China. Maybe One Day #6: Big Catch Up – Argentina, Chile and Bolivia

By: Jeremy Taylor

Big Catch Up

Monday, 30th September, 2002
We had arrived in Puerto Montt the previous day and had been greeted by
torrential rain. It was still raining when we went down to the Navimag
office to confirm our booking for the ferry. Having read all about the ferry
trip from Puerto Montt to Puerto Natales on this very website we knew we had
to get some supplies in. So it was off to the supermarket to buy beer, wine,
whiskey, crisps and some biscuits.

After we had boarded the ferry and found our cabins we headed to the bar to
check out the price of beer. Once there we slumped into the comfy chairs and
offered a toast to whatever god had conspired to put us in the same cabin
as two young, blonde Swedish girls. Once we had got settled in we were
called to the dining room and given a run down of the various lectures,
movies, activities and entertainment that we could look forward too.
Surprisingly I was never bored aboard the ferry, if a movie wasn’t showing
then you could look at the stunning views, and once the sun had gone down it
was a shuffle between the bar and the dining room and back again. The
journey is described in better detail at another page on this website.

We arrived in Puerto Natales early on a beautiful day. The clouds had
cleared, and the sunshine took the edge off the biting wind. Tim asked me
if I thought Debs would be waiting for me at the dock. I replied that I
doubted it and if she is in town she would probably still be in bed. After
saying goodbye to all the Chilean grannies that we had made friends with we
put our rucksacks on our backs and set off to the hostal we had booked.
Walking down the stairs at the hostal I saw my girlfriend in reception. At
some point over the next couple of hours I did ask her why she had not been
waiting at the dock for me. She said that she would have been, but
apparently I had told her that the ferry was not getting in till later that
evening. So she had stayed in bed.

I was also informed that we would be going on a five day hike around Torres
Del Paine national park. Debs had done all the research the previous day and
all I needed to do was go with her and book the bus tickets and hostals in
the park. Now on the boat Tim and I had decided that a couple of day trips
were all that we would need to see the park. A five day hike was definitely not
in our plans. A compromise was obviously needed. We would only book the
first two nights’ accommodation and see how we got on.

The first day was uphill all the way, and although I didn’t feel too bad I
had serious doubts that I would be able to keep this up for another four days.
Luckily we had carried a bottle of whiskey with us, so by the time I had
eaten dinner I was mellow enough to want to continue with the trek the next
day. It turned out that the second day was a lovely downhill walk with fine
views over the lakes and back up to the mountains. Hopefully the photos will
be good. Unfortunately, Tim buggered his knee on this walk and it was
doubtful that he would continue the next day. It turned out that the hostal
was in the middle of nowhere so he would have to walk no matter what.

After such a nice day previously it was a surprise to wake up and find that there
was about four inches of snow on the ground. The cold, snow and tiredness meant
that by lunchtime I was cursing the ground that I was walking on. It was a
relief to finally get to the hostal. I was exhausted. When I woke up the
next day and found that it had started snowing again, I decided that there
was no way I was going to continue. So we caught a boat over to the other
side of a lake and from there a bus back to town. I know Debs was
disappointed not to make it for the full five days, but as we had got back
early we now had time to go to El Calafate and see the huge, advancing glacier there.

We caught the bus over the border into Argentina the next day. It had too
have been the bumpiest, most uncomfortable bus journey I have ever taken.
Mind you, I have not been on any bus journeys in Bolivia yet, and I am told
they are bad. Once in El Calafate we set about finding a tour to the
glacier.

Once a tour had been sorted out, we went to find a small cafe, and introduced Debs
to our favourite traveling activity. Drinking beer. Whilst we were on our
second or third bottle of beer Deb’s two friends walked past the cafe. We
called them in and then sat around chatting till it was time to go and get
some food. As we were back in Argentina and it was the end of a long day, a
good feed of Steak or Parillada. Tim asked the waitress for directions to a
good place to eat and we set off, out of town, across a bridge and ended up
at a fantastic steak house.

The next day we had to be up bright and early to catch a bus which would
take us to a boat, and then the Moreno Glacier. The weather was absolutely
freezing. The glacier itself was amazing. It seemed alive. Huge chunks of
ice would fall off into a lake and then you would hear a gunshot sound of
the ice hitting the water. When it was time to take a picture, we
would sit for ages waiting for the glacier to calf. It wouldn’t so we
would put our cameras away and go for a little walk. Just as our backs were
turned a huge chunk of ice would fall off. Well, it seemed like that anyway.

