Valle de Elqui

In Chile many valleys are created by the snow melt coming down out of the Andes mountains. One of the more famous valleys is Valle de Elqui. The water from the Rio Elqui is used to grow avocados, oranges, lemons, papayas and many other kinds of produce. But the big cash crop is grapes. Vineyards dominate this valley. Table grapes, wine grapes and a special kind of grape that are used to make Pisco are grown here in abundance. Pisco is a spirit made from distilling the wine made from Pisco grapes. In my opinion it is a cousin of tequila. They make a drink called a Pisco sour which is very similar to a margarita. They also mix it with Coca-Cola to a make a “Piscola”. The story on Pisco goes something like this...Pisco had been made for decades in Chile and in Peru. Then a shrewd Chilean politician from this region did some legal research and discovered that the name Pisco wasn't trademarked. So first he convinced one of the small towns in the Elqui Valley to change it's name to "Pisco Elqui" and then got it trademarked. And with what legal body do you trademark these things, I don't know? But think of how the name Champagne is trademarked by the Champagne region of France and you get the idea. That politician would become Chile's President in the 1950's.
Just over that mountain in the top left of the photo above is Argentina. And when I say mountains...there are a couple peaks in this area that are over 20,000 ft. For reference, Colorado has many 14,000+ peaks.

 One of the biggest towns in the Elqui valley is called Vicuña. The Capel distillery is here.

This is the town of Pisco Elqui. The Mistral distillery is here.

This valley receives very little rainfall and receives about 300 sunny days out of the year. These clear days and nights make for great star gazing. In fact, this region is dotted with observatories. From my little bit of research, there are over 25 observatories in Chile. Several of these are open to the public. And to my surprise observatories employ a lot of people. My perception was that a lone astronomer stays up all night at the observatory drinking coffee and looking at the stars. So far in La Serena, all of the gringos we have met here either work at the observatories or in mining...and a few are English teachers like ourselves. (Click on the photo above and you will see two observatories on the mountain in the distance.)

This last photo I've added to show how little precipitation falls here.  I started to noticed how different these mountains looked than the Rockies and it's not just that there are no trees. I concluded that because there is so little rain very little erosion occurs. So the slopes of many of mountains are just even angled surfaces.

School and Getting There

This is us having just arrived at our school, "Norteamericano". We bike to class. It is 30 minutes from our apartment on the beach up the hill in the back of town. It is actually a pretty nice ride and great exercise. We get quite a kick out of our "get-ups" - layers of clothes because it will be colder when biking home in the dark, backpacks, helmets, gloves, right pant legs tied back so they don't get caught in the chain, and bike lights and reflectors on the front and backs. Its good exercise, and a pretty nice way to get around. We bought the bikes used from a mom and pop shop near our house. He cobbled them together for us actually, but the price was good. Now the owner wants us to help him learn English so we might have some new work out of it, too!

Our students are excellent! They all had to apply, write essays, and take tests to get accepted into this program. It is a government sponsored program to develop the English skills of the business and tourism professionals of the country. Rich and I are teaching the business students. The are so eager to learn! It is a breath of fresh air compared to the students at the college in Santiago who really were only taking the class because they had to in order to graduate. These students work really hard and keep us on our toes!

Here are some more photos of the school, etc (It is in a house that is converted into a school). Instituto Chileno Norteamericano is the name of the school. There are multiple campuses around Chile. It was started in the 70's by the US State department and is still sponsored by them today.

Rich getting ready to start class.

The entrance to the school.

Lucy - She tries to keep us all in line.

Towards the back of the house. This is where we have "break" and there are more classrooms out behind.