2,000km in 5 days

After a couple of Piscos to steady the nerves, I checked my bank balance.

As soon as the account flashed up, I wished I hadn´t.  In two days I will have been away for exactly 1 month.  I have already spent about 40% of the money I brought with me....

In an effort to combat this issue I´ve been taking night buses everywhere.  I have spent 3 of the last 5 nights on a bus, saving me approximately 40 pounds.  That is about 1 night of drinking in Mendoza, so I still have a way to go.  During those three nights I have had a total of 6 hours of sleep, witnessed the loudest snoring ever recorded on a moving vehicle, been left holding a 3-month old baby while her parents had a 20-minute argument, and watched ´The Break Up´ in Spanish.  I can´t really recommend any of those activities.  I´m now so sleep deprived that I look like a serial killer.

It´s been a great few days though!  I´ve moved 2,000km North, spent a sun-drenched day in Santiago and visited the beach town of La Serena.

In Santiago, I caught up with some friends from the hostel, visited a rooftop pool and danced the traditional Cueca dance.  "The idea is to seduce your partner by looking passionately into their eyes....while mimicking the footsteps of a male chicken", my Chilean friend explained.  Very well then!

I must admit, when the locals danced, it looked great.  But I was rubbish.  I think we left just early enough that I wasn´t attacked for making a mockery of hundreds of years of traditional dance.  By then it was time for me to get on the next night bus.

I arrived the next day in La Serena at 6am.  It is a lovely little town next to a long curving beach.  There are lots of churches, museums and markets to explore by day and the region is famed for its clear night skies. This has resulted in the construction of many observatories, taking advantage of, on average, 350 clear night skies per year.  Remember that fact, 350 clear night skies per year, its important later.

My bed wasn´t ready so I visited a small museum about Gabriel Gonzalez Videla, who helped draft the current Chilean constitution.  It had some decent paintings and was all very interesting but I was so tired that when I sat down to take a rest I fell asleep for 30 minutes and was woken up by an amused cleaning lady.

The rest of the day was spent chilling out on the beach with some people from the hostel and the evening largely involved drinking games from around the world.  And Extreme Jenga - like regular Jenga but with drinking rules.

The next day a group of us decided to go to the observatory and see some stars up close!  It was a beautiful day, with clear skies and scorching hot sun, so I rented a board and went surfing.  It was great to get back amongst the waves as we don´t get much surf in London....

That night was stargazing night.  Nine of us jumped on the bus for the 45 minute journey to Mamalluca observatory in the Elqui Valley.  You can probably guess what happened - just as we were about to get there we were told some clouds were rolling in and that it would be too cloudy to see anything!  What are the odds?!  Anyway, all was not lost, we still had a great night swapping stories from our travels in the hostel bar...

I´d been befriended by two Chilean girls who were on their holidays and a guy from Germany.  We visited some beautiful Japanese gardens in the morning.  This would have been the perfect place to get over my hangover, except there was a Mexican circus in town.  It had pitched up right next to the gardens, much to the owner´s annoyance, and blasted messages out over the tannoy informing the masses of their famous jumping giraffes and dancing squirrels.

I jumped on another night bus that evening and did the 16 hours to San Pedro, where I am writing this post.  The landscape was fantastic travelling over.  I´ve never seen such huge, dry, rocky expanses in my life.

There are lots of things to do, so we´ll see what my new budget can stretch to.  Oh, continuing the theme of my ridiculous luck, this is the driest desert in the world and there are currently floods!!  It is so bad that some of the roads have been washed away.  This is the for the first time they have had rain like this in 11 years!  Anyway, it looks like I will still be able to visit most things though, so it should be OK.

For now I will leave you with a picture of me celebrating pancake day in Santiago!

Mendoza

So I ended up going to Mendoza, Argentina!

Some of the guys I´d met in Santiago were spending the last 5 days of their trip partying in Mendoza and I thought I´d go and see them off.  I was also looking forward to the bus route which winds its way through the high Andes on the Chilean-Argentinian border.

After about 3 hours on the bus I could see the jagged, rocky mountains stretching up through the clouds and into the sky.  The road has some serious switchbacks and at some points it seemed like we were driving straight up the face of a mountain!

I thought Chile was hot....but as I got off the bus at 9pm I was hit with 40 degree heat.  Unfortunately for me, all the ATMs at the bus terminal were broken and I didn´t have any money.  It was a fun 2km walk into town to visit the bank....

Mendoza was levelled in the 1800s by an earthquake and rebuilt with wide streets and several plazas in order to provide some relief if another big quake struck.  These plazas are great to chill out in and have some nice statues etc.

I have to confess, I´ve been a rubbish traveller in Mendoza.  I´ve adopted the Chris D´Costa method of sightseeing.  For those who don´t know Chris, his approach to travelling is to go out and get drunk every night and see zero sights because you´re too hungover during the day....  I´ve been here 5 days and have taken 12 pictures.

