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Full Circle
Day 169: Valparaiso
I spend much of the afternoon riding the ascensores, a series of short funicular railways which have survived the regular earthquakes and are still going up and down after one hundred years. Each one has two cars, looking like garden sheds on wheels, which are hauled up along rails, thick with oil and grease, balanced on a wood and brick ramp. The Ascensore Artilleria, which runs from the waterfront to an old iron bandstand on the hill, was built in 1893 and is approached through a turnstile that bears the imprint 'Stevens and Sons Ltd., London. Silent Reversible Patent 1887'.British engineers may have serviced the world in the 1890s, but the huge assembly plants and factories we pass on our way from Valparaiso to Santiago belong to the new lords of the Rim - Hyundai and Gold Star of Korea, Nissan of Japan. The only link with a past I remember is my street map of the city of Santiago - sponsored by Shell.
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PALIN'S GUIDES
- Series: Full Circle
- Day: 169
- Country/sea: Chile
- Place: Valparaiso
- Book page no: 226
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