Weekend Adventure 9/25-26: Maitencillos and Zapallar

This past weekend, 5 other gals and I caught the bus in Vina to go to Maitencillo.

The bus ride was so tranquil as we drove by large sand dunes next to the ocean, through the countryside where the cows grazed in fields filled with colorful wildflowers, and beautiful coastlines.

It is so ironic that our California poppy grows EVERYWHERE in Chile whereas it's rare to see them in Los Angeles.

We rented a 6 person cabin at La Cabana Hermansen in a beach town that is frequented by surfers during the summers. The cabin had a Spanish restaurant, La Canasta, connected to it which served one of the best pizza I've ever had (Shrimp with Mushrooms).




We were delighted to see that our trek up the hill to our cabin was more than what we had expected. The stone path up to our cabin snaked through what seemed like a forest.

We had an AWESOME view of the beach. Our cabin was filled with all kinds of arts, crafts and unique furniture.

We thought it was weird that it only had 1 bathroom for 6 people. However, we astonishingly found the outdoor shower and toilet behind the 3 foot door in our indoor bathroom. How weird was that?

We found numerous photo opportunities at the beach including this tree that was firmly planted into the sand. Weee!

For $5USD, we were able to rent horses to ride for 30 minutes along the coast of Maitencillo.

I rode Valentina who was the youngest horse of only 3 years old. I could tell she was a little hesitant so we just took our time way behind the other horses. I sang numerous songs (i.e. Kumbaya, Row Row Row Your Boat, When You're happy and you know it) to her to let her know that everything was okay. I saw her ears perk up every time I started to sing.

We also went to Zapallar to visit our fellow volunteer, Millie. It was her b-day this past weekend. We had the best Alfajores at a nearby bakery and we walked around the mansion-filled town. We caught the sunset at the beach. I would love to go back to walk on the path along the coast and mansions towards Cachagua. I heard that there is a similar path from Cachagua to Zapallar which is equally nice, but neither connect as they stop at a set of rocks.

We got to experience what it is like to wait for the unreliable buses on Sunday since there are few tourists right now and there is less public transportation on Sundays. We waited for almost an hour. Then our bus ride was about 2 hours back to Vina. But we have expected the unexpected.

What a great weekend.