Category: Chile

Posted on

February 24, 2018

We had breakfast at the hotel and headed out. Huilo Huilo had a number of self guided hikes but we decided we’d rather get on our way to Pucón, a 2.5 hour drive. We decided to check out the hot springs in Liquine. Liquine was a very small town, so small that at one point a pig wandered across the road. We stopped at the information office but the woman there didn’t speak English and my Spanish is really bad. Eventually we found a hot spring site. It was very basic, with most of the visitors camping there. I got a tour from a guy working there. For 6,000 pesos, $10, you could use all of their facilities which included a couple of tubs feed by hot springs, a sauna, a mud hot spring, and private bath tubes. It didn’t look that clean so we didn’t do it but it was an interesting spot.

Then we continued on to Pucón. We found the hotel without any problem. After checking in, we went for a late lunch at a Peruvian restaurant and then walked through town. We were trying to find a sailboat to rent but were told that we could only go out with a skipper, oh well! We walked to the lake. There we saw a boat just like our, we joked that we had had it shipped just to S. America.

Here is a picture of the sunset over the lake.

That evening we had our typical picnic on our deck at the hotel.

Posted on

February 23, 2018

We left Puerto Varas this morning and headed to Huilo Huilo, a 4 hr drive, with a planned stop in Frutillar.

Frutillar was established in the late 1800’s by German immigrants and the town still has a German feel. We wandered around the lake front which contained lots of little shops and a world-renowned theater. The volcano loomed on the other side of the lake. Here are pictures of the volcano.

Many of the shops sold yarn, but I showed great self-restraint and resisted. We bought some handmade wooden birds for the wall in the office. Here are pictures of the town.

Frutillar is famous for its theater beside the water.

Then we headed back to the car and planned to drive to our next destination. However when we got back to the car, we discovered that the battery was dead because we left the lights on (Chile requires drivers to drive with the lights on during the day). We called Hertz and they were supposed to send someone.

Rick waited with a car and I went to the German village museum. It was a recreation of the original German settlers village.

When I got back no one had called or arrived to jump start us. I walked into the town to try to find someone to help but no luck. We tried to call Hertz again and were holding for a representative. Rick hung up before speaking to someone because the phone battery was dying and we did not have a way to recharge it. We both thought we might be stuck in Frutillar for the night. Eventually, I waved down a police van driving by. They didn’t speak English but I had used my translator to figure out how to say “My car battery has died. Can you help us?” They understood. They didn’t have jumper cables so they went off to find some. They came back about 30 minutes later. Unfortunately the battery on their van was on the wrong side so they waved over a truck. Finally the car started! We tried to give the police officers 20,000 pesos, about $20, but they wouldn’t accept it so we ended up giving it to the truck driver.

Back on our way, we drove directly to Huilo Huilo. The drive was very pretty, along huge lakes. Here is a  picture from the drive.

Eventually we arrived at our hotel in Huilo Huilo. Huilo Huilo is a conservation project, begun in 2000, which encompasses 1000 sq km of private land that has been developed for low-impact ecotourism and falls within a much larger Unesco biosphere reserve. The hotel was crazy. It was a huge rambling complex. Here’s a picture of the map they gave us.

Here’s a promotional video, many of the places shown were closed, https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=wPo9DK95Tf8.

Our room was in a building that looked like a mushroom. After getting settled in our room we wandered around, getting lost constantly. It was a weird place because it seemed really empty and a big portion was closed. They had game rooms, playrooms for younger kids, movie rooms, an indoor pool, an outdoor pool, a kids pool, etc. We came to conclusion that someone had invested too much money and the resort was in trouble because they could fill it. Once we looked a little closer, our whole place, including our room, looked a little tired.

We had a dinner buffet which was good but expensive and went to bed.

Posted on

February 22, 2018

At breakfast we met a nice couple from France. We both asked the person at the front desk for suggestions on what to do but both came way empty handed.

Puerto Varas is on lake Llanquihue, which is huge, and by a volcano, named Osorno, which overlooks the lake.

We decided to drive around the lake. We drove to an area called Petrohue and passed the Petrohue falls which were quite low and did not have much water flowing. We watched a couple of guys try to fish but they didn’t have much luck. Here are pictures of the “waterfalls”.

Further along that road was another lake that had touristy, water sport activities and a hotel. We stopped for a coffee.  After coffee we continued on our way and stopped at an grill, all you can eat place for lunch. After lunch we went behind the restaurant and sat by the lake. We met another French couple who were living in Chile. They told us that Chilean society had rich and poor and not much in the middle. We talked to them for awhile.

As we continued our journey around the lake, we saw a sign for Los cascades, waterfalls, so we followed the sign.  We ended up on a narrow, dirt road for quite awhile which eventually resulted in a parking lot. Then we had about a 1 km walk through the woods to the waterfalls. I think we were the only non Chilean people there. Here is a picture of the waterfalls.

After the waterfalls, we got back in the car and drove some more. We thought about stopping in Frutillar, a cute town with German origins, but decided to save that for tomorrow. On our way back into Puerto Varas we stopped at the grocery store for dinner stuff.

Before dinner in our room we walked down to the lake so Rick could get a beer. After dinner in our room, I was in lobby, working on the blog, and the French couple came back. We shared stories about our day.  They had gone to Petrohue and hiked for about 3 hours. They are doing the opposite trip, starting in Santiago and ending in Buenos Aires so they told us where to go in Santiago and encouraged us to change our trip to include Valparaiso. So we are going o try to make that change.

