Valparaiso, Chile - March 20, 2014

We spent two days at sea, with the weather warming gradually.  On the second day we saw several whales.  Also on the second day it was my turn for a haircut.  It was a joint project, with me cutting the front and David cutting the back.  It turned out pretty good.

We arrived in Valparaiso at 5:00 in the morning.  We had anticipated this to be one of the best ports, and we were not disappointed.  When we got off the ship, we were immediately put on a shuttle bus to take us to the passenger terminal, about a mile away.  We were just kind of dumped on the street, left to figure out what to do.  We walked back in the direction we came from, eventually getting back to the exact spot where the ship was docked.  On the way, we walked through a busy produce market.  

Once again, we found a city that felt very European. 

 

From there we started to follow a walking tour that I had found.  We soon abandoned it.

Downtown Valparaiso is flat, but the city rises quickly into the hills.  It is totally surrounded by very steep hills, crammed with houses and commercial buildings hanging on for dear life.  The area we walked in is the artsy neighborhood.  Many of the buildings are painted with a mixture of graffiti and street art in bright colors. 

There are about 40 very steep hills, with lots of equally steep stairways.  

 
















Fifteen of them have funiculars, which are over one hundred years old.  We took two of them, and it was quite exciting. 

We had lunch at a small cafe high in the hills.  We sat on the patio and looked out over the city.  There was an area of cemeteries, but we couldn't find any that were open.  One had the gate open for work being done, but the guard dog chased us out.   

We walked back to the terminal to catch the shuttle back to the ship.  We arrived back in time for tea. 

We decided that it was time to try having dinner in the dining room.  We both ordered the turkey dinner, which turned out to be disappointing.  Too much meat, not enough vegetables, and dressing that had tons of bacon in it.  I'm sorry, it was really not good.  It was also our misfortune to be there for the parade of the baked Alaska.  Woohoo!  Oh, well, we tried.

We set sail at 7:00 bound for Coquimbo, Chile, tomorrow morning.