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Published: March 24th 2009
After our amazing horse trek in the Andes we made our way to Puerto Montt, where we launched our 5 day
Navimag cruise to the glacier at San Rafael. We checked our bags and strolled around the city for a few hours before disembarking. On board there were 130 passengers of which 110 were Chilean. The remaining 20 were English, Spanish, French, German, and Canadian. Rounding out the passengers were 40 crew so it was quite a full ship. The ship was originally a cargo vessel that has been partially transformed to transport passengers. It's a little rough around the edges but we enjoyed it!
We boarded at 4 pm and noticed we only had one roommate - we were expecting two - so that gave us a little more space. Our roommate was Alberto from Madrid, Spain. He spoke about as much English as we did Spanish but he was very nice trying to translate all of the Spanish announcements for us. Note if you are considering this trip there were no English announcements whatsoever, all of the information we gained was from nice passengers translating for us. Only a few members of the crew spoke English and they were much used by us!! Still everyone
was very friendly and accommodating and only a few misunderstandings resulted.
After a brief orientation, we had a cafeteria style dinner with half of the passengers. The other half ate in the same cafeteria an hour later. The food was better than we expected and there was always more than enough. We met almost all of the English speaking passengers on the first night and immediately clicked with Garrick and Lucy. Garrick is from South Africa and has a sense of humor similar to Travis', which of course means Lucy and Michelle can relate on the "oh here he goes again making an ass of himself" sentiment! Lucy is from England and she is traveling with Garrick as they finish up a round-the-world trip. The first night's entertainment was Chilean karaoke songs which sounded fun but since we couldn't understand and didn't know any of the songs we called it a night.
Day 2 during breakfast we got to know a few more people including some very friendly Chileans. A Chilean woman was asking for a volunteer for something so Travis volunteered. He really didn't know what he was volunteering until someone translated "Team Captain" and someone else
Navimag
Our first day on board!translated "Sex Symbol". It was around that time as he stood in front of half of the passengers that he started to sweat and think "I think I've made a big mistake!!". Some passengers nicely translated for us that Travis had volunteered to lead half of the passengers as team Rojo (Red) against team Azul (Blue) in 8 challenges as
Trauco. Trauco is a Chilean god of fertility and can impregnate women just by looking at them!! The contests included 5 types of dancing: Meringue, Salsa, Tango,
Cueca, and Rock and Roll. The other three contests were apple grab, balloon pop, and
emboque (sp) which is a toy that Chilean kids play with. After we understood a little better, Garrick bravely volunteered for the Rock and Roll dance. Before letting the teams disperse, Travis asked if the coordinator could translate a pep talk to the team for him: "Team Blue is like a little lamb and tomorrow we will crush them and make Asado"! After the translation, team Red let forth a hearty cheer. We had a laugh saying "what did we just sign up for?!".
The rest of the day consisted of taking in the gorgeous scenery as
we cruised the inlet. Chile really is a beautiful country, and we've hardly scratched the surface! The clouds were rolling over the mountains and looked amazing. We had an excursion at Puerto Chacabuco and Aysen where we took in a waterfall. It was raining so the trip inland wasn't great, but we were very glad we opted for the optional lamb Asado which was quite a good meal. At our table of six were Garrick, Lucy, a nice elderly Chilean couple, and the two of us. Every time the Chilean husband had a sip of wine he would say "Salut!" which is like "cheers" so of course we all had to drink along with him. This happened pretty frequently so we had a lot of laughs. It was amazing how much conversation we were able to have with the Chilean people with a little bit of time and using phrases from the phrasebook!
We got back to the boat and had some more Chilean wine and played cards with Garrick and Lucy, and their roommates Henning and Oliver - both from Germany and fluent in English. Suddenly the dance floor erupted so Garrick got in a practice Rock and
Roll dance with his partner Denise from Chile. Go team Rojo! They looked great together - so good that team Azul's female participant cut in with Garrick! It was hilarious. Denise and her boyfriend later danced an amazing salsa routine. It was like watching professionals!
We woke on the third day and peeked out our little porthole to see brilliant blue glacier ice floating alongside the boat. We were all so excited. We were at first sad to see a cloudy day, but the captain explained to us that cloudy is great for viewing the glacier as a blue sky steals some of the contrast of the beautiful blue ice. We headed to the top deck and heard a lot of "wow"s and "bonito"s from all around. Groups of about 30 headed over on lifeboats to get a closer look at the awesome glacier. The size was tough to gauge until we saw one of the lifeboats at the base of the glacier for perspective. It's huge. As we approached it was alarming to see how the glacier has receded over the last 30 or so years. We spent about 45 minutes cruising in front of the glacier and
Navimag
Amazing cloud formations above the mountains. through the floating ice. It was a stunning scene and we couldn't stop taking pictures.
