Valle de Elqui

La Serena is a historical city in Chile, but most people go to La Serena because it is the front door to the Valle de Elqui a absolutely beautiful valley formed by the Elqui River. This valley is a prime place for growing grapes because of the winds and perfect light conditions.

We signed up for a Valle tour our first day in La Serena because we knew that is was a must on our visit list. We were picked up by our tour guide in a large van early in the morning from our hostel. After a short introduction to the tour and the local area we were off to the valley. During the tour we stopped a number of different places including a farm for the fruit chirimoya. If you click on the link it will take you to the wikipedia site for the fruit so you can see a picture and learn more about it. It is a very popular fruit in Chile, and I don't believe that there is an equivalent in the United States.

After the chirimoya farm we went to quite a few little towns in the valley which were all quite quaint. Most of them had a church that was very nice looking and of course good views of the Elqui River.

We also visited a dam that was built on the river. it regulates the water in times of floods and provides and excellent source of electricity. At the dam there was a very neat sculpture that had been designed as a gift to the Chilean people. It was a sculpture that had strings tied across it and as the wind blew through the valley and over the dam, the wind would vibrate the strings which were tuned to make a very harmonious sound. It was a really unique item. The dam had a side section that served as an emergency route when high water approached the top of the dam. In this section you could see very large fish swimming. Many people find dams like this to be horrible for the environment and I am sure that they are in some cases, however this dam and a debate on dams in Patagonia for my Spanish class forced me to research dams. The truth is you can actually build dams that do not hinder the ability of fish to spawn and you can create dams that are less envasive on the environment. I am not sure if this dam was built in this fashion, but I hope those fish survive.

After the dam we went to an artisan pisco factory. Pisco is kind of like a whisky however it is made from fermented grapes instead of fermented grain. The factory sells pisco which is artisan, meaning that it is made in small quantities and only sold in special places.. or it could also just be a tourist snag. Either way, I fell for it and bought some of the artisan pisco so that I can bring it home and share it with people. They also produced a special line of mango sour a drink where mango juice and pisco are mixed. I also bought some of this to bring home as well. I tried it and it was very, very good. The mango is a fruit which is grown all over the Elqui valley and thus, mango sour is a nice touch to remember the valley.

Our lunch was included and we went to this little hostel/restaurant that seemed like it was in a little crevice of the valley where no one could find it. The food was very good and after lunch we had the opportunity to chill in their lush green backyard. The people were especially friendly and I had a long conversation with one of the waitresses after lunch.

Pisco Elqui is a town that is named because of the abundance of pisco plants and factories in the valley. It is a famous town for the region which hosts many tourists throughout the tourist season. Rumor has it that the Chilean Government changed the town's name by law to Pisco Elqui in an effort to show that pisco is actually a Chilean invention. This fight between Peru and Chile continues today. Many people on both sides believe that Pisco was originally their drink. Thus there are "pisco" cities, valleys, rivers, roads, etc. to try and make that clear. I will not take a position on this on going fight, I will just say that I very much enjoy a fresh pisco sour now and then. In Pisco Elqui our tour group got about a half hour to enjoy the little town and visit the church and other historical sights.

After Pisco Elqui normally the tour would go the birth place of Gabriel Mistral

, however, because our group wanted to visit the Elqui river our guide drove us to the river instead. We all got our feet wet in the river, but it was extremely cold because the water is straight from the snow melt. While it was bone chillingly cold, it was refreshing. After the river most of us fell asleep on our ride to Vicunia one of the larger cities in the valley.

Vicunia is the birth town of Gabriel Mistral, and author and winner of the first Chilean Nobel Prize in Literature. In the town there is a museum dedicated to her as well as just a nice little pueblito (little town). Our group was let off here for a few hours because we had reservations for a Observatory Tour that evening in Vicunia, thus we were allowed to hang out in the city while the others returned to La Serena and the tour guide brought a new group of tourists into the valley. During our few hours of freedom we got dinner and ice cream. It was a fun time just hanging out and the ice cream was delicious. Rumor has it that in Vicunia you can find Avacado flavored ice cream. We looked but didn't end up finding it.