Advertisement
Published: February 6th 2008
Eruption!
Volcan Llaima, as seen from our bus. Later we saw the eruption on the news and from the upclose angle you could see the lava spewing everywhere. Crazy.After partying until 8am on New Years in Viña del Mar, we got some much needed rest on a 14 hour bus ride to Pucon, Chile. This bus ride was more interesting than your average ride because about 8 hours into it, I noticed a funny shaped cloud that I soon realized wasn't a cloud at all, but rather smoke, coming out of a volcano, Volcan Llaima, about 20 miles away from Pucon. We were incredibly lucky to see this; the volcano hadn't erupted in 50 years. It
really erupted too. Following the mushroom cloud of smoke, lava started shooting hundreds of feet in the air. Crazy. We'll probably never see anything like that ever again
Although we didn´t know a whole lot about Pucon specifically, we did know that things were about to change: after months of concrete, big buildings, and lots of dog poop, we had finally arrived in...nature (Goulet). Pucon was our first taste of Chile and Argentina´s famed Lake District and it tasted pretty good, a little salty, but good. January is high season in Pucon and it was packed, but it never really felt touristy; it seemed like people were there to climb mountains, not
My Ice Pick
Saved a couple lives with that pick...also took a couple. to buy souveniers. The town is surrounded by Lago Villarica and its black sand beaches on one side of town and breathtaking Volcan Villarica on the other. This area of Chile has the greatest concentration of volcanoes in the world. You can't ask for better scenery.
Or better food. In Pucon, we finally tried the famed Chilean street snack, the Churrasco Completo--beautiful. One amazing sandwich. Two pieces of fresh baked fluffy ciabatta-like bread containing a huge piece of steak, melted cheese, and probably two avocados worth of guacamole. Much better than Chile's
other national street snack, the completo--a hot dog smothered (literally...drowned) in mayonaise and guac.
The Volcano
The highlight of our stay in Pucon was undoubtably climbing the volcano. During the summer months about 400 people climb it daily, 398 of which were more experienced climbers than us. The nearly 9,000 ft. Volcan Villarica and the 5 hour climb to the top was a perfect fit for us...after all, we hadn´t climbed anything more than a small hill in our entire lives. Our training regimen for this challenge, you ask? Eat and drink everything in sight, especially churrascos. This challege was a little out of our league,
Villarica
Still can't believe we actually climbed it. but somehow we did it. Without boring you too much with details, the hike was very challenging: with icepick in hand, we had to focus on every step and keep an eye on the guy in front of us, or we could slip and fall, a very long way. Looking back, the hike was more mentally exhausting than physically, only because we had to constantly pay attention to our steps and make sure we were holding our ice picks correctly.
The conditions, aside from the expected wind, were perfect and we could see for miles. Lakes, snow capped smoking volcanoes, and trees were all you could see. When we weren´t taking in the great views during brief rest breaks, we were climbing--straight uphill. We tried our best to keep our cool and focus, especially around all the other people (who clearly were way better at this than us), but, at times, we were absolutely terrified. If we slipped and fell, there was nothing to stop us for thousands of feet, except maybe some jagged rocks. (We actually found out that quite a few people have died while hiking up the volcano...bad falls and heart attacks. Thankfully, Sarah didn't know
Black sand beaches are HOT
but not as hot as my chica. this until we were safely back on the ground). Making it to the top was definitely an amazing feeling; while it was no Everest, it was definitely a hike. When you get up there, you just get this crazy ambition to do everything...climb other stuff, swim across the ocean, read books, learn languages, see the world, etc. We realized why people put themselves though extreme discomfort to complete physical challenges.
That feeling. As great as that feeling was, we probably wouldn´t do something like this again. Probably the most fun part of the day was the way down. With special pants made specifically for this purpose, we slid 9000 ft. down the mountain, using our ice picks for breaks, we felt like little kids again.
We´ll be staying a little closer to the ground from now on. We slept pretty well that night.
We needed a day to relax. Five hundred miles after leaving the beautiful beaches of Viña del Mar in favor of wilderness, we were not expecting to see another beach for quite a while. However, the black sand beach of Lago Villarica was in many ways better than Viña del Mar (except for the 50
Overlooking San Martin
No volcanoes, but pretty nice scenerary nevertheless. or so tons of fireworks). The water was incredibly clear, much warmer, and there were actually places to sit.
The town itself was pretty attractive, one main avenue with lots of good restaurants, bars, and fruit vendors (amazing raspberries, and more amazing avocados). Everything was modeled after Ski towns in the Alps...a style we would see repeated throughout the Lake District.
On the way to our next big stop, Bariloche, we stopped in San Martin de los Andes--the Argentine equivalent to Pucon, except with less character, volcanoes, adventure, amazing fruit, and churrascos.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.162s; Tpl: 0.012s; cc: 17; qc: 87; dbt: 0.0832s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.3mb
jeff
non-member comment
9000 foot glasade. That tops my own personal record 2500' ( Mt Saint Helens before she blew her top off). It is hard to explain to someone who has not done it how cold snow can make your ass hot, I expect u know the experience by now. dad