Where's Andrew

BARILOCHE ARGENTINA, PUERTO MONTT & ISLA DE CHILOE CHILE - DEC 4 - 14

I'm up early to catch a 7:30AM bus to Osorno which is about 1.5 hours drive south of Valdivia. I have a couple minutes of panic as I leave the hostel that I'm going to miss my bus. All day yesterday, workmen were installing a new locked gate and steel fence outside of the building I was staying in. This building is a new addition to the hostel a couple of doors down from the main hostel and I'm the only one staying there. They had finished the fence and the gate just before sunset and now the gate is locked. A key is required to exit and I don't have this key. The steel fence is about 2m tall and looks like it would be difficult to climb, especially with my big pack. Luckily there is some scrap steel lying around on the ground and I find a thin length of it and I'm able to wedge it into the lock latch and force it to retract so the gate will open. The bus station is only a block away and I make it to my bus with minutes to spare.

I have about an hour to wait at Osorno before the bus to Bariloche leaves at 10:00AM. It does not take the bus long to start up the pass that we take to cross the Andes. Although it is now summer, the tops of the mountains are covered in snow but there are a few very steep jagged peaks without any snow. Just before reaching the summit, we clear Chilean immigration and after driving another minutes, we come to Argentinian immigration. We are soon on our way and the last 2 hours of the drive is along a huge lake. It's a little after 3:00PM when we reach Bariloche.

I thought Briloche was quite a small skiing village so I decide to walk from the bus station to the city centre but I soon find that Bariloche is much larger than I thought. After about an hour of walking, I finally am near the main square and stop at a couple of hostels and I'm shocked by the $50US cost for a room. By now my bags are getting pretty heavy and I walk a few more blocks to another hostel called Periko's and I'm able to negotiate a price for 3 nights stay at just under $30US per night.



Llao Llao Resort & Golf Club

 Argentina has an interesting situation regarding exchanging money. The government has fixed the exchange on the US dollar at about 4.85 Pesos to the dollar which has been the rate for more than a year. In order to fight inflation which has been rampant, the government has restricted the local population from travelling abroad and in purchasing foreign currency. If an Argentinian wants foreign currency or to travel outside of the country, they have to apply for permission from the government and include why they require this currency or why they want to travel. In many instances, the government will not approve the request. As an example, Caro who I travelled with on the sailboat trip through the San Blas Island was living and working in New York as a lawyer, she is from Buenos Aries. Her mother, who is a doctor and wealthy, applied for some US currency and permission to travel to the US in order to visit Caro


Llao Llao

 but was not able to go because the government rejected her application. As a result of this government control, there is a grey market for US dollars and in a lesser way other foreign currencies. I say grey market because you are able to exchange US dollars at an accredited currency exchange shop or often in a hotel or restaurant for far higher rate than the government rate, sometimes as high as 6.7 to 1. But, if you go to a bank or use an ATM, the exchange is around 4.8 to 1. This is a huge difference and is a huge topic of discussion amongst travellers. What most traveller are doing, including me, is to get US dollars before entering Argentina to take advantage of this higher exchange. In Bariloche, after spending an hour trying to find a good rate to exchange money, I finally settle for 6:1 which is really not that good but still much better than the banks or ATMs. I've heard that the larger cities tend to have the best exchange rate. The one thing I don't like about this is travelling with lots of US cash.

That evening, I'm keen to try some Argentinian beef for dinner. I've heard so much about it from other travellers and other than Chile, the beef has not been very good in any of the countries I've been to. I'm disappointed to find that a the cheapest steak I can find is over $30US, in fact everything in the restaurants are expensive here. I'm starting to realize that I am in the Argentinian equivalent to Whistler and everything is very expensive. My budget cannot handle $40.00US meals which is what it would cost once I have a drink and include the tip so I end of having a $10US Big Mac Meal.

Bariloche has some good trails for day hikes, so the next morning I decide to hike up some ski trails to a peak which is supposed to have great views of Bariloche and the lake. It's raining in the morning and does not stop until almost 11:00AM. By the time I start up the trail, it is after 12:30PM. I get about 30 minutes up the trail and it starts to rain and the wind really comes up. It had been sunny out when I started but now it's a solid mass of dark clouds and it looks like its going to rain for the rest of the day so I bail on the hike. I run down the trail and I'm just minutes form the hostel before the worst of the rain hits. It was a wise decision as it pours until late evening. That night I go to a pizza restaurant for dinner. This restaurant is supposed to be one of the cheaper options around but a pizza, soft drink with tip is still about $25US.

