Chile Travelogue

September 15 - 12:00 noon - Sunny and 19 C

(Tony) We are now in Chile! We arrived in Santiago on the 12th, and it felt very good to be at sea level once again! The main improvement being temperature. The first day we were here felt about 28 C, which was very nice after the cold morning and nights in Peru.

Santiago is quite westernized, and it is very clean, safe and relaxing (quite a relief after coming from Lima). It is easy to tell that one is in South America, though, as everyone here speaks Spanish (very quickly). Even though we are finding this city relaxing, it is teeming with life! We arrived downtown at about 8 am, and tried to catch the underground metro, which had a train arriving every 3 minutes, but it was very difficult to get a space, as the people were crammed in like sardines!

A couple of other great things about Santiago have been: 1. The traffic here gives the right of way to pedestrians, which has been hard to adapt to (in Peru, drivers did not care if pedestrians were in the way or not, so I'm still a little gun shy), 2. The water quality! Fresh fruit and vegetables are an option once again! Krista is in 7th heaven! The avacados, in my opinion, are particularly great to have again!

Speaking of food, both of our appetites have increased significantly since arriving here, and this has worked out very well, as food is relatively cheap, and the portions are large. The other day I had what seems to be a variation on a specialty here - fried onions, french fries topped with a fried egg, and a 1/4 chicken. Typically, this dish is served with a large piece of beef. Very good for a big appetite!

Since arriving in Chile, I have been finding that one of the hardest things to get used to is the currency! The exchange rate is approximately 680 Chilean pesos per US dollar. However, on most signs, pesos are shown with a dollar sign. This makes for some hilarious signs, such as $1600 for lunch or $300 on a pop machine. There have been a couple of jokes made regarding this issue (you want to spend $4000 on dinner?! Are you crazy?!

Tonight we are heading South to Puerto Montt, and then onto the far Southern coast!

One final note I'd like to make is a huge thank you to everyone who has been (and will be) leaving messages in our guestbook! We greatly appreciate it, and I always look forward to seeing who else has left us a note! Thank you!

September 23 - 12:15 noon - Partly Cloudy and 8 C

(Krista) Well, it has been eight days since our last update - our sincerest apologies, but our "lifestyle" in Chile has been very mobile, and thus very busy. Much of our time has been spent in public transport (many times more efficient and cleaner than Peru), in grocery stores and cooking food at our hostels. Every night after dinner, we may get the inclination to go to an internet cafe for an update, but it has been much too cold to leave the hostel.

As I just eluded to, it is cold here in Chile right now. Santiago seemed to have nice weather, but we have been heading south, and have been encountering increasingly temperate conditions. Considering it is spring here (equivalent to March in Canada), we should not complain too bad. The reason why I suffer so, is that NONE of the houses here have central heating, if they have heating at all. Most nights the temperature has dropped well into the low single digits accompanied by very strong winds. Further, most of our hotel rooms have had very poor insulation and improperly closing windows. This makes for some cold rooms at night. Luckily Tony and I have been creative enough to get heat at night though. In one hotel, where the only heat sources was a wood stove in the hall, we left our bedroom door open all night. The next hotel had portable kerosene heaters in some of the halls, so we stole one for each night we crashed there (much of my stuff reeks of kerosene now). In one hospedaje, we actually scored the room with the chimney running through it, making for a comfy night and morning (frozen at night though). One night in a hostel with absolutely no heating source in the entire building, we did freeze, but other than that we have been fairly lucky. The only downside to all of this is that the bathrooms have all been shared and unheated. Fortunately all of them have had hot water - something lacking in Peru.

Because of the cold, we have made very good use of the winter gear purchased for pennies in Peru: toques, scarfs and gloves. The top of my head has not seen the sun in over a week, as daily temps have demanded the full gear. Luckily Tony convinced me back in Canada to pack my fleece jacket and waterproof overcoat, or else I´d be in danger now. My warning to anyone who decides to come to Chile: if coming anytime except January or February, pack warm clothes. No wonder Chile is called Chile, as it´s definitely chilly.