Although not particularly cultural, I´ve met some awesome people.  This weekend was a long weekend in Argentina so most of the hostel guests were people from all over Argentina coming over to party in Mendoza.  All the clubs are open-air (it is around 28 degrees every night) and yesterday we partied up in the mountains with some locals!

I´d already planned to come back next summer when I do Argentina properly so I will see the sights next time, honest.  These include lots of wineries, the mountains and some beautiful countryside.  Next, I´m heading back to Chile to resume my journey North.  Until then, I´ll leave you with a picture of some women dancing with massive sunflowers.....just another normal night in Mendoza.....

Mi casa es su casa

I´ve had a great few days since I last posted, if a little surreal!

On my last day in Pucon I visited Huerquehue national park.  Even though it is almost impossible to pronounce the name of this park, it really is beautiful.  Myself, Chris (from Oz) and a couple from Switzerland hiked the Lagos trail, traversing three stunningly beautiful lakes.  After a swim we headed back and joined the rest of the hostel to celebrate the last night for a few of us.

I have finally decided to head North.  The South of Chile is absolutely amazing but it´s currently the highest of high seasons and I´m planning to go back to the general region at the beginning of next summer anyway.  There´s not much to see between Pucon and Santiago but I always like the challenge of searching for interesting things that aren´t in the guide book.

With this in mind, I picked two random towns and flipped a coin.  The winner was Temuco, 3 hours bus ride North.  This strategy has provided some gems on previous trips....but this time it backfired.  I arrived to find what I can only describe as the Chilean version of Milton Keynes. Except everything was closed and there were zero accommodation options.  I got there at midday and had already decided to leave by 2pm.

I wanted to go to the town of Chillan, but the only bus I could find departed at 8pm, arriving at midnight.  And I hadn´t organised any accommodation....  Anyway, I bought a ticket and was told that I had to go to a different bus station "600 meters" down the road, so I decided to kill some time by walking. After what I considered to be at least 800m there was a sign informing me that the bus station was another 1km away.  Spirits were low at this point!  I finally got to the bus station and chilled out on a grass verge to pass the 4hrs waiting time.  As luck would have it, I ended up chatting to a guy from Santiago who called a hostel in Chillan and sorted me a room - absolute legend.

There was an empty seat next to me when I got on the bus but at the first stop a woman got on and sat next to me.  After about 10 minutes she asked me if I knew what time the bus arrived in Chillan.  She could tell from my reply that I wasn´t Chilean - obviously my Spanish was perfect, it must have been the subtle difference in the accent! - and asked me where I was from.  It turned out that her family lives 3 doors down from the hostel I was planning on staying at, so we shared a taxi.  I´m not sure if it was because she´s really friendly, or because she was amused by my comedy use of the Spanish language, but she offered to show me round the town the next day.

So I met Paula the next day and was shown around town.  I was also introduced to pretty much everyone who lives there - I don´t think they get many tourists.  Chillan has a great market, a really unusual church and a large mosaic wall depicting the escapades of Bernardo O´Higgins, who freed Chile from the Spaniards.

We wandered around for a while and the next thing I knew I had been invited over for lunch. With the entire family!  I couldn´t really say no so I rocked up to the house to find a dining table set for 15!  There were three generations of the Villaman family, as well as numerous cousins and friends.  Luckily they weren´t fazed by my ridiculous use of the Spanish language and the father, who enjoys travelling a lot himself, said "mi casa es su casa" - which I didn´t even know was a real phrase.  Half the time I didn´t have a clue what was going on but it really was awesome.

The next day some of us went to the national park 100km out of town.  There are two volcanoes there and thermal pools everywhere.  We hiked up a mountain to find some hot mud baths and gaps in the rocks spewing sulphur out into the air.  In the evening we went to the restaurant of one of their friends which was completely outside - its about 20 degrees in the evenings here.

Today I said goodbye and I´m back on the road North.  It sounds cheesy but I am truly stunned at how friendly and generous the people in this country are - especially the Villaman family!  Next stop is either the beach town of Pichilemu or Mendoza in Argentina - can't wait!

A huge spider in Huerquhue National Park - a bit bigger than my hand....

One last look at Villarica Volcano

Lago Verde

Mosaics at Chillan

Statue outside Chillan University

Me, Paula and Lorenna about to conquer the mountains of Chillan!

Beautiful views from the mountains near Chillan

Hot mud baths!

A twin volcano near Chillan

¡Hola! Mi nombre es Simon y soy Ingles...

I never liked learning German at school.  I´m not sure whether it was because I wasn´t interested in the language, or because our German teacher had the personality of a Gestapo General.

