On Saturday morning, we rented a Toyota Yaris and headed south to the Andes, to the area of Banos Morales, just South of Santiago.
It took about 1 hour to get out of the city and into the outskirts of the Andes mountains. The towns just outside of the city were filled with restaurants, wineries and ranches, where you could take horse back riding day trips along the base of the mountains and glacier-fed rivers. We continued to follow the road towards Banos Morales and pretty soon the towns were few and far between, and the paved road ended and became a dirt road. The mountains were breath-taking and the best part was that we had the views almost completely to ourselves!
We stopped Termas Morales for a picnic on the bank of a stream that jetted out of the side of the mountain. Unfortuantely, the banos (hot springs) we closed - we think that there were a lot of rock slides after the earthquake which limited road access to some of the areas in the mountain passes. We continued on the road until we could not drive any further (which turned out to be about 6 km from the Argentinian boarder), then took the stroller out of the car and walked to take in the incredible views. Some of the areas appeared to have been mined - there was a gypsum operation that we drove through and you could see some scars on the mountains were there may have been other mining, for minerals like copper. The mountains were completely different looking compared to the Rockies - very arid, with small green scrub in lower elevations, but mostly orange/yellow rock. We did see several glaciers high up in the mountains near the end of the road.
On the way back, the sun was low in the sky and casting beautiful shadows across the autumn scenery. Road side stands were a buzz, selling fresh nuts (walnuts, almonds) and honey. The boys fell happily asleep as we traversed the roads, back to the main thoroughfares heading back into Santiago. When we got back, we all showered to rid ourselves of the dust (which got into everything) and headed out for a dinner at Parque Araco, where they had a live band singing tunes from Cold Play, The Police, etc. It was an awesome day!
On Sunday we took the kids to the aquarium at the MIM (Museo Interteracto Mirador), an interactive museum for kids. The aquarium was pretty tiny and was damaged in the quake, so there wasn't tons to see, but the both kids got a kick out of the small selection of fish and a very entertaining parrot show.
Note about music in Chile - Surprisingly, we hear a LOT of Canadian music in Chile, including Celene Dion, Brian Adams, Alanis Morissette, Rush, etc. There is also another strange Canadian connection. Providencia, the very trendy commercial area in central-Eastern Santiago is named after the Sisters of the Devine Providence who arrived in Chile, from Canada, in 1853. Apparently they were headed to Oregon, but Oregon was flooded at the time and they couldn't figure out how to get back to Canada so they met a captain of a Chilean ship and came to Santiago, where the government of the time encouraged them to continue their charity work.
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