Roadtrip Peru, Bolivia & Chili - Part 10
La Serena - Saturday 23-09-2023
Today we drive to La Serena. A trip of about 400 km. A striking phenomenon are all the graves along the highway. A bizarre thing and there are really hundreds of them. Every grave gets its attention and is well maintained!!! Big ones, small ones, colourful... with pictures or without. They are so impressive that they can make a highway change course. They are untouchable. And the message that remains is that anything can change course at any time....
For me, it is a good reminder to drive especially carefully and stay extremely alert. It seems so easy!!! Driving straight for hundreds of kilometres. But apparently this simplicity has become the final blow for a large number of road users. Perhaps the "monotony" and rough landscape is the assassin. Slowly sinking into nothingness!!!!!
In Huasco, in the middle of nowhere, nothing than a little truckers bar/restaurant. But for us this is a oasis………. We have coffee! And good coffee! ☕️🍪❤️ We refuelled, filled our bottles with more coffee and moved on.
Hostal El Arbol Eco Lodge
The road is fairly quiet and around 4pm we arrive at Hostal El Arbol Eco Lodge. A truly beautiful place!!! The moment we drive there, we look at each other a few times. We drive across an industrial estate, very messy 🤪🤪. But as soon as we are through the gate we enter a beautiful garden and an oasis of tranquillity.
La Serena, Elqui Valley & Vicuña - Sunday 24-09-2024
A good breakfast, in a beautiful garden! Full of lavender!
A stop at the beach and the lighthouse.
And on the way to Vicuña. But just before we leave La Serena we see a beautiful Procession. The people are very devoted, beautiful to see.
The first stop is the Puclaro reservoir. The Puclaro reservoir is located in the Elqui Valley, about 50 km east of the city of La Serena at an altitude of 432 metres above sea level. The climate in this area is Mediterranean dry, with highly irregular annual rainfall. Despite this limitation for agriculture, the climate allows crops of remarkable quality to be grown here, especially fruit. Its purpose is to improve the irrigation of 21,000 ha of farmland in the Elqui valley. The reservoir also offers stunning views. On the dam is a huge wind harp. This harp gives magical and unmistakable sound in the Elqui valley.
Vicuña, the capital of the Elqui Valley and also the largest city in the region. In Plaza de Vicuña you will find an area full of history, starting with the peace monument with at its base "the rose of the four winds". It is a monument that you also come across in other parts of the world, as it was originally written in 80 different languages to express the same message: 'May peace prevail in the world'.
The city is dedicated to poet and Nobel Prize winner for Literature Gabriela Mistral, where we follow her indelible artistic footprint through a walk through the streets lined with colonial-style buildings from the early 1900s.
We discovered another treasure in Vicuña! Artisanal ICE CREAM!!!!!
Vicuña is the birthplace of the best artisanal ice cream in the whole region. It is impossible to visit this town in El Valle del Elqui without tasting the variety of ice creams, very well served and in generous portions.
Locals recommend that you stop at several ice cream parlours during your walk and tasted the ice cream, as they are all delicious and part of the experience of visiting the town. Indeed, there is an annual national competition here: "The Best Picada of Chile", which awards the best ice cream every year. Among the postulates are usually the classiest establishments and ice cream parlours that outdo themselves year after year.
La Bilbaina is the oldest, with more than 65 years of ice cream preparation beginning with age-old and artisanal freezing methods, using natural snow. There we chose our ice cream: Sjak with lemon and cactus and Lara with desert flower and raspberry.
Observatório La Pangue
After our pleasant stay in Vicuña, we decide to drive to Observatório La Pangue. Hoping to see some desert flowers and possibly get a ticket for the observatory. A beautiful drive, but apart from one cactus (one of many thousands) that bore red fruits an flowers, there is no colour or flower to be found. We keep on climbing to Observatório La Pangue and have to take a lot of hairpin bends along deep ravines!!
Once we arrive at the observatory, we find ourselves in front of a closed gate. Nothing to be seen and nothing to do and certainly no ticket sales 🤪🤪. But the scenery is fantastic and so is the way back to Vicuña.
Pisco Elqui
After the valley of Observatório La Pangue, we decide to drive the valley to Pisco Elqui before it becomes dark. A trip of about 50 km. That will be a fast drive because dusk has already set in. The valley is beautiful. The town of Pisco Elqui is not really special except for the fact that the famous Pisco is distilled here. Known for the Pisco Sour. A nice aperitif after a good meal. By now it is dark and on the way back we are greatly delayed by a procession. After more than three quarters of an hour, we can continue and still have a 100-km to go.
Back in La Serene we are very thirsty and like a beer but everything is closed………accept one!!!
🔥 "MY LIFE FOR A BEER!" 🍺❤️
This sentence has never made more sense than today! 🤪🤪🤪
We found it!
🎯