I was therefore a bit apprehensive when I headed up to the language school for my first Spanish lesson.  Myself and a Welsh girl from the hostel, Hannah, had signed up for two hours of lessons per day with Patricia, a larger than life Chilean woman.  I was expecting to ease in quite slowly with a bit of "my name is" etc.  No chance - we went straight into the uses of the verbs ´ser´ and ´estar´, then the conjugation of those verbs.  I´m sure I´ll get mocked for admitting this, but at that point I couldn´t even remember what a verb was. Or how verbs are used in the English language, let alone Spanish!  On top of that Patricia doesn´t speak any English.  I can honestly say that I didn´t have a clue what was going on for the first 10 minutes.

Anyway, after a shocker of a start, I started picking stuff up (thank goodness!).  Not only that, but I really really enjoyed the rest of the lesson.  That was Monday and now it´s Friday.  I can´t believe the difference 10 hours of lessons have made!  Don´t get me wrong, there are small animals that can speak more Spanish than me, but I´m now able to have basic conversations with people.  I´m going to do some more lessons when I get to a cheaper country like Bolivia, but for now I´m just trying to chat to anyone who will humor me.

Aside from the lessons, this week I´ve visited a beautiful black sand beach on the shore of lake Villarica and went Hydrospeeding!  This activity involved throwing myself down grade III rapids holding onto something resembling an over-sized child's swimming float (you know the ones you had when you were learning to swim at school).  It sounds ridiculous but it was great fun (that´s not me in the picture by the way).

I´m not sure what I´m going to do next.  I can´t make my mind up whether to go North, South, East or West.  To confuse the matter further, I was also asked if I´d like to work at this hostel....  Hopefully I´ll have made my mind up by the time I write the next post! Chao for now. 

The town of Pucon.

The moon comes up after another beautiful day.

The weather is so hot that beer needs to be frozen.  We slightly overestimated on this one...

A view of the hill next to lake Villarica from the black sand beach.  The three trees that stick out on the ridge are the town´s mascot.

Doing my homework on the beach!

I´m currently living in something resembling a large beehive....

This statue of Jesus keeps an eye on the town.

Volcano climbing in Pucon

After beaching it up around Santiago I wanted to get out into the countryside and do some hiking.  I´d also planned to do Spanish lessons and didn´t fancy doing them in Santiago as I´d only just left one big city, London.  It seemed like the town of Pucon ticked all the boxes, so I headed down South on a night bus.

Pucon is a fairly small town in the Lakes District of Chile, not too far North of Patagonia.  It´s a beautiful place, surrounded by jagged mountains, sparkling blue lakes, and the snow-capped Villarrica volcano.  I found a hostel and went straight out for a trek into the countryside with a couple of the other backpackers.  We ended up at Salto de Claro, a huge waterfall out in the hills.

The next day a couple of us hiked out to Cartagua to visit a huge lake and some more waterfalls.

Day 3 was the day I´d been waiting for - a few of us had decided to climb Villarrica volcano, one of the most active volcanoes in Chile!  The bubbling giant provides a striking background to the sleepy town of Pucon.  You can see the sulphur gas spewing out of the cone during the day and the glow from its lava lake during the night.  It´s 2,840m tall and, even though it is the middle of summer, the last 800m are covered in snow.

We woke up at 3:15am (!!) and got all our gear together. We took a transport up to the start of the climb, already 1,000m up.  We hiked through the first 1,000m in the dark, looking up at the stars while zig-zagging our way towards red glow at the top of the volcano.  It started to get light at about 6:30am and for the first time we could see the fantastic view out towards Pucon.  We could see the lakes, mountains and countryside as far as Argentina.

At about this point we hit ice.  It was already ridiculously cold as the sun wasn´t properly up but this was the point the water in my bag started to freeze!  Anyway, we deployed the crampons and started the long walk to the top, ice axes in hand.  Walking on ice in crampons takes a lot longer than trekking across the ground.  You need to keep your feet flat so that the spikes can dig into the ice properly and therefore have to zig-zag more.  The last 800m took another 2.5 hours before we were finally at the last scramble to the top.

We all ran up the last 20m over the cusp and into the crater.  There was sulphur steaming out of the gaps in the rocks and a sheer 60m drop down into the crater.  We couldn´t see the lava as it was too far down but we could hear it bubbling away.  The 5hr hike was definitely worth it, we could see for miles - the view was truly stunning!

After about 15 minutes the sulphur had burned away the lining of our throats so we headed down.  Luckily, getting down was easier than getting up.  We pulled down the backs of our coats and slid down on our asses!  5hrs up, 45 minutes down.  What a day!

Today I´m going back to school!  I currently have the Spanish skills of a two-year-old so I´m going to do 5 days of Spanish lessons.  By then I should at least be able to get around without using the English-Spanish dictionary...  Here are a few more pics from the last few days:

Saying goodbye to friends in Santiago (Claire from Paris and Fabiola from Santiago)

A bit of street art in Bella Vista, Santiago

You meet backpackers from all over the galaxy.  This guy was French.

Cartagua - the lake, beach and some sandstone carvings

Me and Eoin ready to tackle the volcano!

About 3/4 of the way up

Looking back to Pucon in the twilight at about 5am

Having a quick rest before the last stretch...