Just wanted to say sorry that it has been such a long time since updating my blog, but due to some problems with the blog's website and just having too much fun in Argentina, I haven't got around to it lately :) So after a few days in Pucón, I broke off again from my Quebecois friends and headed to the city of Puerto Montt for the sole purpose of buying a passage on the Navimag from Puerto Montt to Puerto Natales, a three day journey to the south of Chile. At the Navimag office, I was notified that the boat [View Full Entry]

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Now I'm finally off to somewhere that has been recommended to me time and time again by travelers heading north, Pucon. The town of Pucon is the base for many outdoors activities, especially the ascend to the crater of Volcan Villarrica, the reason I was going. Unfortunately, there were no direct buses between Chillan and Pucon that I could easily find, so I ended up taking a bus to the city of Temuco, changing bus terminals and catching another bus onto Pucon. This ended up being a more costly option, but at least I didn't have to wait around until [View Full Entry]

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My last morning in Santiago, I woke early and decided to walk down to the bus terminal with my friends from Quebec who were headed to Pucon that morning. My reason for going was so I would get myself out of the city and finally heading in the right direction, which is south. I am sure my friends thought I would probably stay longer in Santiago, but I noticed a promotion to go to Chillan for 2.000 pesos, so I jumped on this opportunity and bought a ticket for lunch hour which means that I was leaving Santiago! As a [View Full Entry]

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Hard to believe that I have been traveling for almost a month and here I find myself back in Santiago where I started my trip from. I am not making much progress, am I? The main reason for coming back this time was to visit the Concha y Toro winery and to look into the possibility of skiing in the surrounding mountains, things that I never got around to in my previous two visits to the city. It isn't that I don't like Santiago, but this is going to be the last time that I go to Santiago on this [View Full Entry]

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Backtracing south through Chile, I decided to make another trip to Valparaiso as my previous visit to the city was way to short. Luckily Gladys, the owner of the hostel in La Serena, gave me contact information for her sister's hostel in Valparaiso because every hostel that was recommended to me and that I called from the bus while about to arrive in Valparaiso was full. Quite glad they were full because the hostel I ended up at, El Rincón Marino, was a great choice as I had my own room with television, free internet and breakfast included for 6.000 [View Full Entry]

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Chile, being the string-bean country it is, means that if you start in Santiago and go to the north and then want to travel south again, you have to pass through all the same places again. I decided to break up my long journey from Iquique back towards Santiago with a stop in Copiapó, a thirteen hour bus ride from Iquique. Arriving early in the morning, I went on my way to find a hostel room in town. Being a mining town, and having no tourists around, it seems like all the "residenciales" in town were fully-occupied by mine workers. [View Full Entry]

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So almost three weeks into my trip and according to my plans of heading south in Chile then working my way up through Argentina, I am currently in negative territory as I am 1465km north of Santiago where I started my trip about three weeks ago. Oh well, for the opportunity to travel with friends it has been worth it. Iquique (ee-key-kay) is a destination I thought I would get to while living in Bolivia, but the stars didn't line up correctly and I never made it over to Chile, so here I am now. After an early arrival in [View Full Entry]

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After a long, overnight bus we finally arrived in Bolivian, oops I meant the Chilean city of Antofagasta at about 10AM. Antofagasta has been part of Chile since March 23, 1873 and how do I know this information, because Bolivia still commemorates this day every year with military parades on this day. Losing the city of Antofagasta and the region around it was a big blow to Bolivia because they lost their coast line on this day and have been a land-locked country ever since. Bolivia has been begging for the coastline, asking Chile to give it back and honestly, [View Full Entry]

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Our arrival in La Serena early in the morning was quite surprising for me. I can't believe hostel owners are already at the bus station at 6:30AM trying to persuade residents into staying with them. We had made no reservations so we waited to hear what all of them had to offer and ended up going to Hostal Gladys, as I had recognized the name of this one from research I had done before. For $CH 4000 ($8) a night, the three of us would share room, have access to the kitchen and free internet. Pretty cheap! Even though we [View Full Entry]

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After a full day in Santiago, Alejandro, Linnea and I were ready to head off to our next destination: Valparaiso. Being only an hour and a half away by bus and buses running about every 10 minutes, it was definitely not a problem to find a bus that would take us there. Can't believe I have been in the country for almost two weeks, and know I am finally stepping onto a bus. I am sure there'll be lots more bus ride ahead of me on this journey back to Canada :) Arriving in Valparaiso in the early afternoon, we [View Full Entry]

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