So what have we done since leaving Santiago? Alot of travelling, and very little touring (unlike Peru, where everyday was a tour). Our first destination, via night bus, was to Puerto Montt, a port town halfway between Santiago and the southern tip of the continent. The entire area surrounding Puerto Montt is called Chile´s Lake District, and with good reason. There are lakes, volcanos, rivers and mountains all over the place. The main industry in the area is dairy, tourism and cottaging, with good reason. Absolutely beautiful region! The only complaint I have concides with my first two paragraphs: cold and very much rain. We didn`t go one day or night without hours of rain. Needless to say, as you will read, we didn`t spend much time here.

The night bus to P.Montt was an interesting ride, about an hour down the Panamerican the bus made a very large clunking noise. Ten minutes later, we pulled off on the highway and were told that the bus was down. We were to wait 25 minutes for another bus to show up. There we were, a half full bus of people waiting on the side of the Panamerican in the dark and cold. It was quite a sight. Well it seems that everything happens for a reason, as the rescue bus (containing people) was a significantly nicer one - likely a higher class - and we still had the same kick butt seats as the previous bus (the nicer seats are in the first two rows). We totally scored. In the morning, they even served coffee!

While waiting for this bus in Santiago, we had met with an American running a hostel in the city who offered us a ton of valuable advice. The primary piece of advice he offered was "don`t stay in Puerto Montt if at all possible, it is a dive of a town. Instead stay in Puerto Varas, a swiss-like resort town bordering a lake only 20 kms north". We decided to heed his advice and disembark from the night bus in this town instead of P.Montt. Over the next week we confirmed that this was the best piece of advice taken in Chile.

Puerto Varas is a gorgeous town at the side of a large lake, with two cone-like and snow-capped volcanos on the other side. Absolutely beautiful. It looked almost exactly like a Swiss town nestled into the side of a lake. Too bad it rained basically the entire time, and only our first and last days afforded us a view of the looming volcanos. In P.Varas, there are many many tours offered as horseback, trekking, kayaking or climbing the volcano Orsono (the most cone like one). As much as we really wanted to any of these tours, they costed a minimum of $90US per person, per day. Yikes. Who buys this stuff? It is low season here too, so many of the tours weren`t being offered, or weren´t recommended. We quickly made the decision to do independent touring.

Our first day was a tour to an apparently beautiful location in the Lake District - a highly recommended, but distant village called Petrohue, on another lake at the other side of one of the volcanos. Since we were doing independent travel, we stuck with public transport there, and had no idea where we were going, or when we were returning (the language barrier is a big thing in this region). Two South Africans joined us on the bus, and thus weren´t alone on this bus ride to who knows where (the tourist information booth in P.Varas were not very informative in what there was to offer in this region). It rained the entire time, and the views were nill for the lowlying clouds covering the surrounding mountains and volcanos. When we arrived in the area, it was pouring out, and nothing (I repeat, nothing) was open. Not a restaurant, a hotel, or a store. Now what? We were surrounded by a beautiful lake nestled at the foot of mountains (unseen due to clouds), but what could we do now? We didn`t want to take any of the boat rides around the lake for the cold and rain, and the cost was astronomical. Further, we had no idea when the bus out of the town was scheduled for (we were told many conflicting stories), so we left the South Africans and started hiking up a path towards one of the volcanos.

After our hour-long hike, we returned only to find the South Africans standing in the pouring rain still waiting for the bus out of the town. We joined them, and waiting for about 3 hours. No food, no services, no seats, only a little roof overhang to stand under. Everyone was telling us that the bus comes every hour, but three hours later, one showed up and we thankfully left the pouring rain for our hostel an hour away.

Well that was our first attempt at independent touring in Chile and it was very unsuccessful. We have a few more stories, but my time is running short on the internet, thus must end here (I will continue tomorrow for sure). In case you are wondering, we are now WAYYYYY down near Antartica in Punta Arenas (check the map). This is by far the nicest place in Chile, with a very Canadian climate. This afternoon we are taking a tour to see PENGUINS!!!! I have to tell you about it later.

