Rabuco

The mountains near Rabuco.



Village women teaching us how to make empanadas.



The owner of a nearby ostrich farm shows us his setup.

Today we went to a really rural area about an hour from Valparaíso called Rabuco to visit a small farm. We broke into small groups and spent all day there, in very beautiful but of course freezing surroundings. We learned how to make empanadas, saw grapes, kiwis, lemons, and mandarin oranges growing, visited green houses of flowers (which they ship to Santiago), had a class on how to dance the national dance of Chile, the Cueca, and had a delicious lunch made by the village women. It was a really fun and exhausting day.

This area really reminds me of home, and its odd to hear the other, mostly midwestern kids oohing and ahhing about the ocean (which looks a lot like the ocean by Pacifica), the coastal mountain range (again, Pacifica), the vineyards (Napa...I thought of Jaime!), the different kinds of plants growing (nearly all of which are familiar to me). For me, its not really that big a switch in terms of the natural landscape, though of course its a tremendous switch in terms of the people and ways of life.

Our bus to go to Rabuco left from Viña del Mar, Valparaíso´s twin city, so for the first time I got to see it. It had lots of beaches, whereas Valparaíso is mostly port. It was also really posh, clean, and quiet...in Valparaíso there is more bustle, chaos, garbage, fish venders, etc, which gives it a livelier feel.