We left Cochrane on Tuesday after a very chilled out monday recovering from the previous week. We flukily managed to get the last 2 seats on the minibus to Caleta Tortel. The bus driver sat us up the front of the hiace so we had the best views and honestly he was more like a tour guide then minibus driver. Chatted away to us at a million miles an hour so we caught lots of information (and missed a stack more), put names on all the mountains, lakes and glaciers that have names, stopped at the scenic spots for us to take photos (we were the only gringos so I´m not sure what the other locals thought of us!) and regaled us with stories of what its like to drive this section of the Carretera Austral. He does the return trip 4 times a week all year round no matter what the weather. This is snow chains territory for 3 months of the year and there is no road-snow clearing done - probably as there´s only about one car/van/bus a day. His "best" story was getting stuck in 2 metres of snow for 16 hours before somehow being rescued (our spanish didn´t get that part).
We past some fantastic scenery -huge snow capped mountains, glaciers, forest, many lakes and of course the massive Rio Baker which is just a very HUGE river, the mouth of which is just at Caleta Tortel. I cant remember how much water flows out there but its enough to change the colour of the water in the sound near Caleta Tortel to a kind of pale greeny blue.
Caleta Tortel is famous for its 5kms of cedar wooden walkways. Its situated about 20kms off the main road between Cochrane and Villa O Higgins. There´s no roads just a little carpark above the town (which has only been built in the last couple of years -before then you had to walk 2.5kms from the airstrip via a wooden walkway) and from there the only access is via boat or on the wooden walkways. Its very strange but novel and very cute for us tourists but it must be so much hassle living there as its freezing cold or wet most of the year there. When we were there they had the best summer they have ever had so it was very pleasant walking around. Saying that its like a continous session of up and down steps. Maybe thats why they have no gym there ;) altho we did see many very untoned, large butts around so not sure what happened them. Maybe they never leave home?
Aside from walkways, the main attraction is boat trips to either Ventisquero (glacier) Jorge Montt or Steffan. We tried in vain to find someone to take us out but there wasn´t enough other tourists around so we failed as the only way was to pay $US400 for a boat just for us. A tad out of our price range. Instead we spent the time strolling about and (enforced cos nothing else to do) chilling out. Walked all around and on the tourist track above town which has lovely views. Stayed in Hostal Costanera where the lady who runs it is very sweet. She made divine jam - gooseberry one morning and rhubarb the next (not as good as my mum´s tho!!) and her bread was good too. She also gave us some raspberry pie as we charmed her with our praise of her jam and the pie was even better!!
Eating in Tortel is an adventure in itself. The 2 minimarkets are ridiciously overpriced. I know they have to carry everything in but wow labour isn´t that expensive in this part of the world. We ate out twice. There´s no menu just whatever is being cooked that day or night. The first meal was a great feed of spuds and boiled beef and the second place was just hilarious. Its obviously new (think its called El Mirador) and has a stunning view over the harbour (altho it didn´t occur to the owners to open the blind until after everyone had finished eating). They ran out of beer as the German invasion had happened (more on this later) -we were not very impressed!! The food was good (well for this part of the world), altho the salmon had been fried to the point where there was hardly any pink colour left at all!! We also found a great place for empanadas which was just some woman´s house - the apple ones were really good. Aside from that we stuck to what was by now our staple fall back in Chile - bread (dry and tasteless after about 4 hours out of the oven), ham (well salami or mortadello or whatever was in the roll in that particular shop) and cheese (2 varieties, first sliced and tasteless, the second comes in a squeezy tube and is like easy singles but kind of creamier - hunger the great palate leveller!).