September 24 - 6:30 pm - Scattered Clouds 10 C

(Tony) As Krista said above, we are now in Punta Arenas, which is almost as far south as one can easily get! It does get cold down here, but mainly due to the wind. It can be sunny and warm, but if the wind from the Magellan Strait picks up, it feels brutally cold! It is a very good thing we brought appropriate clothes! Punta Arenas is very nice, with a feel similar to any town in isolation - peaceful and relaxed. It feels safe here as well, which is a definite bonus! The skies here are huge (when it's not raining), and remind me of Chetwynd with lots of wispy clouds high up in the atmosphere, or blankets of rippled cloud a little lower.

One good thing that came out of the lake district is that I learned why there is a dollar sign as the symbol for the Chilean peso. Supposedly (you can't believe everything you hear in South America), the dollar sign with one line through it is the peso, and the dollar sign with two lines through it is the dollar (at least here in Chile). I had always thought that the two signs were interchangeable...

While we were at the lake district (as Krista described above), there was poor weather, but I have had the opportunity to see more water than I have in my lifetime! Growing up in Southern Alberta, I did not have a lot of exposure to large waves or riding on ferries, so I have been enjoying these things immensely! We have even seen dolphins jumping out of the water on 3 out of our 4 ferry rides!

Tomorrow we head to Puerto Natales, which is the closest city to the Torres del Paine National Park! There we will go into the park, and trek for 2 days minimum, 7 days maximum (very dependant upon weather). It should be interesting, as there are "refugios," which are huts to stay in with hot water and kitchen facilities throughout the park! We should not have to rent a tent (also available at the refugios) unless we want to save some money! We will let you know how every is when we get back! If you would like to see some pictures of the park, there are some good ones at Torres del Paine pictures.

September 24 - 6:15pm - Partly Cloudy and 10 C

(Krista) We saw penguins yesterday....Up close and personal with Magellan Penguins. It was quite an event. Normally these magellan penguins come to this area of Patagonia for breeding starting mid-October, and thus most tour operators do not operate penguin tours this time of year, however we got lucky. We found a tour operator that would take us to the "wild" penguin nesting habitats; the habitats not visited by many tourists. Basically this means that we went through the back door to the penguin reserve. We rode in this, what seems like, a bullet-proof, 4x4 mini mini van along a beach surrounding a very very wild area of the Magellan strait sea. This is not a tourist beach, at all (the winds were 70km/h plus, and temps of max 5C), but it was sparsely populated by very poor and isolated men living in corrugated steel huts, and who survive on collecting seaweed. Needless to say, as an "American" tourist, I was not looking to get stuck on this beach (the ride was a little sketchy). But nevertheless, after 1 hour of riding, and 1/2 hour of river fording and beach tramping, we reached the penguin colony.

This species of penguin are so adorable - exactly as one would imagine a penguin to be; "wing" flapping, wave surfing, shaking and waddling. As a defenseless bird, they are very finicky. Even seagulls will scare them from the beach to the sea. We had to hide behind a two-foot high shelter of drift wood on the beach in order to see them, but to avoid scaring them. I felt like I was from National Geographic, all hunched over in the freezing cold, snapping photos of wild life.

Our "guide", in his broken english, explained to us that these penguins live half the day (morning to late afternoon) in the sea, where they hunt for food; octopus and fish. Late afternoon (when we were there), the penguins come to shore from the nasty wild sea to nest. Now for a penguin to come to land is quite an ordeal, as they are so defenseless. First, one of them will swim ashore to the surf on the beach only and scope out the area. To the point, he'll look around in all directions and waiting. Soon, a few of the remaining clan will come ashore. Then a few more. At the best point, there were about 10 of them. This is basically what we saw of the penguins; one and then a bunch hanging out on the beach like Hank and his buddies on King of the Hill. They were flapping their wings, shaking off excess water and just chillin (literally).

This chillin out is a very watchfull one however. At any time (including when seagulls fly by), they will dive back into the frigid sea to start again. But, if they do feel safe enough to continue on, the clan will waddle completely up the beach over the small sand dune up to a farmer's field that backs onto the beach. Here they nest. Luckily for us, we saw dozens of them hanging out on their nests checking out the surroundings. Unfortunately we couldn't get too close to them, as a fence was in the way (actually to protect the animal's safety and comfort, I'm glad we couldn't).

