La Serena (Coquimbo), Chile - Elqui Valley

Monday March 5

I had set up a private tour with Jaime at https://www.patagoniashorex.com/

He was so helpful in setting up not just this tour, but our overland from Pisco to Lima and on to Lake Titicaca for 2 nights before rejoining the ship in Lima on the second day there.

We were joined today by Trish & Gary and Donna.

Our tour was Elqui Valley & Vicuña & Solar Restaurant Lunch  https://www.patagoniashorex.com/tour/vicuna-elqui-valley/

Well, the Captain once again arrived in port late. Over an hour this time. It was nearly 9:00 when we finally got docked. He also had our all aboard at 5:30. (not the 6:30 it should have been) We didn't leave until about 7:45 this evening.....

Finding the tour guide was easy as he was right where he was supposed to be holding a sign with my name on it. (something that hasn't gone that smoothly on many tours this trip) Nicholas was with us as was a driver.

 sail in

We started our journey to the Elqui Valley which is a narrow fertile strip of land in the middle of a desert plateau and is irrigated by the Elqui River. It about an hour and a half drive through beautiful scenery. Our first stop was at Viña Falernia for a restroom stop. We had samples of papaya juice and they had their wine for sale and many people got stocked up.

OK, here's where it starts to get weird. There were 2 vans; we had our private group of 5 and Gregg (another CC member) had a private group of around 10 people. We saw them at the port and didn't think much of it other than we had booked the same company. At the restroom stop we waited for their group before continuing on. They had a guide that was full of information and she also took all of our orders for lunch so the solar restaurant could be prepared for us. We were told we would all be eating together. We didn't have a problem with that, but not sure why we had to caravan behind them and wait for them at every stop. We didn't how much it would impact our day at the time, but as the day progressed we realiazed it impacted us a lot. We might as well have all been in one van (we would have fit) if we had to tour with them. The whole point of booking a smaller private group is to move about more quickly and go at our own pace, not wait for 10 more people. In fact, we pay more to do that.

We passed through typical Andean villages such as Algarrobito, El Molle and El Tambo. We passed many vinyards where the grapes that are cultivated to produce a typical Chilean liquor called “Pisco” were growing.

Burrowing Parakeets

We made a few stops for photos of the beautiful mountains, crops growing up the mountains, vineyards and the Elqui River flowing through it. Rolling hills and the cactus-dotted Atacama Desert. We could see the Tololo Observatory but we had to ask what it was since our "guide" didn't tell us anything. If asked a question he would answer, but never volunteered any information on the area we were seeing. More often than not his answer was "I don't know".

Chilean Mockingbird

Common Diuca-Finch

 Chilean Mockingbird

We stopped at Pisco Elqui where there was a town square and a lovely church.  We also stopped at “Bauer Tower”, a symbol of the city, where the first town hall of the Elqui valley was located, and its characteristic “La Inmaculada Concepción”. Again, we wait for the other group before continuing on. It seemed a bit like we were "killing time" waiting for the restaurant to be ready for us.

 paint the poles to match the wall - genius!

Our next stop was at Monte Grande the tallest mountain in the region and there was a beautiful old church there as well.

From there we went to lunch at the Solar Restaurant where all the food is cooked by sunlight in solar ovens. Capel Lo Autentico del Pisco was the restaurant and we saw the ovens where the food was being cooked. Greg & I ordered empanada appetizers and Goat meat with either rice or mashed potatoes. They also offered choices of soup or salad instead of an empanada and for the main they offered beef, vegetarian or pork. We were served rolls made in the ovens. Lunch seemed to take a long time as they were treating us like one big group. We were told we weren't having desert, but they came around and got our choices. So, that took more time.

 unscheduled grape drying plant

 Solar Restaurant

 solar ovens

 empanada

 goat and potatoes

When it was time to leave we pulled out, but our driver had to wait for the other van as she didn't know which way to go. I think we were following the other van because she didn't know the route. Our "guide" said she didn't know the route and it wasn't his job to tell her. His name was Nicholas and he told us nothing in the van, he just spent all of his time on his phone trying to get his next job. He had graduated as was receiving job offers. So, the real guide was on the other van. The driver bumped into another van trying to back up to make room for our other van to get out of the driveway. Just a tap, but still......

Now, our day really fell apart. At lunch we were told we would have to skip Vicuña since we were running short on time. He said the Pisco distillery would take 45 minutes. Then we would have 30 minutes or so at the market in La Serena at the end of our day.

We arrived at Aba Pisquera Distillery. Pisco is one of the national drinks of Chile. We spent about 5 minutes being shown the barrels and vats with some explanation from the other van's guide. Then we went to the tasting and sales office. We each got a sip of 2 different flavors and they were the low alcohol content, but the bottles they sell were high alcohol content. One person said you expect us to buy it without tasting it? So, they finally let a couple people taste it. A few people bought some and in less than 20 minutes we were finished with that stop.

Then, we drove through Vicuna with no explanation of what we were passing. Then we had the drive back towards the port in La Serena where we also were supposed to tour. However, we got to the market and were told we have only 10 minutes as we were running way late. The other van stopped for unscheduled photo stops which ate up a lot of time. (of course we had to stop since they did) My group was beyond pissed off at this point.

The Recova market was selling mostly a lot of "junk". In all fairness, if we had had at least 30 minutes there I'm sure we could have found some fun stuff. Donna and I were just looking for a decent magnet, but they really didn't have much. Then, we made our way back to the port. 

it was huge and went way back inside and on both sides

On the beach road the other van decided to make yet another photo stop. We said we want to keep going, but it didn't matter since they were ahead of us, we couldn't get past them in traffic to go around them. We did see some sea lions on the beach.

 molting sea lion

 sea lions

We arrived back at the port and did some power shopping to get rid of our leftover Chilean Pesos. There were no magnets, but Greg got a bottle of wine and I bought a nice pair of earrings made from their pretty blue stones.

sail away

Back on board with a few minutes to spare we regrouped and grabbed dinner upstairs in the buffet and went to the early show which was Jesse & Colleen Kazemek doing a Beatles tribute. They were entertaining. After that we went to the Motown trivia and did pretty well for just the 2 of us (instead of teams of 6) though we just play along we don't sign up or anything.

Then back to the cabin to get ready for bed. We now have 2 sea days before Pisco, Peru. We got an extra hour of sleep tonight and will get another hour tomorrow night.

La Serena & Elqui Valley Chile https://photos.app.goo.gl/2o4ysPzZNbi2pfXL2