But before I get into the latest adventures, here is an update on our trip to Chile.
Teatro del Lago
Nathan spent a week rehearsing at the Teatro del Lago, which is a new theater in Frutillar (close to Puerto Montt on the map below). The project included 60 or so musicians (choir, orchestra, and soloists). The first concerts were performed at the same theater, followed by another concert further north in Temuco, and finishing with a concert in Santiago. I flew in to Santiago in time to see the final concert in Santiago and then we had a few weeks to explore Chile before flying back to Spain.
As always, this music project was a great opportunity to make new friends and new connections. By the end of the project, Nathan had been invited to stay with multiple different people in Santiago as well as elsewhere in Chile and in South America. :) We were delighted to get to spend part of our time staying with these new friends in Santiago as it is always nicer and much more interesting to stay with locals rather than in hostels.
Santiago is a huge city, but it has a good metro system so it is pretty easy to get around. Everyone we met was very friendly, but the one big drawback while we were there was the smog. As Santiago is in a valley, smog is easily trapped. There were some days where it was so hazy we couldn't see the surrounding mountains, so we were looking forward to getting out of the city so that we could breathe a little easier.
We stayed pretty close to the Santiago area during our time in Chile. Some of the highlights were visiting the Isla Negra (one of Pablo Neruda's houses), seeing all the colors and murals of Valparaíso (World Heritage City about an hour away from Santiago), and camping along the coast in Pichilemu at an awesome little campground (Pichilemu is famous internationally for its surfing championships).
Chilean Spanish
I was very curious to see how Chilean Spanish sounded to me, after spending an extended time in Spain, and especially in Andalucía. Chileans are famous for speaking quickly and "eating their words" (which means dropping syllables or final consonants). However, we were pleasantly surprised that our "training" in Andalucía had us well prepared. Chilean Spanish seemed to be no more difficult than understanding the 'Andalú' of Granada. :)
However, vocabulary was another thing. It was fascinating to once again be at a stage where we would pick up a menu and hardly recognize/understand a single thing on the menu! Many vegetables and fruits have different names in Chile, and Chile has many special food dishes that, of course, have their own special names as well.
Some vocab or expressions were the same as in Mexico, and it was funny for me to have to revert back to vocab that I have been working so hard to replace with vocab from Spain. :) So many words that Spaniards have corrected for me, that I then had Chileans re-correcting me back to the original word. Sigh. ;) For Nathan the new words were just new, as his vocabulary was strictly from Spain.
Chilean Food
Chileans seem to be really into sweet food, at least when it comes to beverages and breakfast. We stayed at a hostel with bed and breakfast and were served, not only bread with a variety of jams and sweet spreads, but also cake, sweetened fruit juice, jello, sweet yogurt and fruit!
We enjoyed sampling a few Chilean specialties such as Completos (fancy hot dogs that come with a ton of different vegetables and sauces, usually heaped with some kind of guacamole), Empanadas (pastry stuffed with pretty much any combo of vegetables, meat, chicken, seafood, and cheese), and Mote con Huesillo (a drink made from peach nectar that also has a small canned peach and a good serving of boiled wheat, which is like barley... which might sound strange, but was actually delicious!). We also ate a LOT of avocados, which are called "paltas" in Chile. The mother of the couple we stayed with in Valparaíso gave us a couple of paltas off of their tree. Seriously, this has been a good year for avocados. :)
Pichilemu
Our original plan had been to go surfing at Pichilemu, as it is world renown for it's surf. However, we were there just in time for some of the biggest waves they have seen this season (as it is currently fall, nearing winter in Chile)... and as we met a few locals who were fairly good amateur surfers who were NOT surfing because the waves were so big... we decided my one weekend worth of experience, plus Nathan's one weekend from 8 years ago or so, was not quite sufficient to brave the waves. We'll have to go sometime this summer in Spain, as we have been told summer in Spain is good for beginners as the waves are always small. :)
The advantage of the big waves was the opportunity to watch the professionals surf them! We rented bikes one day and cycled out to Punto de Lobos, the spot with the biggest waves where there are usually people on jet-skis accompanying the surfers to rescue them if they fall.
Return to Spain
We finished off our trip in Santiago once again, and had a lovely last gathering with all of the choir friends who live in Santiago. We tried to convince our friends that we had become very tanned while we were at the coast... and we were heartily laughed at. Even though it was true!! But in Chile we are both extremely "rubio", and apparently our change from very white to still quite white wasn't very noticeable. ;)
We then flew back to Spain! Landed in Madrid with a few days to try to get over jet lag and prepare for the visit from Nathan's family. But I will save our Madrid stories for my next post.
Overall Chile was lovely and the culture of hospitality and warmth was one of the strongest impressions we had of the country. It is not a cheap place to travel (prices are very similar to Canada actually...), but worth seeing for sure. Who knows? Maybe Nathan will get invited to do another project at the Teatro del Lago and we'll have another excuse to come back one day.
Love and blessings,
Candyce
