Do we gotta go home?

So here we are in Santiago, within hours of having to leave for the airport, and I really don't want to go. Chile is very much to my taste (in every sense of the word), and I'd love to spend more time here.

To continue our voyage north from Antarctica...

We made our way through some of the fjords on Chile's coast, dropping in to visit a glacier, heading out to the rough Pacific beyond Chilean waters so the gamblers could have their casino, nipping back in to see the Darwin Channel – and there we were met by a pod of porpoises playing in our bow wave and wake. Oh wow! Wonderful. Amazing. Awe-inspiring. There were cameras going off all along the starboard rail, but I don't think any of us got a good picture, not even the ship's photographer. You just couldn't tell where they were going to come up. I have a few splashing tails off at the edge of one of my pictures, and that's the best I've seen. Never mind; the images will stay clear in our minds for a long time.

Landed again at Puerto Montt, still in southern Chile but in a more temperate climate – rather Vancouver-like from what I could tell. We'd signed up for the “Traditions of Chile” tour, which turned out to be the best I've been on. They took us out to a small resort town, Puerto Vargas, in an area originally settled by Germans in the mid-19^th century. It's a pretty town on the edge of a lake with a view of two only slightly dormant volcanoes not too far away. So that took care of the requisite shopping opportunity; then they took us to an estancia (ranch) owned by a former Chilean rodeo champion who is dedicated to preserving the traditions of the Chilean huasos (cowboys). They greeted us with food and drink (setting the tone for the afternoon), folk dancing by a group of talented teenaged girls and boys with music on guitar, paraguayan harp and tormento (a percussion instrument kind of like a washboard with a sounding box). They showed off their Chilean horses – a special breed that's probably very close to the original Spanish horse, intelligent, gentle and nimble, and able to run sideways. Then they took us out to the rodeo corral and gave us a demonstration of the Chilean rodeo – kind of a bullfight that does no damage to the bull except to his dignity: the idea is to get him running around the ring several times in a perfect circle and then stop him with the horses. There's a lot of skill on the part of the horses and riders, and the sideways running comes in handy. There was more food, music and dancing, and then we had to leave. Alas!

On up the coast for one more day at sea to give us a chance to pack. As we were moving about the cabin trying to fit things back into the suitcases we'd take the occasional glance out the window, and twice we saw whales right beside us. Just a glimpse of a fin or two, but definite whales. There were fishing boats out there, too, so I assume the whales and the people were after the same thing.

Landed in Valparaiso and got bussed through pretty mountainous scenery to Santiago. The next morning we navigated the metro system to the Plaza de Armas to experience the Mercado Central. We saw more kinds of seafood than I ever suspected existed and had some abalone (not all that good) for lunch. Prowled around the area some more, seeing the wool shops close for Saturday afternoon just like in Buenos Aires, and found the Museum of Precolumbian Art that Evan's friend had recommended. It is indeed a lovely place full of objects collected mostly by one man on the basis of their beauty and artistic merit, not scientific interest. They were well displayed with bilingual signs giving all kinds of useful information about what they were and the cultures they came from. Definitely a place we're glad to have seen. In the evening we went up a small mountain that's a park near our hotel and had dinner in a fine restaurant with a view of the city and the sunset on the mountains opposite.

The next morning we picked up the car Evan had reserved for us and drove south to the Colchagua Valley wine district, finding our hotel in the pretty town of Santa Cruz with no trouble at all. We enjoyed the brunch Evan had arranged for us, then booked a few wine tours for the afternoon and next day.

We saw four totally different wineries – I never suspected they could be so different. One was new and modern with its building designed along feng shui principles and its premium wine ageing in casks to the sound of Gregorian chant. Another was in an old estancia; they treated us to a horse-drawn carriage tour of their fields and a sampling of raw wine from one of their vats (smells like baby poo, one young mother in our group commented). A third had a lift to carry us up the mountain side to their display of native Chilean cultures (including Easter Island, which of course belongs to Chile) and their observatory with a collection of meteorites. The fourth, my favourite, was just a competent winery in beautiful old buildings, although the owner did like to display his collection of antique cars there, too. They have an elegant small hotel attached; my idea of a good thing to do would be to stay there during the wine festival around the second weekend in March.

It was wonderful being able to get out into the countryside and see a few things on our own. It was my first time in South America when I didn't feel like I was in Turkey. The old farm buildings are definitely sui generis, unique to Chile – long, low brick buildings with wide roof overhangs, one room thick, enclosing a central patio. The ones we were in felt cool and breezy even on a hot summer day. There were gardens full of flowers everywhere, and orchards of apples, pears, peaches, citrus fruit – whatever, all ready to be shipped to wintry Canada. It was all quite lovely.

Back to Santiago pretty well uneventfully, except for some fun trying to get back onto the highway after we got off to fill up the car, and more fun when we turned one street too early to get to the hotel. Never mind. I don't think divorce is immanent.

So today, after we've found some way of packing our souvenir wine safely, we'll leave our stuff at the hotel and head off into the city again, back to the Plaza de Armas area to find my wool shops and see what we missed there (handy hint: in South America look for the Plaza de Armas in whatever town you're visiting; that will be the old and interesting part of town), maybe back up the mountain to have one last look, and then (alas!) off to the airport for a day of flying and waiting to fly.

Final impressions of South America: don't miss it, but learn some Spanish first. Surprisingly few people speak useful amounts of English here. Fortunately Spanish is not all that hard, at least at the basic bodily needs level, but I sure wish I knew more. And I'm going to learn more. I must come back.