The Look of Argentina and Chile

 

Our trip took us to four countries: Argentina, Uruguay, the Falkland Islands, and Chile. I covered the Falkland Islands last week and will make a stop at Uruguay next week. However, most of our time was spent in Argentina and Chile, and this post is limited to them.

The photo at the top of this post shows both countries. Chile is very long but very narrow. From the town of Fruitillar, Chile, which is about an hour from the Pacific coast, you can look across a lake and see several volcanos. The one on the left is in Chile and the one on the right is in Argentina.

We started our cruise in Buenos Aires, which is known for its colorful buildings, especially in La Boca, which was originally a poor Italian neighborhood. The only way the residents could get paint for their houses was to use the leftovers from the ships that arrived at the port. So they might have enough blue for part of the house and use yellow or red for the rest, or maybe they would need three colors to complete the exterior. La Boca is no longer a poor neighborhood (mostly tourist shops now), but the tradition has continued.

The following photos show one of the buildings in La Boca, with a figure representing Eva Perón in the center, and the iconic pink government building where Eva used to give speeches from the balcony.

The cruise ended at Valparaiso, Chile, which had its own peculiarities. It isn’t the only city on a hill with houses built over empty space, but the sight is still fascinating. The next photo shows residences hanging from the hill.

Valparaiso is a historic city and building owners can do whatever they want to the interior but aren’t allowed to demolish or change the outside of an old building. The following photo shows a creative developer’s solution—and he apparently got away with it.

It isn’t just the buildings that are interesting, though. The scenery along the cruise route was spectacular. The next three photos were taken from our ship. The first shows the scenery we sailed by, and the following two are of the Amalia Glacier at the end of a fiord.

I’ll finish this series next week by talking about some of the entertainment we took in along the way.