So that was our penguin experience. One more thing to check off of my top things to do in life. I can`t wait to upload pics to the site for all to see. I hope the photos turned out as excellently as they look on the cameras read-out screen. I was using my digital zoom for the first time, and therefore am not 100% sure as to what to expect.

One thing I have been wanting to write about is Chilean food. While in Peru, I lost a good 10 pounds because I had no appetite from the altitude or from the actual thought of Peruvian kitchens. Well, here in Chile things are completely the opposite. When I read in the Lonely Planet guide that water was completely potable in Chile, I was ecstatic - we can eat salads again!!! We can buy fruits and vegetables again!! We don`t need bottled water to brush our teeth!!! Exciting. Well this excitment was completely justified. It is wonderful to eat an apple, or enjoy a freshly bought tomato off of the street (washed of course). The only downside to any of this is price. Food is very expensive here (one caveat: the prices are in comparison to Latin American prices, and also to our daily budget). We can easily spend more on one meal than on our entire night`s lodging.

To counter these inflated prices, however we have been blessed with hostels that allow their tenants to use the kitchen. Because of this incredible feature, we have spent more time in grocery stores than in our hotel rooms so for in this country. Don`t get me wrong, grocery prices are still reasonably expensive (relative even to Canadian prices), but as Tony would say (in paraphrase) "there`s hardly a sense of satisfaction that could beat grocery shopping in a foreign country". It`s like we`ve become part of the local scene! What have we been eating (besides an absolute ton)? Tomatos, tuna, avocado, mayonnaise (ad nauseum), pasta sauce with rice - for the gluten intolerant - ham slices.....mmmmm, real food washed in tap water.

Because of this sudden culinary freedom, I have subsequently put back on pretty well all the weight that I lost in Peru (is it more dangerous to lost 10 lbs in one month, or gain it???). This weight gain is NOT solely due to the ham slices and tomato. I have to talk about Chilean food, as we have had many opportunities to eat out here. As a warning, I`m about to embark on a fat-ridden journey into Chilean meals and snacks, but this is only from a budget-traveller`s perspective. If we actually had money to spend on restaurants, things may be a little different. Okay, here we go.

As a budget traveller, there are a number of options for prepared food, but it all depends on how much money one wishes to spend, or how hungry one is. I will talk about the meals based on level of starvation. If one is looking for the lighter option for food, or is just semi-hungry, the best option (and the cheapest) is the completo. Basically this is a hot dog, in a bun, smothered (and I say smothered with much emphasis) in layers of mayo, mashed avocado and tomato. There is more calorie-laden topping than bun on this concoction. Remember though, this was the light menu, and is quite popular here. There are about 50 brands of hot dogs in each grocery store we`ve visited.

The next option, for those who are beginning to feel a tad bit more famished, is the churrasco, ave, or lomito. All of these are round sandwiches at a minimum of 6" (15cm) in diameter and topped with all of the fixings: mayo, mashed avocado, tomato, lettuce and sauerkraut (yes, marinated cabbage). The difference between each of these monstrosities is the meat inside. The churrasco is beef steak, the ave is chicken breast, and the lomito is slabs of pork. Terribly fattening, but excellent. Just to give you an illusion to the size of these mountains: Chileans eat these things with forks and knives; not with their hands as Tony did on his first attempt.

Now for the meal to be had if you are REALLY hungry. This is a meal served in all restaurants, from the dirtiest corner store to the most posh seafood restaurant in town. It is called the a la pobre, and can be served as a 1/4 chicken a la pobre, or steak a la pobre, or even sausage a la pobre. What is it? It is a huge slab of meat (the meat you chose), served with a large handful of french fries on the right, and a large portion of fried onions to the meat`s left. To top this all off, they put two fried eggs on top of the fries. I tried this dish once, got 2/3 of the way through it and almost vomited. Tony, on the other hand, quickly devoured his and made his way into mine (finishing it, I must add). This is a very generous meal, and a Chilean staple, all for $2US, and up to $8US.

