During our time in La Serena, Mom and I hopped on a local bus to the nearby city of Coquimbo where we wanted to wander around for an afternoon. Without fail, Chile’s local buses lack any semblance of an announcement or signal as to where the vehicle is stopping. So I finally asked the bus driver if we were in Coquimbo and he rushed us off at the next stop, saying we were about to pass the downtown’s center. The bus drove away to expose a poor, run-down residential neighborhood where we were standing on a random corner. “What downtown’s center?” 

We wanted to visit a large cross monument, Third Millennium Cross, that supposedly provides incredible views of the bay from atop a hill. We figured our best bet would be heading up, so we started up a windy zig-zag street which essentially models a less maintained version of Lombard Street or “Crooked Street” in San Francisco. Other than the cross, Coquimbo had few “attractions” to offer tourists, making it an even better destination.

A snapshot of Coquimbo: Crooked street after crooked street zigs then zags up a steep hillside plastered with weathered shacks. A mouse could barely squeeze between the properties that stack up like fallen dominoes. The ramshackle homes of tiny tin roofs and crumbling walls manage to offer a hopeful vibe: paint, although peeling, is always in bright hues. No questions asked, locals point the way to the town’s only tourist stop as lost wanderlusts toting backpacks find dead-end roads. The townsfolk rock in rickety chairs on front porches and weave handkerchiefs at sills of broken windows. Finally, the climb up dozens of stairs reaches a dove-white cross that towers over the forsaken city like a protective saint. An ascent in a narrow elevator uncovers dizzying views where the crooked streets criss then cross to the ocean’s bay.

—JDF