On Saturday, we headed off on the ferry trip around Lago O Higgins. We decided to do the full day trip as its 33k pesos (about 50 euros) for the full trip and 20k pesos for the basic trip which lasts a couple of hours and drops you at Candelaria Mancilla so pretty much better value for the full day. There was some drama with the minibus to the ferry (I think this happens every time the ferry runs) as there was too many tourists to fit in the bus so the guy had to do 2 trips. Not very difficult or you would imagine complicated but the guy with the minibus and the travel agent who books the ferry tickets dont coordinate this so ends up being this hilarious saga - presume they just do it to create some drama as there´s not much else to do in VOH.
Lago O Higgins is a pretty big lake (I´m sure I could find out exactly how big but couldn´t be bothered) with 5 arms out from the center. We headed down the first arm of Lago O Higgins and it was very pleasant, altho cold. Lovely views and good for photos. We rounded the corner into the center of the lake and got hit by a massive blast of wind. Half the people up top got drenched and everyone made for the covered in seating area downstairs where we all stayed til we reached Candelaria Mancilla (CM) and dropped the first installment of people who were heading for Argentina (see the next post for more info on this). The little harbour is beautiful and very well sheltered. From there we headed back out into the lake and more winds altho the boat was heading into the wind now rather then being hit from the side so we could go back above board.
After about 30 mins we got our first glimpse of Glacier O Higgins and also Glacier Chico which is less spectacular as covered in volcano dust. Its a very spectacular cruise upto the glacier as chunks of ice float past and glaciers from the edge of the southern ice cap tip over the side of the mountains. Very beautiful plus good fun too as we got blasted by the wind heading upto the glacier. The glacier is something like 60m high and about 1km long and stretches back 18kms into the southern ice cap. Little chunks were falling off and making thunderous noise. A chunk of ice about the size of a football made a sound like a gunshot when it hit the water in the lake. We also got to sample some ´whiskey´and ice from the glacier (I dunno what brand the whiskey was but it tasted pretty bad) which is allegedly 1000 years old. Cruised around in front of the glacier for a couple of hours then headed back to CM where we got dropped off. A really great day and despite being quite expensive, worth the effort since we had never seen a glacier so big before.
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