Now to be nice, these aren`t the only three dishes to be had in this country. There are many more, such as salads and fried calamari ($$$$), but these are the staples. To continue on though, I have to talk about Chilean snacks. Everyone, and I mean everyone, eats ice cream. Every store sells ice cream, and often has at least one person buying from their freezers. Santiago was crazy. Everyone had an ice cream in their hands. One woman was eating ice cream out of a rather large cup, and instead of using a spoon to scoop it out, she was using a cone from another ice cream. Crazy.

Every corner store in town has a wall of chocolate on one side, and a wall of potato chips on another. The third wall is booze (that is another paragraph: stay tuned). It is so hard to keep the junk food consumption down here, especially when these two items are so cheap. One very popular snack (for Chileans, as well for Tony and Krista) is honey-roasted peanuts. For 50cents US, one can get a bag of warm peanuts at any street corner in Santiago. We had at least one bag a day while in the city, and woke up thinking about them.

The last insanely popular Chilean snack is this phenomenon called mote con huesillo, sold kitty-corner to the aforementioned honey-roasted peanut vendors. This visually unappetising concoction is a cup half-full with cooked barley, and then topped up with a peach nectar containing reconstituted dried peaches. I, being gluten intolerant, cannot feasibly tasted this mess of tastes, but Tony just loves them. He thinks it`s the texture. One thing is for sure, they are popular, if a Chilean is not eating ice cream, you can definitely be sure they are enjoying on of these drinks.

I`ve rambled enough. Until next time (post-Torres del Paine!!!!).

October 3 - 7:15 pm - Partly Cloudy and 19 C (!)

(Tony) We are now back in Santiago, and it is much warmer here than in Punta Arenas! It is good to be back in an area where we do not need to wear our toques! However, I did enjoy our trip down south, but it was a very rugged environment.

While down south, we did visit Torres del Paine National Park (as I rambled on about in an earlier entry). The closest town to the Park is Puerto Natales, and we headed there on Sept 25, hung out for 2 days, and then headed into the Park. While in Puerto Natales, we found the nicest hostal we have found yet! Casa Cecilia is owned and run by a Chilean-Swiss family, and was amazingly cheap for what we received! For 10,000 pesos, we had a nice room, shared (but unbelievably clean) bathrooms, homemade bread for breakfast, a kitchen for guests only (typically, the kitchens have been shared with the family that lives there), and heating in every room! The owners even spoke english (a luxury, we have found) and were very friendly and helpful! I would highly recommend this place to anyone.

Lodgings aside, we arrived at the park and hiked to the refugio (a mountain hut), which was nice, but very cold. The hike itself was a little more difficult than I had thought, and the wind definitely kept our temperatures down. The refugio was located in a small valley that leads to the actual Torres del Paine (Towers of Paine), which are the three, dramatic granite towers that are often in pictures. The refugio was not quite at the half-way point to the Towers. We ate lunch at the refugio, and then headed up to see if a view of the towers would be possible.

It's worthwhile describing the refugios in more detail, as they are quite impressive for thier location. The one we stayed in (Refugio Chileno) is a tall, new building with a main eating/lounging area with lots of windows in the front, a kitchen behind that room, bathrooms behind the kitchen and then guestrooms with bunkbeds in the back. The building has two wood burning stoves for heating (little or no insulation), and hot and cold running water. As I said, it was quite impressive for it's location. The hot water was definitely a luxury!

The hike up to the viewpoint for the Towers was a little sketchy in some areas, as there were numerous washout areas and the trail was very wet and slippery. The final section of the hike up to the viewpoint took us up an avalanche run with some of the largest boulders I have seen. A partial view of the Towers was all that I had, as clouds hung low throughout the valley. I could, however, truly sense how large the Towers are (the largest having 1 km of vertical face). I think that on a clear day, I would have stood there staring at them for some time. However, with a new wind blowing in, we moved down as quickly as possible and back to the relative warmth of the refugio. When we arrived at the refugio, it was nice to find that the only other people staying there were tenting. We started up the wood burning stove in the back hallway of the building and warmed up for the rest of the evening.

