Antarctica to Zimbabwe – Day 18 – Santiago

Antarctica to Zimbabwe – Day 17 – Santiago can be found here.

We went to bed with dreams of missing cruise ships and absentee tour guides buzzing through our heads. But we got to sleep in a bit, which is always nice. Up at 8 am this morning – packing up our bags for the sixth time since this trip began. (Seventh or eighth if you count the pre-trip dry runs.)

Back downstairs for another delicious breakfast. I completely forgot to order the eggs Benedict, but the standard buffet options were no less delicious.

I changed it up today and added some smoked salmon to the repetoire. Delicious!

Back up to the room to finish packing. In the process of checking all the closets for the umpteenth time, we come across the Mandarin’s laundry pricing:

Let’s just say we’re very glad that we did all our laundry at our previous resort. We calculated that at $3.50 for socks, $4.50 for a T-shirt, $7.00 for trousers, and $5.00 for pyjamas plus the occasional jacket and sweater we would have gone through roughly US$100 in laundry per day for a family of four. Add in the six nights of leftover laundry from EcoCamp Patagonia and that could have easily been US$1,000 in laundry – which is close to the cost of staying in a loft dome at Cascada de las Animas for five nights.

Back downstairs, where it was time to argue with the Mandarin’s front desk – though admittedly it was both our faults this time. I’d thought the Mandarin’s “Families by MO” promotion would give us 40% off both rooms, whereas the Mandarin had it as 40% off of zero rooms.

The truth lay smack in the middle with 40% off the second room – but it took some negotiating to get it right, plus some further complaining to point out that they’d charged us for kids meals that should have been free. (Though we should have pointed this out when the restaurant bills originally came.) To the Mandarin’s credit, they did discount the bill to remove the extra meal charges.

We then handed off our massive pile of luggage so that the Mandarin could arrange to shuttle it to the Ritz. It felt strange exchanging 345 pounds of luggage for a simple receipt, but we knew it was a better option that returning to the Mandarin so that we could personally escort our luggage to a new hotel.

I then stepped outside to wait for our guide to show and… he arrived on time!

We all piled into the car, and he drove from the newer portion of Santiago into old town.

The Cathedral de Santiago

As we carried on toward the Museum of Pre-Columbian History we passed the former site of the National Congress – it was built in 1901 and used until 1973 when the democratically-elected government was overthrown by the Pinochet regime. The congress has since moved to Valparaiso, and today the site houses the Santiago headquarters of the Cámara de Diputados and Senado and the Congress Library.

We walked one more block to reach the pre-Columbian history museum:

It was a fascinating experience. I’ve long since realized that my knowledge of South American history is minimal, but a visit to a museum like this really drives it home.

It’s in the small details, such as the scale of the indigenous nations that made up pre-Columbian South America:

And the vast breadth of time they spanned, dating well back to before 4,000 BCE:

South American indigenous ceramics date back more than 6,000 years:

And the stone stelae rival those of ancient Egypt:

Similarly, it’s fascinating to see ways in which different cultures’ funerary rituals and burial traditionals grew independently of one another. People of rank were often buried with special figurines that represented creatures of power from their ideologies:

Others served solely as armed guards in the afterlives of the most powerful and prominent:

Apart from the artifacts on display, there were many facts and figures about South American history. I had no idea that Teotihuacan once was the world’s most populous city, with more than 100,000 residents, or that the beautiful Spondylus shell was once used as currency:

We also took in the Chinchorro mummies exhibit, which contains the preserved remains of members of the Chinchorro people from Northern Chile. They are the oldest known mummified remains, preceeding Egyptian mummies by up to 2,000 years. The process involves replacing soft tissues with branches, plants and mud. Unlike the Egyptian process that focussed on nobility, Chinchorro mummification was applied without regard to social status. (No photos taken out of respect for the dead.)

There was also a beautiful exhibit on textiles, but photography was prohibited. But again it was fascinating to learn the ways in which these beautiful textiles evolved – often exceeding the quality and complexity of their European counterparts.

Source: Pre-Colombian History Museum website (www.precolombino.cl)

Then we took some time to wander and simply take in the exhibits:

A pre-Columbian Moche shaman

A variety of musical instruments

Headdresses, including some representing various animals

A sculpture made by renowned artist Juan Tepano Haki (1866-1947), whose work marked a renaissance in Rapa Nui art

One of the most fascinating exhibits was an example of the quipus or knotted cords that were used by the Inca State to keep their accounts. Data was stored on these knots based on the quantity, type and position of the knots. This example is believed to hold more than 15,000 data points. The specific meaning of the various knot characteristics has been lost to history.

Lastly, we then took in the beautiful wooden statues that were placed atop the graves of the Mapuche people. The statues were modelled after the deceased, and designed to help them with the journey to the afterlife.

