First we discovered that in honor of International Women's Day (which is tomorrow) there were various events going on around the city. In the park right by our house was a huge fair going on with booths focused on everything ranging from women's health issues to arts and crafts.
After an obligatory stop at the girls favorite tree....
.... we headed on towards downtown. We made a detour to pick up something from a shop (which turned out to be closed on Saturdays) but in finding our way back towards the Plaza de Armas--now from a slightly new direction--we stumbled across what we think is the most spectacular historical site in Santiago. In all of my digging around on websites to determine the various sites we should see here in the city, I never noticed this one, and I'm not sure why. It's a whole castle, right in the middle of the city!
I was all geared up to write a blog post about how modern Santiago is--there's very little here that gives the country a distinctive Spanish flavor like most of the other countries beginning with Mexico and continuing all the way down through South America. I learned that the primary reason for this is not because those structures weren't built here, but rather because all of them have fallen down due to earthquakes throughout the centuries. Because of the extreme seismic activity here, there is very little remaining from the days of the Spanish conquest.
However, apparently there are a few structures here in the city that are not completely brand-spanking new, this castle being a perfect example! The hill itself on which the castle is built was called the Huelen by the native people prior to the 16th century. Then Pedro de Valdivia conquered the area in 1541 on the day of Santa Lucia, and that's the name that stuck--Santa Lucia Hill. The spot was used for military defense throughout the years, however, the fort that rests there now was not constructed until 1816-1820.
We had a load of fun exploring the place (which, by the way, is completely free to the public--just like a regular park).
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| This picture doesn't look like much, but I took it because the small mountain behind the trees is Cerro San Cristobal, the one that I hike up numerous times each week. If the trees weren't in the way, you might even be able to see the Santa Maria statue at the top..... |
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| The fort is nestled right in among some really cool natural rock formations. |
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| This is one of the few places I've seen anything with Moorish influence here in Santiago. |
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| View of the top part of the fort from the gardens below |
Then more exploring and fun with fountains on our way out.
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| The stone steps here were extremely steep. It was hard to walk down them, but I discovered that this was not the only risk involved when I managed to drop my phone at one point while trying to take a picture. It kept falling down one step after the other like a fast moving slinky, and I couldn't catch up with it! Finally some nice guy coming up the other direction rescued it for me and handed it back. Good thing I had a good case on it, or it would have likely been in multiple pieces by that point! |
After our unexpected visit to the fort, we redirected ourselves back towards the Plaza de Armas, gleaning some organic treasures along the way.
The Santiago Metropolitan Cathedral is huge and impressive. It was built roughly between 1750 and 1800 (as I mentioned before, earlier cathedrals in the city had been destroyed by earthquakes). My phone did a poor job of photographing the inside, but it at least captured (sort of) the immensity of the place.
On the way home we meandered down the Paseo Ahumada which is in fact a whole web of wide pedestrian-only streets that surround the Plaza de Armas. It's a really fun place to hang out: great people watching, and so nice to not have the noise and annoyance of cars going by.
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