The next day the weather has cleared and it is sunny out. I want to head to Llao Llao which is about 25kms farther up the lake and where the famous hotel and resort of the same name is located. There is also several parks and a 20km hike around a lake with beautiful views of lakes and mountain peaks. But before I go on the hike, I walk to the bus station and buy a ticket back to Chile and the city of Puerto Montt. Near Puerto Montt I can catch a ferry to the Isla de Chiloe where I will spend a few days before heading to Futaleufu for the river rafting trip. I catch a city bus to the Llao Llao Resort. The hotel is absolutely massive. It was built more than 60 years ago right on a lake and is surrounded by a golf course. Guide books often compare Llao Llao to the Banff Springs Hotel in Canada. Another golf course has gone in right across the street and I have a great view of a couple of par 4s that stretch right along the lake front. I would consider playing if the wind wasn't blowing about 35km/hour.

I start hiking around the lake, the first 7 to 8 kilometers is through a park and the trail wind along the lake. The park is heavily forested with giant deciduous trees and lots of large bamboo bushes. After about about 90 minutes, I exit the other end of the park and come to a narrow paved road. The road winds its way between numerous small lakes and rivers and there are nice views of beautiful mountain peaks. I come to a mountain park which has numerous trails that lead to the peaks above but it's too late in the day to start hiking any of these trails.

After about 6 hours or walking, I finally get around to the other side of the lake near where I started. Within minutes a bus comes by and I'm soon back at the hostel. I have not hiked much since leaving Bolivia and I'm sore after walking almost 25kms. For dinner I head to a nearby pub for a burger, fries and a brew and it still costs me almost $25US.

The next morning, I'm on a 9:30AM bus to Puerto Montt. This time I take a cab to the bus station instead of walking the 4 to 5 kms. The bus first goes to Osorno, so the ride is just the opposite direction from the bus ride the other day. The weather is sunny without a cloud anywhere and the

last hour drive to Puerto Montt is beautiful. There is one perfect cone snow topped volcano which dominates the view to the east of the bus. The bus arrives in Puerto Montt around 2:30PM and there is a nice older lady waiting for the bus trying to get people to come to her hostel called Hospedaje Familiar. She says a private room is $18US so I decide to check it out and it's pretty nice so I decide to stay.

After getting settled in my room, I decide to go for a walk in the city. It's not a beautiful town although it does have a nice paved walkway around the waterfront that stretches a couple of kilometers

Volcano Near Puerto Montt

from the bus station to a modern new ocean front mall. The main retail area of the city stretches about 6 or 7 blocks by 3 blocks and is very busy with street vendors and many pedestrians. Before heading back to the hostel, I stop at a local restaurant for a chicken dinner and then stop at the bus station and buy a ticket to Chiloe and the town of Ancud for the next morning.

My bus leaves for Ancud at 9:30AM. We drive about and hour to the southwest to Pargua where we catch a small ferry to Chacao on the Isla de Chiloe. The ferry crossing takes about 40 minutes and I see a bunch of Sea Lions lounging on some large moorage buoys and a lone dark coloured


Seawalk at Puerto Montt

 dolphin. It takes about 20 minutes to drive from where the ferry docked to Ancud. Ancud is a town of about 30,000 people. It is early afternoon on a Sunday and almost the entire town is closed which is typical of many small towns on a Sunday. Ancud is located on the coast about 25 kilometers from the northwest tip of Chiloe where an old lighthouse is located at Faro Corona. There is supposed to be a nice beach to walk there and a nearby colony of penguins.

I'm pleasantly surprised to find a room in a decent hostel for $12US, maybe the southern part of Chile is cheaper than the north. I say southern part as I'm over 2000kms south of


Sea Lions Near Chacao

 Santiago and more than 4500km south of the Peruvian boarder but I still have around 2500kms to travels to get to Punta Arenas at the southern tip of Chile where there is a ferry to take me to Tierra de Fuego. Chile is not wide but it sure is long. I spend much of the afternoon trying to find out about transportation to Faro Corona for tomorrow but everything is closed and the few people I ask give me such a lengthy answer in Spanish that I don't understand. I ask the lady who runs the hostel and I'm not quite sure of her response but it did not sound good. I'm hoping this will not be another case of having no transportation even though my guide book says there are 3 buses there and back a day.



Ancud

 That evening, my next challenge is finding an open restaurant. There are a bunch of seafood restaurants near the harbour but they are all closed. After 30 minutes of walking, all I've seen that is open is one small corner store market. I'm just about to give up when I wonder past a small cafe and it's open. It is full of locals watching a Chilean soccer game on TV but I'm just glad I found it. I decide to order a steak because the Chilean beef is supposed to be pretty good and it is only about $13US. I'm very happy when I get a nice thick 1/2 a kilogram steak and it's awesome. It is definitely the best beef that I've had since leaving Vancouver.