Posted on

February 21, 2018

Today is a travel day. We left the camp at 10 and were driven to Punta Arenas, about a 4 hour drive, much of it over unpaved, rocky roads. One thing I haven’t written about is how unpopulated Patagonia is. In both Argentina and Chile we traveled literally for hours without seeing a house, just wide open land!

We were dropped off at hotel where we could store our suitcases for the day. Punta Arenas seemed like a very sleepy town. Ships leave from there to cruise the Chilean fjords but we didn’t see any tourists or ships.

We found a restaurant for lunch. After lunch we walked to the cemetery which was the one highlight according to Lonely Planet. Many of the plots included pictures of the person buried there. Here are pictures of the cemetery.

Rick’s camera had a protective screen over the view finder. The screen had gotten broken so we walked to the “duty free” zone to look for a new screen. We aren’t sure why it was call the “duty free” zone because everyone was there and it was more like a shopping district. We went to several stores but couldn’t find one that fit.

We walked back to the hotel along the water. Here’s a picture of an old dock filled with imperial cormorants.

We picked up our suitcases and took at taxi to the airport where we boarded a flight to Puerto Montt. We arrived in Puerto Montt and rushed to the Hertz counter because they were staying open late for us. We rented a Toyota Yaris and drove about 25 minutes to our hotel in Puerto Varas. Once there, we fell into bed. It was a long day.

Posted on

February 20, 2018

Today we did a beach walk along the Grey Lake and boat ride to the glacier in the park. We left late, at 11, so we had a relaxing morning. It was very, very windy for the beach walk. We walked across a suspension bridge and a rocky area that was really, really, really windy to a little island from which we could see that Grey glacier and an iceberg. Here are pictures from our walk.

The lake water is grey from silt from the glacier. The silt is so dense that it prevents sunlight reaching the bottom so there is very little plant and animal life in the lake.

After our walk to the island we crossed the windy, rocky area again and returned to a picnic area for lunch. Then Rick and I had to walk back across the rocky area to get the boat to the glacier. The rest of the group went for a another walk.

There were about 10 officers from the PDI, policia de invescionnes and 2 dogs boarding the boat with us. We didn’t realize it but the boat was also dropping off people to do the W trek, a famous 4 day trek through Torres Del Paine. The officers were going to the drop off point because a woman had gotten lost in the woods. One free pisco sour was included with the boat ticket. Interestingly the officers drank their pisco sours while on the way to start their mission. Also we visited the glacier before dropping off the officers.  It seemed weird to us that they didn’t get dropped off first.

The glacier has three fronts moving into the lake. The ship went quite close to all three and gave people plenty of time for pictures. The glacier was beautiful!  I thought they did quite a good job. Here are pictures from the boat ride.

After about an hour of moving around the glacier we went to the W drop off point and the officers, dogs and a couple of trekkers got off. Then we headed back. We had to walked back across the windy, rocky area.  Four times in total across the rocky area.

We returned to the parking lot and found our van. It was almost 7:00 so we had assumed they had taken the rest of the group back and come back for us but we were wrong. They took the rest of the group on a long walk. One of the people we talked to didn’t go on the long walk because they had gone on a really difficult walk yesterday and his big toenails were black. They sat in the cafeteria for several hours. Needless to say they were angry, not at us, but at Patagonia Camp. I agree this walk was not handled very well.

We didn’t get back until 8:00 so we went directly to dinner. Our friends from the ship had already eaten since they heard we would be back until later.

Posted on

February 19, 2018

Today we are on the fauna excursion. We saw lots of guanacos, a grey fox, condors, cara cara, upland geese, and ibis but no puma 😕. Here are pictures of the animals we saw.

It as a very gentle walk which ended at a rock overhang. Under the rock there were cave paintings that have been carbon dated to 4,000-7,000 years ago.  Here’s a picture of the cave paintings.

 

Additionally we stopped at several lookouts.

Here is a picture of our new friends, Chris and Jim.

When we got back we hooked up with our friends, David and Alison, from the boat. We had a fun evening with them and Jim and Chris.

Posted on

February 18, 2018

Here are pictures from our yurt window of the sun rising on the towers.

Our excursions today are the mirador and condor walks. The first hike was considered easy and the second was medium. Here are some pictures from the first hike.

After the first hike we went to a picnic area for lunch. We had selected our lunch at the briefing the previous night. At the lunch site there was an armadillo who was very cute. Here are pictures

The second hike was steeper than the first but not too bad. We saw a couple of condors while hiking. Here are pictures from the second walk.

We returned to the hotel and had a drink with Jim and Chris. The hotel had a lamb tasting before dinner. Similar to the lamb roasted at the ranch, they seem to rub salt on the meat before they grill it so it’s too salty in my opinion. We also had dinner with Jim and Chris. It was a great day.

 

Posted on

February 17, 2018

Today is a travel day. We are headed to Patagonia Camp in Torres Del Paine. We met another couple, Jim and Chris, at our hotel that are also headed to Patagonia Camp. They left at 8 while our car was scheduled for 9. We had a very nice driver and a very nice car. It took about 3 hours. We saw lots of guanacos and rhea on the way. I didn’t get a picture of the guanacos but here’s a picture of the rhea

We had to show our passports at the Argentinian border and then again at the Chilean border. We had heard horror stories that it took 4 hours at the Chilean border so we were glad it only took us about 45 minutes.

After we cleared the border who did we meet but Jim and Chris. We were all transferred to a Patagonia Camp van. None of us could figure out why they left an hour before us. We drove about another hour and a half to the camp. Much of road was rough and unpaved.

We had lunch and then were ushered to our yurt. The view from our yurt is fantastic. Here are pictures of our yurt.

That evening there was a briefing about the excursions for the next day. We had dinner after selecting our excursion.