City of rivers

Pinnacle of the holiday finally achieved, we moved onto Valdivia - the urban centre and capital of Los Rios region. Valdivia is famous for being the location of the world's biggest ever recorded earthquake - a huge 9.5 on the Richter scale in 1960. It's also famous for its German influences, beer, fish market, rivers and sea lions!

The day began shrouded in dense fog as we ambled along the waterfront trying to avoid the grasp of the plethora of pleasure boat trip sellers keen to seize on a couple of tourists. In addition to the rather yummy looking fish market (a pity we couldn't cook that night), the waterfront also boasts a massive submarine and a pendulum clock that tells the time based on the curvature of the earth. And how could I forget? The waterfront is also home to loads of (rather smelly) sea lions, who lounge around all day except for when the market clears up at night...

My picture postcard of Valdivia's waterfront (and sea lions)

While we were waiting for the skies to clear, we decided to take in a few museums. The first was the Kunstmann brewery (cerveceria) - which we took a short micro trip to get to. Now, we were expecting something on the scale of the Guinness Storehouse in Dublin. Not to be I'm afraid; the brewery has a small museum and shop and a large restaurant. Still, it was interesting to learn about this family business, started by German immigrants who first arrived in the mid 1800s, which now competes on a global sale. The honey ale is particularly nice.

Philippi (right) and friend.
I love this photo, nothing says 'Victorian
explorer' more.

Back in the town centre, the sun had broken through so we enjoyed our sandwiches on the riverside - at a safe distance away from the hungry lobos marinos (sea lions). Afterwards, we crossed the river to the university side of town (Valdivia is an important student city) and visited two more museums. The first was an historical and anthropological museum that contained artefacts from the region's various colonisers, from the Mapuches to the Spanish to the Germans.

The second was the Philippi museum of exploration. The observant amongst you will remember I mentioned Philippi in my post about Puerto Varas. Despite the sound of the name, Philippi was a German explorer who 'discovered' a large part of the regions of Los Rios and Los Lagos. A palaeontologist and zoologist, he worked extensively to categorise and document life in this exotic land, which at the time consisted mainly of dense forest.

Full of information, we decided to finish off the day with one of the riverboat tours we had an initially been avoiding. Thankfully, we made a good choice - a sturdy boat, a very informative guide and a decent long tour along the Valdivia, Cau Cau and Cruces rivers. Another sunset in another romantic place.

Valdivia, city of rivers

More Valdivia photos on Flickr:

www.flickr.com jaynescarman's Valdivia photoset