The next morning I head to the tourist office in the bus station and I'm pleased to find it open with an English speaking women working there. But, I'm frustrated to find out that there are no buses running to Faro Corona, this is becoming a recurring theme. There are special taxis that go there, it's $30US one way for up to 5 people but there does not seem to be any other tourists around so this would cost me $60US. There's another fishing village not far from here on the west coast of the island called Chepu that is also supposed to be nice so I enquire about buses going there. I'm in luck, one leaves in about 30 minutes but there is only 1 returning bus and it leaves about an hour after I would get there


Fuerte San Antonio

 so I decide not to bother as I would get there and then need to come back almost right away. It seems to be a Catch 22 thing here in Chile, there are no buses to go to any of the smaller more remote locations for tourist because there are not that many tourist but there are not that many tourist because there is no way to get to some of these interesting remote locations. When I went to Bariloche, there were many Gringo type travellers but I've seen very few in Chile. I'm also figuring out that the tourist season in Chile runs January through March here in the south and is mostly Chilean travelling down from the Santiago area.

So, I spend the day going for a 10km walk down the coast and exploring an old Spanish fort called the Fuerte San Antonio. At this fort in 1826 the last Spanish royalist troops in all of South America surrendered to Chilean troops. That evening I have a nice Salmon dinner at one of the ocean front seafood restaurants and buy a bus ticket to Quellon at the south end of Chiloe for tomorrow morning.

It pours rain all night and the next morning. Even though the bus station is only about 5 blocks away, I catch a taxi so I won't get soaked. My bus leaves at 9:00AM and it takes almost 5 hours to get to Quellon and it's pouring rain most of the way there.


Quellon Harbour

 I arrive just before 2:00PM and find a hostel down along the waterfront for around $30US. I'm hungry so I go find a nearby restaurant for lunch. Later I decide to go for walk to a park called Punta de Lapa along the coast about 10kms away but just as I leave the restaurant the skies open up and it starts pouring again and does not stop the rest of the day.

I had planned to stay another day in Quellon but I need to be in Futaleufu on the 16th and the bus schedule is supposed to be a bit sketchy south of Puerto Montt so I decide that I should start there tomorrow as it will take 3 days to get there which gives me 2 days just in case. So the next morning I buy an afternoon bus ticket back to Puerto Montt, I had tried to buy a ferry ticket direct to Chaiten but of course the ferry is not running yet.

Monument at Punta de Lapa

It not raining but the weather looks very unsettled but I decide to chance a walk to Punta de Lapa. It takes about 1.5 hours to walk there and it rains a few times along the way. On the way back, it rains hard a couple of times and I take shelter in a couple of bus shelters but it soon stop. I get back to town just in time to have a nice lunch before catching the 3:30PM bus to Puerto Montt.

By the time the bus leaves it is pouring out again. The bus is delayed for a long time because of road construction and we are over an hour late arriving into Puerto Montt at 9:30PM. I was going to buy a bus ticket to Chaiten for tomorrow morning but all the bus companies ticket counters in the bus station closed at 9:00PM, but I do find out that there is a bus that leaves at 7:30AM. I had planned to stay at the same hostel as before but it is quite a walk up the hill and I'm not sure if there is a room available so when I meet another woman at the bus station who has a closer hostel at the same price, I decide to stay there. I soon regret my decision as the neighbours dog sits barking right outside my room's window for the next 4 hours. I don't think it stops for even 10 seconds during that time. A dog barking like this is not unusual in South America and no one ever seems to complain or even notice but it drives me crazy. This particular dog was so close to my window he may as well have been in the room with me and I must admit I was plotting his demise.

Ripley´s Mall in Puerto Montt

The next morning, I'm up at 6:30AM and at the bus station shortly after 7:00AM but I'm dismayed to find that the bus is sold out and there are no other buses today. Good thing I have a couple of spare days. So, I buy a ticket for tomorrow's bus. There is no way that I'm going back to the same hostel with the barking dog but it is too early to go to this other hostel. So, I grab a couple empanadas to eat and sit in the bus station reading a book until 8:30AM and walk up to the other hostel. The lady seems happy to see me and I am the only one staying here, I should have come here last night.

I spend much of the day watching videos, reading my book and working on my next blog post. I then head into town for a late lunch/dinner and I notice that The Hobbit is playing at a local theatre. So after dinner, I go and see it. I'm surprised to find out this is the first of 3 movie; I read the book and it wasn't very long. The movie is not bad but I find it kind of drags a bit. When I get out of the movie theatre, it is pouring rain again so I catch a cab back to the hostel. It has rained a lot lately but it is supposed to get drier the farther south I go.

More on travelling south to Futaleufu and river rafting in my next post. Happy New Year's.