Vina Del Mar, 1967
Santiago, 1986
Partial view of the city located at the Llanquihue lake’s shore. At the back the Calbuco Volcano.
Petrohue, Chile
Torres del Paine National Park
Region of Magellan and Chilean Antarctica, Chile
Lago Grey Hotel, Patagonia, Chile
A few days before I went on my epic trip to South America my car got hit. I was driving through an intersection (yes, the light was green), and this complete idiot came at me from the left and ran right into my back passenger seat door. I could see him coming. I tried to swerve out of his way. I was sure he would stop. He had to have seen me. I was right in front of him. But, alas, he ran right into me. I got out of my car and walked over to where he had stopped. He was looking at his car puzzled. His front left bumper was hanging off. I said – What happened? And he said – ” I think I ran into somebody”. (Really?)
I said – ” yes, You ran into me!” Oh, he said. Then he said he was lost and was looking for the local Catholic Charity homeless shelter and did I know where it was. (Really??) I said it was nearby. “Do you have insurance?” I said. I wasn’t feeling hopeful but I had to ask.
Luckily the guy did have insurance. Unfortunately the damage was too great and the insurance company totaled my car. This upset me because although my car was 10 years old, it had low mileage and there was nothing wrong with it. The engine was fine. I thought about keeping it anyway. But after getting a couple of bids, it turned out it was too expensive to fund the repair myself.
They picked up my car yesterday. It was a sad day. I had a wake. By myself (and a little vodka). I really liked that car.
Having to come back from a long trip and immediately deal with all of this retarded my trip recovery. I usually need about a week to get back into the swing of things but this time it is taking longer. I also had an issue with my furnace just before I left and had to deal with that right away when I got back. Luckily it turned out to be a minor issue.
So now almost two weeks later, I have done most of my laundry, dealt with my car, dealt with my furnace, done some laundry, caught up on high school reunion plans, unpacked, and started planning my next trip in September. I guess I’ve done a lot. I’m almost back in step with reality.
Whether I like it or not.
Trip Roundup – I went to Easter Island and Patagonia with an organization called Overseas Adventure Travel (OAT). It was my first time using them. I’m not big on using organized tours but there are places I want to go to and are difficult to organize on my own. This was one of those places. I wanted to cover a lot of Patagonia and I didn’t want to go by boat so this was one of the few tours I found that offered what I was looking for. The Easter Island part was a pre-trip add on that I figured I couldn’t pass up and I’m glad I went for it. It was definitely worth it. A fabulous experience. The group was small, only eight people.
From there we went to Buenos Aires to meet up with the rest of the group and start the main tour. We were 16 to begin with but one guy got sick and left after about five days. So then we were 15. We had local guides at every stop and most of them were very good at providing interesting relevant information. One or two were a bit tedious. This tour group is big on having that “local experience”. I’m pretty cynical and have mixed feelings about such things since they are obviously staged and paid for so not very spontaneous. I have always enjoyed the magical moments that happen when you turn up in a village and somebody invites you in. But that is not so easy with 15 people in tow.
We ate at a family ranch, we dined with a family in their home, and we all helped make a local dish at a small farm. They were all things I could have lived without but all the people are nice and some were interesting. The other thing they like to do on these tours is have lectures on “controversial subjects”. They weren’t really controversial but I think they were educational and good for people to know about. We heard from a man whose mother was one of the “disappeared” in Argentina, and from a woman of German descent who talked about Nazis hiding in Chile and Argentina. The most interesting lecture for me was the one about the Mapuche Indians of Northern Patagonia. Apparently the Spaniards were never able to conquer them.
I really enjoyed the long bus rides through the Patagonian emptiness. The occasional encounters with rhea and guanaco. And of course the beauty of the landscape. That is why I went. All the other stuff like dealing with personalities, weird encounters, annoying guides, and too many airplane rides, didn’t matter.
Would I go with this tour group again? It is funny because most of the people on the trip had been on tours with this group 5 to 20 times. They all seemed to really love it. I thought they were well organized and the Trip Leader was fantastic. Overall I would say it was a good company. I probably wouldn’t go again with them unless they offered a particular trip I was interested in, like this one. I’m not a traveler just to travel. I travel to see particular things I am interested in. So I wouldn’t randomly choose this company. But you could.
One thing I noticed while driving through the countryside from Punta Arenas to El Calafate was just how vast and how empty it was. My sense of space became warped. My brain had a hard time processing distances. I would look out the window and it felt like I could touch the clouds or reach out and pet the animals. But they were miles away. It became more obvious when I tried to take a picture. My camera could only see a speck no matter how much I enlarged it. There were no billboards, there were no houses, just fences and a few animals from time to time. Otherwise, about 450 miles of open space.
We had a quick bathroom stop at a cafe, shop, small hotel all in one literally in the middle of nowhere. Ranches all around. The sign on the door said: “Hotel Posada Rio Rubens. Here, we open when we get here and we close when we leave. If you arrive and we are not here, then you won’t find us. Thank you.”