Chiefs and great warriors were sent to the East after their death, where they would roam among the volcanoes in the “blue land”. The rest went to the west to eat bitter potatoes beyond the sea.

We then said farewell to the musuem and drove back through old town, taking in scenes of everyday life:

Our guide Santiago did a very good job, though I would have preferred someone with a more active approach. He was glad to answer any questions that we had but it was clear he was more of a general guide than one with specific expertise in pre-Columbian history.

That said, there was something nice about being able to wander through the exhibits and take them in at our own pace. (And I’d be the first to admit we’ve been spoiled by the guides at Context Travel, who are experts in their respective fields.)

Santiago then deposited us at the Ritz-Carlton, where Silversea was putting us up for the night before our departure on our 40 day Antarctica / Cape-to-Cape cruise.

Silversea had previously used the Mandarin Oriental but we elected to maintain our existing reservation even after they’d made the switch – due mostly to the larger and fancier pool. (You can extend your hotel stay with Silversea directly, but it’s a brutal upcharge compared to just booking with the hotel yourself.)

Our arrival at the Ritz was something of a mixed bag, particularly after our experience at the Mandarin.

The good – One of our rooms was ready right off the bat, they had successfully received our luggage from the Mandarin, and they offered to take it up to our room right away.

The bad – Our lunch was very expensive for what it was, and there was only a fixed-price multi-course option for the kids as opposed to being able to order individual items. Despite offering to take the bags up, they still hadn’t made it up until after lunch. And one of the locks in their restaurant bathroom jammed, trapping our daughter inside.

Silversea’s portion went well. They had welcome stations ready for when we arrived, both in the lobby and in the boardroom where they were filling out paperwork:

A more detailed briefing was available on the second floor. Here we learned that we were tentatively scheduled to head to the airport at 8:50 am the next morning, though they cautioned it was subject to change depending on what happened with the ship.

Speaking of lunch, we ate at the Ritz itself – at Estró Santiago. The adults had tuna, quinoa and avocado:

Very tasty, and reasonable value for money at around US$25 per entree

While the children had pizza:

The world’s tiniest, most expensive pizza at US$29 per person. It included a drink and a dessert, but we were trying to limit desserts to just after dinner

Our second room was then ready, so we collected the keys and went upstairs to change to go swimming.

There was no way to get photos of this pool without also photographing about 10 guests, so stock photo it is (Photo credit: The Ritz-Carlton Santiago)

Apart from the pool itself, the spa floor was quite comfortable and included complimentary iced tea and flavoured water. There’s also a well-stocked bar.

The pool isn’t exactly warm, but it’s not nearly as cold as the water at either the Sheraton or the Mandarin. The pool was tiny, however, and we asked our children make way for other swimmers after they’d had a 30 minute round of Marco Polo, which was done in whispers to avoid irritating the other guests. There is a hot tub and steam room, but solely for those 18 or older.

We have – unsurprisingly – been getting a bit of side eye from the other passengers. This cruise is not designed for children and our fellow passengers don’t know us yet, so we absolutely understand why they might have reservations about there being kids onboard.

We’re carrying on with our usual approach – be on our best behaviour until the other passengers realize just how amazing they are. (As evidenced by a previous comment from one of the last cruises, “You guys are fine but your kids are amazing!”)

We stayed at the pool for an hour or two, and then it was time to head back to our rooms.

The Ritz is fine, but the longer you look at it the clearer it is that it’s not nearly as fine a hotel as the Mandarin. Everything’s older and more worn, and the details just aren’t there. The bedding isn’t as nice, the air conditioning rattles, the pillows are flat, the towels threadbare, the smoke detector flashes at random intervals, and so on.

The Mandarin is better in every way that matters. Frankly, I think even the Sheraton is nicer than the Ritz.

I went back downstairs to check with the Silversea reps to see if they had any updates, and learned that our departure time had been moved up to 6:50 am – boooo. On the bright side, at least we’re not in the second cohort, which won’t depart Santiago until 3:30 pm in the afternoon.

Still not sure how any of this relates to the rough waters around the Silver Wind – could it be flight delays from North America, instead? None of the reps or the passengers seem to know. Perhaps we’ll find out more once we’re aboard the ship – hopefully by late afternoon tomorrow.

We debated dinner options for a while, and eventually decided not to just order delivery pizza and to instead go out for a lovely dinner at La Cabrera, just a few blocks away:

My son had the chicken:

While my wife and I each had 400 grams of beef tenderloin:

Despite being Canadian, we are apparently terrible at the metric system – we really ought to have known this was way too much food. (We should have known when our server asked if we wanted to share.)

After, we went across the road to Antica Gelateria del Corso where the kids got chocolate and vanilla ice cream.

Because our daughter’s little, she got little meringue googly eyes on her cone: