We bused 16+ hours and made it from northern Chile to less-northern Chile (this country is really as long as it is thin!). Known for laid-back villages, Pisco-production, and stargazing, we knew we couldn’t go wrong in Vicuña, Chile.

A first feast on our personal patio off our room

Full moon, free concert, a lovely way to spend our 8-year meeting-i-versary.

To collect and better use fresh water that used to flow freely from the Andes to the Pacific, a huge dam was built.

It could get very windy as we were in a valley that led straight to the ocean forty miles away.

Laguna Puclaro, the artificial laguna that is the result of the Puclaro Dam.

This valley was turned into a lake when the Puclaro Dam was built. The city of Gualliguarca was flooded, the residents relocated to the very banks on which we were standing. Recent droughts have revealed parts of the old town, including a highway that now runs straight into the laguna.

A church that was moved in its entirety from the valley below.

Peppercorn a-plenty.

Grapes turning into raisins. Fifteen days in the sun and they are ready to be sorted and boxed.

Pisquería ABA for Pisco learning and tasting.

Diaguitas, as our hotel-owner/guide-for-the-day described: a city full of people, but nobody in the streets, like Macondo in Hundred Years of Solitude. It’s the home of a delicious craft beer that we had the pleasure of trying.

Click here for a tour in the Elqui Valley.

Mote con huesillos, a refreshing non-alcoholic drink consisting of dried peaches cooked in water, sugar and cinnamon. Once cooled, it is poured over freshly cooked, husked wheat. A great snack to drink and eat!

A complete and accurate map of Monte Grande, home of poet Gabriela Mistral, Chile’s first winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature.

A stop to a charming Pisco moonshiner (to the right) of sorts, offering Pisco in no less than ten flavors. Our guide and host is in the middle, and a fellow tourist to the left, perhaps already pickled from our day spent taste-testing Pisco, beer, and wine. Or maybe is was the 80 proof Pisco he had just sipped.

Sun set colors from our hostel’s rooftop patio.

BBQ!

Our ride for our short, 8-hour drive to Santiago.

Travel conditions; certainly more leg-room in Chile than in previous countries!