.

The first thing we do, is buy a small bottle of wine from the restaurant, take it to the beach along with two wine glasses, and toast to heaven on earth.  After a nice long walk along the beach we take a short nap and head to the restaurant downstairs. Of course when you are at the coast you must eat seafood. We order Paila Marina. A seafood soup. The spectacular sunset alone was worth the price we paid for our meal and the wine. What a fantastic experience. We certainly do not take this for granted.