It was rather expensive to stay in the refugio at US$17/person, particularly as you still need a sleeping bag. However, we found it to be more than worthwhile, as a storm blew in during the night and it poured and poured all night long. In the morning, it was still pouring rain, so we headed back to Puerto Natales. It was Krista's brother Jeff who hit the nail on the head with "Always leave something to come back to" (Sorry if I misquoted you, Jeff). I would definitely like to return to this area to explore it further.

I'm off for tonight, but tomorrow I'll fill you in on our other main trip down south!

October 4 - 12:18 pm - Mostly Cloudy and 22 C

(Tony) Today is a big day for us - we have officially been on the road for 50 days! We have just one more night in Chile, and tomorrow at 8 pm, we head to Madrid, Spain! There is way to much to see in Chile to fit it all into one trip, and I would have really liked to have seen the Atacama desert in the north. However, I am ready to move on to another country, after having spent the last 22 days here.

As I said last night, I'll fill everyone in on our other trip down in the south that brought us to the Moreno Glacier in Argentina! Krista has updated the photos section with some great shots of the glacier, if you would like to check it out for yourself! When we returned to Puerto Natales from Torres del Paine National Park, we warmed up, and headed out the next morning on a one day tour of the Moreno Glacier. It was a little expensive at 35,000 pesos/person (approx. 53 USD), but it was well worth it! The tour itself was basically transportation to the glacier in a large minibus. The tour itself consisted of transportation - 6 hours each way (including border stops) in a large van.

It was still raining in Puerto Natales when we left, and as we passed the Torres del Paine NP on our way to Argentina, it was clouded over (that made us glad that we made the right decision to get out of there when we did). As we crossed over into Argentina, the weather became nicer and nicer, and blue sky could be seen on the horizon. Once we reached Argentina, the road became a little bumpy and 5 point seat belts would have been helpful (even though the driver looked like a Chilean John Travolta, he drove like Mario Andretti!). On the way to El Calafate (the town closest to the National Park Los Glaciares), the surroundings were flat and barren, but as we approached the Park, the mountain ranges were visible, as well as lakes with small icebergs in them (not that I have seen that many icebergs, it always amazes me how deep blue they are). Also, there was a lot more vegetation than in the flatlands we passed through earlier. The greenery was a lot more lush than on the other side of the mountains in the Torres del Paine Park. It was very dramatic to see the bottom of the moutains covered in green, moving up to snow and rock about halfway up.

The glacier is in at the end of a valley that is an offshoot from another valley. This meant that we didn't get a look at it until we were close! The glacier is massive, and one can easily tell from a distance. It is 2.5 km wide, 70 m tall, and 14 km long! As the face is located in a lake, only 10% of the glacier is visible. You can choose to view the glacier from the far side of the lake, or take a boat trip to get very close (at 7 USD/person it was well worth it!). We hopped on the boat and got a close up view of the glacier. I'm unsure if I can describe it, but the Lonely Planet guide summed it up well saying that it an audio and visial experience, as viewing the glacier is impressive enough, but frequent crashes can be heard as ice breaks both internal to the glacier, and off of the face into the lake. It was incredible to see a big chunk of ice calve off the glacier and slip slowly and serenly into the lake below, quickly followed by a thunderous cracking sound.

After the boat ride took up and down the chilly face of the glacier, we warmed up with some greasy french fries and then headed to a series of staircases and lookouts. This gave us a good overview of the glacier, and the length of the glacier was very apparent, as it stretched back into the mountains, until becoming one with the rest of the whiteness. The top of the glacier is very jagged up close, where individual ice towers can be easily made out. One can hear these towers falling and cracking frequently.

Our homeward trip gave a chance to stop at an Argentine grocery store (which was very cheap, even compared to Chilean grocery stores), and I had an opportunity to obtain some of the best pickled vegetables I've had. In my mind, the key to these vegetables is the balancing of the salt and vinegar. If these are out of balance, the taste is out of balance. I can say one thing about the Argentines, they definitely know the proper balance! I know I will looking for "product of Argentina" from now on when I buy pickled vegetables!

The next time you hear from us, we will have endured a rather long flight to Madrid!