Tourists indulge in aphrodisiac at Chile song fest

SANTIAGO - Tourists visiting Chile's picturesque port town of Valparaiso have cleaned the town out of a herbal aphrodisiac called palwen, an indigenous remedy also known as "Mapuche viagra", according to local media.

The internet news service Alfa Chile said tourists and performers visiting the world famous Vina del Mar song festival at the Pacific beach resort have exhausted supplies of the sexual energiser produced by the ethnic Mapuches.

The Mapuches from Chile's south are famous for the fierce resistance they put up against Spanish conquistadors in the 16th century.

"The Mapuche Viagra increases the desire, the libido and the sexual appetites of men and women," Italo Diaz, a pharmacist at the Mapuche pharmacy Makelawen, told Reuters.

"The compound is a Mapuche secret."

Enthusiastic tourists have found the price for palwen at 2000 pesos per bottle ($5.27) irresistible and Diaz is trying desperately to restock.

- REUTERS