We write this on our last night in Puerto Varas. It's been a relaxing few days in a pretty town. The setting is great, on a lake with snow covered volcanoes in the distance. The weather has been pleasant and sunny, although very chilly at night. Our first day we went to Frutillar on the bus, only half an hour away. It is a small, quaint German town with lots of German architecture. Our main purpose for the visit was to go to the international classic music festival being held there. It was pot luck which show we'd get to see and it turned out to be an all male choir from Chile. They were superb and entertaining and performed at the Theatre on the Lake - a beautiful setting. Afterwards we played on the black ... read more

Chiloe Island is a large island, 200km or so long, just off the mainland from Puerto Montt. The scenery is reminiscent of Scotland, rolling hills, very green, lots of lakes and seaside towns. What is different is the housing. It is all wooden, made of locally grown timber. The prettiest of the houses are made with hung-wooden tiles and they look a bit like the Gingerbread House. The churches are the highlight of the architecture though. There are 16 UNESCO Heritage churches on the Chiloen Islands and I think we managed to visit about half of them. They were very simple and modest and some were painted is bright colours. What makes them so unique is that they were originally completely constructed from wood, no nails even, just tongue-and-groove joinery. Now, the roofs were mostly of ... read more

Puerto Natales The bus took us from El Calafate to Puerto Natales in a comfortable 6 hours including an easy border crossing. Along the way we got a taster for the Chilean Patagonian mountains. The range of snow-capped mountains was even bigger than in Argentina. Puerto Natales would be our base for the next few days. On first glance the town was unattractive apart from the beautiful setting on a huge lake surrounded by mountains. However, our first hostel (Hospedaje de Maria) was pleasant as were the two ladies running it. The town was very “seaside” and a bit scruffy, greasy spoon diners and some souveneir shops. However, it had a really nice feel to it and the people were friendly. We picked up our hire car that evening which would get us around the park ... read more

The highlight of the last week or so was our trip to the Barbie Shop ... just kidding. But we did go and it was great fun for our Barbie crazed 5 year old daughter. She came away with a new Barbie doll to boot. No, the highlight was our trip to the zoo. Not only was there a spectacular collection of animals, including elephants, white tiger, black panther, giraffes, rhino, hippos - you name it they had it - but the buildings and enclosures were the original Victorian themed ones. While the paint was flaking and they needed a bit of TLC they were so beautiful and unique. The week passed by quickly, with numerous swims, barbecues, movies and walks. Amy made friends with Delfina, a 9 year old girl who spoke very good English. ... read more

From Tilcara we took the early morning bus to Salta, via Punanamarca a town with the most incredible coloured range of hills lying behind it. They were striped, horizontally in 7 different colours. Unfortunately our bus was just passing through so we managed to just get just a short glimpse of the colourful hills. A bit of drama on the drive to Salta. There was a road block by some people protesting about something, just some branches across the road. So our bus turned around and drove the wrong way down the motorway for about a mile until there was a turnoff for a minor road. A bit worrying as there was quite a bit of fast-moving oncoming traffic. Not to worry, we came out unscathed. We changed buses in Jujuy then onto Salta. Salta is ... read more