El Che!

Forgot to post this a while back.  I was caught in the middle of a street protest in Bolivia and managed to snap a few pictures.

While the only people with Che t-shirts in the states are hipsters and fringe leftists (I don´t say that to be offensive... but it is only a fringe, isn´t it?), he is still kickin´in Bolivia.  I couldn´t catch the details, but basically a political rally by miners for a more left-wing local government.

Random Pics

Here are a few that missed the regular updates...

Chuquicamata open pit coal mine near Calama, Chile.  The world´s biggest open-pit mine.  It is about as deep as the grand canyon and a few miles across.  Those tiny little dots on the bottom are actually giant Caterpillar trucks.

Hard to grasp the scale here... each of those terraces is between 30 and 80 feet high.  You can just barely make out the construction traffic if you look hard.

Peruvian burger chain, Cuzco, Peru.  Lots of really interesting flavors.

Overwhelming gas station signage, Atacama Desert, Chile.  5 star bathrooms, see-saws, food, indigenous pottery, and they even have a blank box in case they need one more!

McColloso sounds more impressive than ¨waffle cone¨.  Santiago, Chile.

Chile - Wine Country Part II

Cousiño-Macul cellars, Santiago, Chile

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Santiago has a couple of great wineries accessible by public transport, and I had a few days to kill.  It was a match made in heaven.

Chilean wine is good, and its cheap, which makes it good for people without a lot of money to spend but who like something a step up from Franzia or Yellow Tail.

The two wineries I visited were very different - Cousiño-Macul is a medium-sized winery that has been owned by the same family for over a century.  The site is quaint and the corporate culture has that small-company feel.

Concha y Toro, on the other hand, is Chile´s largest winery and South America´s largest exporter.  The Company´s revenues are nearly a billion dollars and it is publicly traded on the NYSE.  The culture is professional and efficient.

Wines at both places were fantastic.  They have some highly rated wines for $20 or less.  Concha´s Marques de Casa Concha label and Cousiño´s Antiguas Reservas label are both very good.  

Cousiño-Macul cellars, Santiago, Chile.  These big oak fermentation tanks were in use until about a decade ago.

The more modern kind of wine production.  Cousiño-Macul, Chile.

This year´s production in stainless steel tanks.  Cousiño-Macul, Chile.

Cousiño-Macul cellars, Chile.

Cousiño-Macul cellars, Chile.  Most of the company´s wine is aged in another, much larger, facility offsite.

Cousiño-Macul cellars, Chile.

Cousiño-Macul family cellars, Chile.  These old bottles are part of the family´s private wine collection.

Cousiño-Macul.  A 1937 cab on display.

Cousiño-Macul showroom, Santiago, Chile

Cousiño-Macul logo, Chile

Cousiño-Macul´s midrange wine. Retails for about $20 in the states.

Enjoying a little wine tasting at the vineyard.

Some Brazilians being fabulous as they wait for their shuttle after the wine tasting.

Concha y Toro - Chile´s biggest winery.  The restaurant and showroom is located on an estate that used to be the family´s summer home!  Here is the main house / mansion.

Concha y Toro varietal garden, Santiago, Chile

Concha y Toro cellars, Santiago, Chile

Concha y Toro uses a combination of French and American oak barrels... apparently French oak is more expensive.  The barrels cost a few thousand dollars, they use them for a few years, and then re-sell them to other 2nd tier wine producers, or port producers. 

Concha y Toro cellars, Santiago, Chile

Concha y Toro cellars, Santiago, Chile. It gets dark down there!  Like Cousiño-Macul, the company moved its main production facilities far outside of Santiago a long time ago and only a few wines spend time here, to give tourists a sense of what the winery used to be like.

Concha y Toro cellars, Santiago, Chile

May 27th - Adios, Don Quixote

I took my time driving to Santiago.  It was a warm, sunny day and I only had 100km to do.

Somehow, I managed to navigate the city and find Motoaventura Chile, at 8000 John F. Kennedy, northeast of the city center.

I had made it.

But it almost seemed like a non-event.  I went through my checklist - repack, clean my helmet, check the bike back in, calculate the damages.