From Torres del Paine we drove to Cerro Castillo on the Chile/Argentine border. That took us all morning. We had lunch at a restaurant that catered mostly to tour busses. There wasn’t much else around. There was one tourist shop that we actually visited twice – once going into the park and once leaving it.
Across the border we picked up National Highway 40 that runs from the Bolivian border to the southern tip of Argentina. It was 200 miles from Cerro Castillo to El Calafate and there was one “town” between the two. Its name was Esperanza – Hope. The road was pretty good. We were glad to be on paved roads after the dirt bumpy roads of Torres del Paine. We arrived in El Calafate late in the afternoon.
Our hotel was an old converted ranch house with plenty of charm. The building was surrounded by lavender plants and lovely gardens.
El Calafate is on the shore of Lake Argentino, the largest fresh water lake in Argentina at 546 square miles. It is within the Glaciers National Park and its water flows to the Atlantic Ocean via the Santa Cruz river. The town has about 6500 residents and caters to tourists. Lots of touristy, artsy shops, restaurants and bars. It is also home to the Glaciarium Museum dedicated to educating people about ice and glaciers. It has an Ice Bar in it where they serve cold drinks. It is said to be the only bar in the world constructed from glacial ice.
The main attraction, of course, was the Glaciers National Park and the Perito Moreno Glacier. This glacier is special because it is the only one in the world that is easily accessible to humans. It is easy to get to and to get close to. Good or bad? Not sure. But it was definitely something to see.
We spent a few lovely days in Bariloche. Our hotel was right on Nahuel Huapi lake and I fell asleep to the sound of gentle waves lapping the shore. Bariloche is a vacation spot for many and is a ski resort in winter.
A native Mapuche man gave us a talk about his people. Their culture is tied to the earth. To the stars and the moon. The Southern Cross and silver jewelry are important.
We also had a talk about Germans in Argentina and the hunt for hiding Nazis. The Bariloche of today was settled by German immigrants in the late 1800’s. And in more recent times a Nazi was found living in town.
Our first day in town we took a chair lift to the top of Campanario Hill. I was taken aback by the view. It is one of those things that words can’t describe. It kind of hits you in the gut.
Anyway, the photos don’t do it justice.
That afternoon we went for a gentle hike and ended up at a German brewery for lunch. The following day we climbed into two rubber boats and spent a few hours floating down the Limay River. Quite idyllic.
From there we headed to a family hacienda where some went horseback riding. We ended the day with a delicious meal of grilled lamb, chorizo, and beef.
And on the third day we boarded a bus and headed back over the Andes on our way to Pueto Varas, Chile. It was very dry on the Argentine side but turned lush and green on the Chilean side.
We made it across the border in time for lunch. We stopped at an auto museum. An elderly man, a dairy farmer, started the museum out of a love for cars. He has the largest collection of Studebakers outside the USA.
We ended up at the Radisson Hotel right on Llanquihue lake in Puerto Varas. The first important thing we did was learn how to make a Pisco Sour and we have been drinking them ever since.
Next – Puerto Varas and Chiloe Island.
Climate and the Land
Yvon Chouinard, rock climber and founder of the brand Patagonia, announced he has given away his company, worth about $3 billion. He gave it to a non-profit called Holdfast Collective that will ensure all profits (about $100 million per year) are used to combat climate change and protect undeveloped land. Patagonia will continue to exist but Chouinard will no longer own it. Patagonia has given $50 million to Holdfast Collective and plans to give $100 million more this year.
Chouinard’s best friend was Doug Tompkins. They used to go rock climbing and adventuring together and in 1968, they drove from Southern California to Patagonia together to climb Mt FitzRoy on the Chile/Argentina border. They made a film about it called Mountain of Storms.
A later film (2010) recreates their journey and highlights some of the conservation work Tompkins was doing — 180 Degrees South: Conquerors of the Useless.
Tompkins died in 2015. He was the founder of the North Face and then of Esprit. He sold them both and in 1991, he established the Foundation for Deep Ecology. He had always loved spending time in Chile and he eventually moved there and bought a rundown farm. He spent his time climbing and kayaking and considering how he might preserve the area. Over time he bought up land in Patagonia that was still wild and undeveloped. When he died he left over a million acres of land to the Chilean government to create a national park. In 2017, the president of Chile accepted the one million acres and added another 10 million to create the largest protected area in South America.
After watching these documentaries, I became enthralled with Chile. It is definitely on my list and I hope to be able to spend some time there exploring its many diverse landscapes.
By the way, Mount FitzRoy was named after the Captain Robert FitzRoy of the Beagle, Charles Darwin’s ship.
The Queen’s Queue
Not only is Queen Elizabeth II lying in state for close to a week, but there is a “queue tracker” where you can keep tabs on the long line winding its way across London. Last time I checked the wait was 9 hours but this changes constantly. People seem happy to do it. I might even do it if I was in London. After all, it’s a one-time thing (click on image it see it live).
A few parting shots
Happy Friday.