Wine and Cajon de Maipo

Well..we spent a lot of today getting lost and realizing that there has not been a lot of QC on Google maps in this area of the world.  Luckily, most of the detours were somewhat interesting at least the second half of the day. 

One of the biggest wineries in Chile (especially for export) is Concho y Toro.  Their original vineyards were quite close to Santiago and have since been consumed by sprawl.  Nonetheless, their tourist center is still close by so we took a tour complete with wine tasting for the non-designated drivers.  They store some of their oak barrels still at this place and house the administrative offices but most of the winemaking takes place off-site (and at a different time of year!).  ´We´ll have to hit some wineries in February/March to get the real thing.

Yes - there is a drinking age.  No - we did not follow it.

We continued on to Cajon de Maipo (not "my poo" - Jonathan asked me to write that) a popular weekend day trip for Santiaguinos.  It is a series of small towns following a river/river bed up into the mountains.  We drove around one side of the canyon (the side where Concho y Toro is located) looking for a place to cross the canyon.  What we didn´t realize is that there is a bridge every 20 km or so and we missed one early on.  Luckily it was a lovely drive and luckily I had tasted two wines already and the kids didn´t realize that they were hungry until we finally got to the restaurant.

We ended up eating at Trattoria Italiana Calypso recommended by my friend Dorit (I told you you´d end up here eventually).  It was beautiful and reminded us of Rob´s parents´ former tea house in Uruguay - rustic, charming, beautiful landscaping, quiet, and yummy food (Alberto and Gilly - we´ll have to take you there next visit).

I "needed" a Pisco Sout after our drive to this place

Mom insisted on a coffee picture of Rob - always at his happiest

The road through the canyon passes through many small towns and many cute restaurants.  Apparently, there are also hiking trails, horseback riding, rafting, climbing, etc. throughout the area.  Coming back it only took us 50 minutes confiming the fact that we took the long way there and that we need to get a very detailed map of Chile before setting off on a longer trip to the south in February.