We were so lucky as the clouds parted during our rendezvous with San Rafael. When we returned to the boat we were given a huge glass of whiskey - cooled with million year old ice cubes that had fallen off the glacier! It was a tremendous morning and everyone seemed to be so happy. A few of the passengers even took a second ride over to the glacier!
All the excitement of the morning (and maybe the whiskey) took a lot out of us, so most of us had a siesta after lunch. It was a good thing we rested up because we had no idea what we were in for that night...
All we knew is that we were supposed to dress up in costumes, Denise had mentioned just use something from your room?!? So we thought everyone would be doing that. We started to put together our costumes and when we went out in the hall we saw what some people were wearing and couldn't believe it - I guess they all knew about the party before boarding (it was
Navimag
What did we just volunteer for? probably written somewhere on the website in Spanish!) so they were prepared. The costumes were great - french maids, Dracula, Napoleon, the devil, cats, crazy wigs...pretty much a random mix of everything! Michelle walked out wearing a toga ensemble and one of the Chilean ladies said oh - wait here a minute...she went to her room and brought out a Statue of Liberty headpiece (of course she had a spare costume?!). Michelle went along with it and ended up winning best costume for team Rojo!! The six of us headed down to the common room and really had no idea what we were in for. It is hard to write all of the funny and crazy details and I guess the whole night was hilarious and shocking to us because we just did not expect it, but it was so much fun and great mixing in with the Chileans so much.
Travis (as Trauco) was dressed as the tribal god is normally depicted i.e. with a robe and triangle-shaped hat. Of course had to make do with what we had on board, so he used a garbage bag as the robe and a newspaper hat! The ladies made the
Navimag
About to see the glacier!! Trauco costume for Travis since we had no idea what a Chilean god of fertility would wear to a party. Travis received many cheers and chants when he entered the room and was immediately ushered up to the front to make a speech! Again, the English-Spanish language difference made for some very funny moments for us and for the Chileans.
Host: (in spanish) "what's your name"
Travis: "uh, si?"
(everyone laughs)
(someone translates to english)
Travis: "oh, TRAUCO!"
Host: (in spanish) "What do you do?"
(someone translates to english)
Travis: (in Spanish, he had prepared this line) "Make blue team pregnant"
everyone burst out laughing, but the best reaction was from the Captain, who keeled over and smacked his knee!
All of the dances were great. We were amazed with how so many of the Chilean people knew these dances. I guess a major difference between our cultures is that we don't know how to dance with a partner. Trauco had to participate in a pass the apple game with the Queen, which they thought was quite risque! They also had to play a game where she put a balloon on his lap and then had to sit
Glacier at San Rafael
Our first view of the glacier after breakfast. on it to pop it. I'm sure you can imagine the faces Travis was making - he had to whole boat killing themselves with laughter! There was one game that was quite weird...two partners and one is wearing an oversized clown suit. The other one stuffs 10 balloons into the suit, once that is done they have to pop them while they're inside the suit!? Each game/dance was judged by a panel of four judges (including the Captain of the ship). We got the final results the next day that our team won! It was fun to be on a team that was so enthusiastic.
After all of the events they cleared the floor to make a dance floor and we tried some salsa dancing.
For those of you that know Travis you can picture the dance moves he was trying out on the dance floor. However, this confused some of the Chilean ladies...so much so that one of the ladies asked one of the other backpackers if someone should teach him how to dance? Our friend said, no he's meaning to do that, it's funny. The Chilean lady just looked confused by Travis' dancing. When she told us
Glacier at San Rafael
The other boat looks so small against the huge size of the glacier. this the next day, we had to laugh because you shouldn't have to tell somebody when something is funny!!! We had a few more drinks and dances before heading off to bed. It was an eventful day!
They gave us a break and made a later breakfast the next day. Most of us were in the mood for relaxing - so we read, played cards, enjoyed the view and talked as we headed back towards Puerto Montt. The last night's event was Bingo. It was a good way to practice our Spanish numbers!!! Michelle won a round and took home a swiss army knife and flashlight kit - pretty handy for the trip.
Meeting great people made this trip really worthwhile for us. We loved the scenery and seeing the glacier, but it wouldn't have been the same without the great conversations and laughs we had.
We left that afternoon on a flight to Buenos Aires - headed towards a big city and hot weather. A nice change after being on the boat for five days!
Thanks for reading!
Michelle & Travis
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