The Don had suffered a bit of wear and tear.  The rear brake light had gone out completely, the front brake caliper was clogged with dirt, which meant I did the last 500km without much of a front brake, and the tires were pretty worn.  There was also a broken gas cap, my fault since I had been loopy one morning and kicked it after fueling up in Valparaiso.  I hope they fixed that on the new model GS because it is really, really annoying to kick your gas cap in the morning and realize that you just caused $200 of damage.

My trail backpack felt foreign,  too heavy.  I was making the transition from motorcycle traveler to backpacker again.  There's less anxiety, there's more camaraderie at the local hostels, but there's less adventure.  I felt like I was trading in my flying wings, or getting a desk job, or something.

That afternoon I felt triumphant.  I had driven over 7,000 miles, some of it in pretty extreme conditions, and somehow, miraculously, I didn't get anything more serious than some windburn.  Secretly, I think I was expecting worse, maybe a lot worse.  There were a couple of close calls - getting lost north of Mendoza, the fried battery in Salta... but they all turned out OK.

Letting go of the bike meant letting go of a bit of liberty, but also some of those anxieties that were sitting in the attic of my brain for the last three months.

And I felt ready to head back to family and friends, even if I wasn´t ready to stop traveling.  My biggest fear hitting the road was getting lonely, isolated - whatever you want to call it.  Somehow, that never happened.  Between hostels, Skype, and the kindness of strangers I always felt like there were kindred spirits around me.

I wonder how the feeling will change over time... I´m writing this in early June and I already miss the open road a bit.

Hanging up the helmet for the last time...

12,000km

Heading toward the finish line... total count - 12,200km, or 7,320 miles.

Mutumbo

How about this for a quirky candy bar with politically incorrect sexual overtones.

Roadside snacks

There´s a region just north of Santiago that´s famous for sweets, La Ligua (if memory serves me right...)

It´s kind of quirky, and probably a little dangerous, but all along the highway there are women with little baskets of cookies and pastries that wave down oncoming cars with those little white flags.  Folks stop, stock up, and then keep going.  

Chile - Wine Country

Indomita Vineyards, Casblanca Valley, Chile

A classy end to a long trip.

Chile´s wine country stretches around and down from Santiago towards the west and south  With all the tourists heading for beaches or mountains, most are well-prepared to handle tours.

I swung by two vineyards and had a chance to see a different side of Chile´s export economy.  Demand for both the mines and the vineyards are increasingly being driven by China, but that might be only thing they have in common.  Men in hardhats were replaced by gracious hostesses and refineries were replaced by brand new wine showrooms.

Most of the wine business is relatively new - think 1980 and after - in this region, so the owners are eager to please and to grow their business.  A good way to spend a day (or two... or three)... although I had to go really easy on the wine and be ready to head to Santiago the day after.

Casas del Bosque vineyard, Casablanca Valley, Chile

Tasting paraphernalia, Casas del Bosque Vineyards, Casablanca Valley 

paraphernalia

Casas del Bosque vineyards, Chile

Casas del Bosque vineyards.  I arrived towards the end of the harvest and there was plenty of activity at the production facility.

Casas del Bosque vineyards.  More premium wines spend some time in these French oak casks.  Mid-range wines will do about a year and super-premium wines will do about 2.  Table wines usually go straight from the tank into bottles, or are ´aged´ in the stainless steel tanks for a few months.

Casas del Bosque vineyards.  Fermentation in process.

Barrel markings, Casas del Bosque vineyards.

Casas del Bosque, Chile.  Aging cellar.

Casas del Bosque vineyards, entrance.

Casas del Bosque.  Very thoughtful decor and architecture throughout their facility.

Casas del Bosque.

Casas del Bosque, tasting room.

Casas del Bosque, entrance.

Casas del Bosque.  You can see fall is in full swing in the southern hemisphere...

Casablanca, Chile.  Lunch.  

Indomita Vineyards, main entrance.  Outstanding restaurant, but the wine wasn´t quite as good as Casas d. Bosque.

Indomita vineyards.  Outstanding views from their restaurant and showroom.

Indomita vineyards.  Feels like winter here.