Tuesday, October 10, 2017

Disembark at Punta Arenas, Chile/Carlos Pueblo

Disembark at Punta Arenas, Chile/Carlos Pueblo

After leaving Puerto Chacabuco, Chile, the ship was two days at sea through
the fiord of Chile, Southern Hemisphere. I comparing with the Northern, the
time of our arrival carried less snow or glacier in the South. I could lazily stay
in the room and observed the fantastic scenery outside. The ship disembarked
at Punta Arenas, Chile, the southernmost city of that nation. The port was very
popular before 1914, the opening of Panama Canal, as a major shipping route
for commercial vessels between the Atlantic and the Pacific Oceans. I had almost
finished my routine walk of the old town until I ran into Lucia of Brazil again on
a street. She invited me to join her to tour the city on private hired taxi and of
course we had developed a way for me to pay her back. We did have a very
interesting tour indeed.

The driver, an elder gentleman, brought us back to his company’s command post
to register the new venture, a tour of the government housing projects, driving
along the coast line to a small fishing harbor, over viewing a newly established
medical center, and finally dropped us off at a free port shopping center. He pointed
out that the housing projects were all over the nation including the capital city,
Santiago. Chilean citizen can own the house, a single dwelling with a small yard with
minimum monthly payment and eventually have the title and deed. It was started
a term of presidency of Michelle Bachelet, the current incumbent. He said that she
was very aggressive at her first term and quite slowly on this second term for such
project. I admire her very much and so does Professor Jim Drumond, the lecturer at
the ship. This is an old story or current history of South America including Richard
Nixon, CIA, Henry Kissinger, Salvador Allende, Pinochet’s Coup. I always like politic
and my interest of such knowledge sometime surprises newly acquaintance.

The elder driver is a gentleman as Lucia says with grown up children as lawyer and
teacher. Before he dropped us off in front of the tax free port mall, he clearly instructed
us how to get back to the old town terminal. I bought a cowboy hat made in China. The
taxi is really like a small scale of bus or van for public transportation. Passengers can hop
on and off with a fixed rate per person by distance. I didn’t see any of the city bus at all.
Lucia and I had had a very fine late lunch at a fancy restaurant with lobster, abalone, and
a bottle of red wine; however, my share was U.S.$90 which stopped me in the future to
join her for another taste of cuisine.



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