"This painting was made from the top of one of the funicular railways
This time in Santiago I was able to get in at the Youth Hostel, and found it quite good, with many other travellers. I would like to have stopped longer but was keen to travel on to Valparaiso, so only had the one night, leaving early next morning. On reaching the bus station, I was surprised to find it very busy, then I realised it was the start of the Easter Holidays. Public holidays can often come as a bit of a shock when one is travelling and not keeping an eye on the dates, easily causing havoc to ones plans. As luck would have it I managed to get the last seat on a bus down to Viña del Mar, and then take the local train, the 10 miles or so along the coast, to Valparaiso. Although the road from Santiago winds its way down through the mountains, it was not a particularly scenic journey, made worse by an overcast sky, making the tree covered hills look quite drab. Not 'till the last few miles, when the road started to drop sharply through a number of shanty towns, before it enters Viña del Mar, did the sun come out and things started to brighten up.
Viña del Mar, with its fine beaches, is known as the playground for Chileans with money, and also the rich from other parts of South America, with many of them having fine houses here. In contrast to the shanty towns on the hills at the back, Viña del Mar, with its elegant 19th century buildings and horse drawn carriages, was more like being in Vienna or Monaco. I only had a short time in the town, but it was enough to get a good impression of the place.
Reaching Valparaiso at Easter I worried that I may have problems finding somewhere to stay, but luckily I was able to get a room at a small, if not very good, guest house close to the centre. The guest house, that occupied the 3rd floor of a large building, was reached by one long flight of stairs without a landing, quite unusual and a bit dangerous I thought.
Valparaiso is squeezed onto a small piece of flat land surrounded by high cliffs. It is hard to imagine a more unsuitable site to build, what has become, Chile's major port and second largest city. The elegance and charm of many of the older buildings in the centre, and the way they contrasted with the higgledy-piggledy mass of shanty suburbs that seem to cling precariously to the surrounding hills, connected by a maze of tortuously steep roads, long flights of steps, and funicular railways, made the city, for me, a most fascinating place, and I had no trouble finding views to sketch and paint. This was also made more easy by the comparative quiet due to the holiday.
I spent an enjoyable evening in a bar, listening to a group of singers singing Chilean songs to the accompaniment of an accordian. I was surprised what an orderly and friendly affair it all was, considering the area the bar was in.
Riding the old funicular railways was fairly cheap and, I found, good fun, even though they were all in a pretty bad state of repair. I thought it a wonder some of them worked at all. I counted 8 funiculars, though there could have been more that I missed.
I had 3 full days in Valparaiso, and though I enjoyed the stay, it was spoilt a little by the fact that it was the only place in Chile where I did not feel totally safe. So when the time came to leave, on an early morning bus for La Serena, on the 4th day, it was with some relief that I had survived my stay without incident." - MH
View over Valparaiso, 1990
All items are produced from original paintings by Martyn Hanks.
Prints: Size is A4 (8.27" x 11.69"/210 x 297mm). Printed onto high quality 245gsm fine art watercolour paper to give the print an authentic look and feel. Supplied in a textured off white mount size 12" x 16" (305 x 406mm), backed and sealed in a clear cellophane wrap and delivered in a protective carton to ensure it reaches you in perfect condition.
Cards: Size 7" X 5"/178 x 127mm. Packaged in a clear cellophane wrap with a top quality 150gsm self-seal white envelope.