Friday, 11th October, 2002
I had said my good byes to Debs the previous day and was now preparing to
fly up the coast to Santiago. If everything works out okay then I will be
meeting her again in Sydney in time for Christmas.

The only notable thing about the plane journey was that it made a stop off
in Puerto Montt. And it was still raining there.

Once in Santiago we met up with a couple of Tim’s mates – Adrian and Lawrence.
We had arranged to stay in the same hotel as them, and they had brought some
supplies from England for us. Namely shaving gel for me, and shaving gel and
hair gel!! for Tim. Following a good meal and a few beers, we were all desperate
to go to a good club. After trying a couple in the area we had been drinking
in we almost gave up and went home. Then I started asking random people
where a good club was. Almost immediately these three Chilean girls popped
up, told us they knew a good club, and that they would take us there.
Result. And they didn’t even want any money. Tim and his friends
left the club earlier than me, so I was forced to get a taxi on my own. Once
at the hostal I found that no one else had made it back yet. Strange I thought, then
passed out on my bed. In the morning I found out that the others had in fact
gone to another bar around the corner.

The next day, Saturday was a recovery day. I wandered around town for a bit
before going back to bed whilst Tim and his mates went to a football match.
In the evening we went to watch Scooby Doo at the cinema. If you
haven’t seen it yet, don’t bother. Wait till it’s shown at Christmas on BBC1.

Sunday we had arranged to meet another one of our friends from London. Mr
Derek Griffin. First of all we had to do some sightseeing as we would be
leaving town the next day. We went up a couple of hills for a look over the
town. Then we met Des and went down a pub. Des was traveling to Torres Del
Paine to walk 100km for the charity SCOPE. He was supposed to go back to his
hotel for a meal and a talk about what to expect down south. Having just
come from there we persuaded him that he should miss the meal and the talk
and stay out drinking with us. After all, it had been seven weeks since we had
all been out on the town together. We also promised him that we would take
him to a much better restaurant than the one the rest of the group would go
to. I have since received an e-mail from him telling me that he managed to
complete the walk for charity. So our little chat with him obviously did the
trick. We told him to get some waterproof trousers as he was intending to
do the walk in his shorts.

After leaving Santiago we headed north to a seaside town called La Serena.
There we took a nice day trip to Elqui valley, were they make Pisco (the
tradional Chilean tipple) and also the last resting place of some famous
poet. In the evening we went up to one of the observatories that are dotted
about this part of the world. I have to say I thoroughly enjoyed looking at
the stars through a big telescope. I saw the moon up close. Learned the
names of some more constellations. Learned about star clusters and actually
saw some. We were also told about a new telescope that the Europeans are
building in Antofagasta. It is called the VLF (Very Large Telescope) and
when it is completed it will be powerful enough to actually see the
American flag on the moon.

The next day was a wander about town and get sunburnt day. Then we had
another overnight bus to Antofagasta. Once there we jumped straight on
another bus to Calama, and then another bus to San Pedro.

San Pedro is the kind of sleepy little town that depends completely on
tourists. We saw sunrise at the world’s highest geysers fields (4300 meters). However, when we crossed the border to Bolivia we visited another geyser that was 5000 metres high. Then we saw a sunset at a place called the Valley of the Moon. Despite what others have said the sunset was definitely not the best I have ever seen.

After a few days in San Pedro it was time to leave Chile and head into Bolivia. We had chosen a company called Colque Tours to take us on a three day trip from San Pedro to Uyuni. On the
first day we saw a blue laguna, a red laguna, and several other lagunas
all located high in the Andes and teeming with flamingos. We also saw some
strange spiky snow, and a geyser that was 5000 metres above sea level. On the
first evening of the trip we played football with a couple of local kids and
also had the pleasure of the school band come and play for us. My one
complaint is that traditional Bolivian music sounds a bit samey after a while.
Visions of the fast show and their traveling pan pipe band kept popping into
my head.

The next day we saw a new born Llama before going for a walk around
a pre-Inca village. It was more Llamas during the day as we drove through a
whole valley full of them – it was called the valley of the Llamas. On the
last day of the trip we visited the famous Salar De Uyuni, the largest salt flat in the world. Our driver remarked that it was like being on another
world. We did get Tim to ask him which world, but we couldn’t help
but agree with him. It had rained the previous week, so we were in for a
treat. Where the water had not yet evaporated you could see a perfect mirror
of the sky above. After taking loads of photos we headed of to Uyuni.