La Chascona

Our visit to La Chascona meant that we achieved the Pablo Neruda hat trick, and visited all three of his houses while in Chile. Go, team.

Situated near the San Cristobal hill in the trendy Bellavista neighborhood of Santiago, this house does not disappoint. The house consisted of three or four buildings (connected by winding staircases, and surrounded by beautiful garden spaces), each with intentional design. Pablo loved the sea, so built in a bar with a wavy counter top that mimics the ocean waves. He enjoyed small details (especially when it came to being playful or entertaining) so much that he kept salt and pepper shakers labeled "morphine" and "marijuana" to tease his guests. This house has my favorite feature of all his houses, though, which is a sweet secret passage through the built-in hutch to the bedrooms upstairs. Totally dreamy.

Speaking of details, he incorporated
his and Matilde's initials into the design of each house

Speaking of Matilde, this is the house that Pablo built in 1953 for his then-lover Matilde Urrutia. (Chascona (woman with unruly hair) was one of his nicknames for her). Since building a house is a lot less subtle than meeting in a motel, I started to think that their relationship was not that secret. However, Pablo's friend, Diego Rivera, painted a portrait of Matilde during their courtship depicting her two faces (public life and secret love) so maybe they were trying to keep the relationship secret to an extent. It was a few years before Pablo was able to (as the audio tour guide put it) "change wives," but he and Matilde married in the mid-1950s and were together until his death in 1973.

Portrait by Diego Rivera
Notice Pablo´s profile anywhere?

Speaking of his death, La Chascona was also the site of Pablo's funeral, which turned out to be the first public protest against the Pinochet regime. 

Winding staircases
Funeral procession started here

The coup happened on the morning of September 11, 1973. Not only had Pablo been a friend and vocal supporter of then President Salvador Allende and a beloved public figure, he was also an honored diplomat with political connections and influential friends throughout the world. For these reasons, Pablo was seen as a threat to the military regime. Before Pablo fell ill, this house was sacked the soldiers in the inital days of the takeover. Pablo had been in La Isla Negra during the time, but was able to be transported to Santiago when he fell ill. He died on September 23. 

Mourners came out for the funeral procession, and -as Isabel Allende recalls- there was a bit of a standstill between the soldiers who were instructed to control the situation and the mourners who were not only mourning the loss of their Pablo but also the loss of their freedom. 

Pablo's got his eye on...a tree.
In the background you can see the mural that
Pablo's friend designed for La Chascona