After 2 nights in Tortel (including an aborted attempt to get the bus back to Cochrane which was full so we couldn´t) we decided to get the hell out of there as there´s only so much chilling and bread one can stomach. On Thursday, there was a minibus south to Yungay which is about one third of the way to Villa O Higgins and we knew there was a bus to Villa O Higgins (from here on VOH) leaving from Cochrane at 2.30pm so we decided to risk it and hope the bus wasn´t full. The drive south was stunning again -amazing forest. I think its some kind of special area as its really wet so lots of stuff grows there. Also supposed to be able to see huemul (rare deer) but we didn´t see any possibly cos the creaking suspension in the minibus had scared the crap out of everything for miles around. Incredible scenery all the way. From Yungay to Rio Bravo there is a free ferry (no road built there yet and probably wont be for a long time) 3 times a day. Very scenic also. We met 2 Israeli guys we had chatted to about hitching the day before - they had got 20kms the day before so weren´t too happy. Anyways our minibus driver continued on for about 30kms south of the ferry to a little farm in the middle of nowhere where he collected the farmer and returned to Tortel. Beautiful setting - in other countries this place would sell for millions. Isolated but surrounded by mountains and a glacier at one end of the valley. We ended up sitting there for 8 hours. 3 cars passed us ALL day. We knew the bus was due around 7.30pm as the last ferry was in at 7pm. It finally arrived as the rain started to drip and we were well and truly blasted after 8 hours in the wind (nothing is good enough to stop the wind in Patagonia). The driver got out and said the worst words ´no asientos´(or something like this which translates to NO SEATS) hahahaaha very funny except we werent laughing as the prospect of spending another 2 days waiting for the next bus was suddenly very real. We did have enough food it this happened but not sure about enough mental strength. Anyways turns out there is little seats down the aisle of the bus and we could sit on them if we wanted. Of &%$ing course we wanted them. Did he really think we´d prefer to sit in the middle of nowhere in the wind and rain for 2 days rather then 2 hours on a slightly squashy seat????? Am still baffled by this question. I would have strapped us to the roof if we had to!!
So on we went to VOH much happier and relieved. Got in around 10pm after another stunning drive albeit in low cloud we still got superb glimpses of mountains, glaciers etc. In VOH, there was a slight accomodation crisis as the German invasion had happened there too. We stayed in a little Hospedaje Cascadas next to where the bus stopped and got fed there. Turns out half the bus ended up there. The rooms were tiny tho -literally space for 2 single beds in each and that was it plus you could hear everything from the toilet (and other rooms) next to us. Not the best alarm clock in the world.
In the morning (friday) we got up early to try and book the ferry to Candelaria Mancilla (more on this below) which we knew was going to be hard to get tickets for as the Germans were on the boat already. We should have known better - at noon we finally managed to get tickets after wandering about aimlessly in VOH for the morning. The travel agent didn´t bother to open til 11.30am. It was frustrating as we wanted to do a hike up to Glacier El Mosco but didn´t have time then. We still walked to the refugio (hut) below the glacier which was a very pleasant stroll (well about 4 hours) thru nice forest with good views of the glacier. That night we ate at the Cafe Patagonia (or some name like this) on the way into town. It was a really nice wooden building and good food too -we even had a choice of beef or chicken on the asado (basically a bbq) plus by now even tinned fruit was tasting good! VOH is a surprisingly nice little town altho some of the houses just look like they must be freezing in the winter (or anytime of year) as they are skinny, no insulation or wind protection of any kind, and very small. We could have probably spend another day wandering about there but the ferry was leaving the next morning so headed on.
So thats the end of the Carretera Austral for us for now. We´re hoping to make a brief return maybe in March but this depends on funds at that time. Its been an incredible 5 weeks of scenery, trekking and travelling with every day bringing some new WOW factor. The people are very friendly but the tourist infrastructure is still very limited which is great in some respects as we were the only gringos for miles in some places but not so great when we needed to get transport. It would have been much better to have had our own transport in the southern part of the trip (so we didn´t get stranded so much and could stop and camp and take photos whereever we wanted) but saying that it added to the adventure by not having one ;) The hiking was superb and we have plenty more ideas about more we could do if and when we come back. The food is basic but sufficient and the incredible scenery just blows your mind all day long everyday.
And finally to explain the German invasion. A group of 14 retired Germans (I think we talked to them all at some stage) planned a trip down the Carretera Austral for 2 weeks and left a trail of full towns, no beer and no space left for the rest of the tourists behind them. They were lovely people and truly well organised (well except for the horses over the border disaster for them explained in the next blog entry) but since the tourist infrastructure is so limited they used up all the resources around!! Seriously we met people who kept saying things like ´we couldn´t do X, Y, Z cos of the Germans´eg they drank all the beer in Tortel for us ;), they booked all the ferry/horses/cabins/restaurants/etc in other places so became quite infamous with the rest of the tourists. I dont think they were even aware of the chaos that they caused. Hehehe anyways that just shows how few people this area expects or can cope with.
Good bye for now Carretera Austral - its been the highlight of our travels so far and would HIGHLY recommend to anyone as its very safe, relatively easy altho time consuming, and just beautiful.
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