Advertisement
Published: March 19th 2009
Edit Blog Post
After Millawapi, we took a bus 2 hours from Conaripe to Pucon, Chile, another small, pretty town in the middle of the mountains on a lake called El Lago Villa Rica but MUCH more touristy. It is just on the other side of the volcano Villa Rica but much closer to it. A LOT to do here and a ton of tourists... again like in Iguazu there are SO many Israelis and we hear Hebrew just about everywhere we go... there are even signs in Hebrew in town and the keyboard im typing on right now has Hebrew letters.
So our first day here we rented bikes to explore the area a little... we biked out to some pretty waterfalls in the middle of the mountains and the woods called Los Ojos de Cabulgua, as you can see in my pictures. Then we went to another lake in the area also in the middle of the mountains called El Lago Cabulgua. That was fun, but nothing like our second day we had here...
Day 2... we signed up to climb the volcano Villa Rica so we left at 7 a.m. from town and headed out for the Volcano where
El Volcan Villa Rica
first rest stop about 2 hours into the trek right before the snow and ice part begins... about 1,000 meters done at this point all the different groups and guides going up for the climb met to get ready, put on all the gear, and headed out. It was reallyyy cold and windy up there. The climb is 1400 meters. The first 400m, which took about an hour, were just really steep zigzagging up a dirt path along a chairlift that they use in the winter for skiers... or you can pay 5,000 Chilean pesos to take the lift for the first 400m. But we walked it! So we got to the top of that, took our first break for water and food up there, and then continued on for the next 600m.
The next 600m, which took about an hour and half, were mostly the same terrain... rock, dirt, and some dried lava that blends in with the dirt. It wasn´t too hard, just really steep and we were at a pretty high altitude. After about 600m, everyone breaks at the point right before the snow and ice begins. We all sat down to have a bite to eat, drink some water, and put on our crampons and get our icepicks ready. (That was so exciting for me because for some reason
I have 3 infatuations with being in Patagonia- one is using crampons and ice picks, so got that one down, and the other two are seeing glaciers and penguins). So we breaked for about 20 minutes and then started up the ice and snow for the last 400m, which took about 2 hours.
The first part was really steep, so you climb in a zigzag up the glacier part. The icepick comes in handy too- you always use it on the side towards the mountain as you walk horizontally in a zigzag up it. It also comes in handy of you fall to stop from sliding down... luckily none of us fell though! Then we reached the top of that first slope, and walked across the top of what was like big ice triangle. The rest of it alternated between really steep zigzagging up the slope and less steep slope where you could walk just straight up, only because we had the crampons on. We took a few breaks to just sit in the snow and rest, and when we did, we were able to really take in the view... So that was about 2 hours of glacier climbing,
El Volcan Villa Rica
summit with the volcano in the background untill we got to the last part of the climb where the snow ended and it was just rockclimbing on dried lava to the mouth of the volcano. We were exhausted and the air was thin because we were up so high so we pushed through the last 15 minutes and then finally reached the very top of the volcano. Looking out at the view in all directions was incredible... and then to look down into the mouth of the volcano was amazing. The volcano was smoking and spitting out some type of gas, so you can only stay up there either for as long as your lungs will permit, or no more than an hour. Being asthmatic I could only stay up there for about 20 minutes... enough to take in the view and get some good pictures.
So we hung out at the top for a while and then began our descent. We took off our crampons, walked down the dried lava part, and then go to the beginning of the glacier section. This was where the fun began... there are sections of shutes in the snow, so you strap on a sled like thing to sit
El Volcan Villa Rica
summit with the view in the background on, sit down with your icepick in hand and backpack on your pack, and just slide down the shutes. They last about a minute each, and then you walk over to the next one, and do it again. A lot of the shutes have bumps in them from people pushing the snow down them, so if you go fast enough, you tend to get some air which is quite fun. After the shutes, you walk down the rest of the snow once the snow gets too thin for the shutes, and then eventually make it back to the dirt section, which is just an easy walk down the rest of the volcano with gravity on your side.
Just below the snowy part once we reached the dirt, we stopped to have some water and put our icepicks away. The best part was that when we looked up, there was a HUGE condor flying and dipping around just above our heads. Condors are gigantic, with a wingspan of up to 9 meters. So the rest of the descent was pretty easy from there, just walking down the dirt and rocks.
That night, we were planning on just relaxing, but
El Volcan Villa Rica
summit with the view in the background we got an invite to go paintballing with a huge group of Israelis... all just out of the army, and in the army they sometimes do paintball as practice... so that was a lot of fun.
Our last day in Pucon we just did some sightseeing of the lakes and mountains and relaxed. The next day we took a 4 hour bus to Osorno, Chile, then got on another bus bound for Bariloche, crossed the border, and that night finally arrived in Bariloche, Argentina.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.09s; Tpl: 0.012s; cc: 7; qc: 45; dbt: 0.0545s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
Susan
non-member comment
That's awesome! The volcano and ice trek looks like your at the top of the world...beautiful views! It looks like a challenging trek...you guys look great! Love the pics...miss you! Hi to Bo and Amos...love, mom