La Serena

So I finally got to go to La Serena after trying to go three times before! It's a bit of a long story, but when I was studying in Chile, I reserved a place on a tour to La Serena and Valle del Elqui, which was cancelled and moved to the following month. Then when I tried to confirm my place on the new tour (as well as on another tour to the Atacama desert) the company were completely useless. Every time I contacted them, they said they would get back to me, but they never did. I never paid anything, so it was their loss! Coincidentally, on the weekend when the tour was supposedly taking place, some of the people I went with to Algarrobo for the first time were planning to go to La Serena too. Once I realised I wasn't getting anywhere with the tour company, I wanted to join their trip, but I think by then they'd given up on the idea. So I ended up visiting Viña del Mar instead.

But I'm very lucky, because I got to go to the Atacama desert in January and now I've also been to La Serena, Coquimbo and Valle del Elqui, thanks to my amazing boyfriend! He drove us there and back and all around the area, which was a lot of driving, because it takes at least six hours to get there from Santiago. So, Claudio, if you're reading this, I have a message for you: eres el más bacán! 💗

One of the first things you see when you arrive in the city are the big letters that are great for photos!

A short distance away is the lighthouse, the best known landmark in La Serena.

After we arrived, we looked for a cheap place to stay and found a really nice little apartment by the sea.

That afternoon, we went to the beach to swim in the sea, which was a bit crazy, because the water was really cold. But it wasn't as freezing as the sea in England, so it was fun for me!

The next day, we went to look around the city centre. There's a Japanese garden there that we wanted to visit, but it was closed, probably because of the protests. Through a gap in the fence, it looked liked a bigger version of the one in Santiago.

La Serena is the fourth biggest city in Chile, so the centre is quite big with a lot of interesting architecture, which I found out is neocolonial in style.

I really enjoyed visiting La Serena at long last, and I would definitely go back!

In my next post, I'll be writing about Coquimbo, a city right next to La Serena but different in many ways.