G&B: Mar 2024: Patagonia & Iguazu Falls

Geoff Brock & Bruce Gamble

Iguazu Falls

Island Sky

Day 19: Casablanca Valley and on to Santiago

An all day excursion from San Antonio, visiting the Casablanca Valley, with lunch at a wine estate. On to Santiago for a one night hotel stay.

Tuesday 19th March 2024

The text from today's programme was as follows (based on a scheduled arrival time in the port of 10:00am):

"After an hour drive you arrive in the wine growing area of the Casablanca Valley where lunch will be served at a local winery restaurant followed by a wine tasting and distillery tour. before driving for another hour to Santiago and the Singular Lastarria Hotel to arrive at about 1730-1800."

The reality was that because of long delays in being able to disembark, for which there was no explanation, we only set off in our coaches from the port at 1300. We do, of course, understand that port delays are sometimes unavoidable, but being so late, we had hoped that the excursion may have been adapted to take account of the delayed departure and that we would be taken straight the lunch venue. Instead, we were taken on the originally planned scenic coastal route, stopping off at a somewhat lacklustre gathering of market stalls for a "shopping opportunity" and a visit to a quite interesting little church, before finally arriving at the wine estate at 1530 for a very late lunch, which turned out to be very nice. Thereafter there was a lengthy tour of the wine estate and its distillery, including the tasting of some of its really rather indifferent wines and spirits. By the time we left at around 1700, there was still a two and half hour drive to our hotel in Santiago (not the one hour quoted - due to peak hour traffic), arriving there close to 2000.

We had been looking forward to making the most of our one free evening in the city before we were due to fly home in the morning, but instead, we arrived feeling really tired and only had time for a bar meal, which, to be fair, we enjoyed very much in the company of Eveline and Peter. For most of the day, we felt that we had been given no choice about the day's activities after the unexpected delay and that, if people had been given the option of travelling directly form the ship to the hotel, many if not all of our fellow passengers would have opted for this and perhaps one or two of the three coaches allocated to us could have been diverted from the original itinerary.

This was the actual route taken by us today, from the port of San Antonia, up along the coast, stopping for a visit plus shopping at Iglesia colonial Nuestra Señora de la Merced before travelling inland to the Casas del Bosque winery, Later, the rather long, albeit very scenic drive into Santiago and to our lovely hotel, The Singular.