Pucon

Finally Home. Back safely in the NBK, having survived South America, the bus rides, the flights, the muggers and disease. But I have two more stops to tell about. First is Pucon, Chile.

WARNING: Don't go to Pucon unless you enjoy outdoor sports!

On this trip, I discovered that I really don't enjoy outdoor sports and probably won't be going back to Pucon anytime soon. It is a pretty boring small town for those lovers of urban life.

On Day one, I made my first and last attempt at climbing a Volcano. The volcano outside Pucon is called Volcano Villarica and the tour company told us that first time climbers would have no problem getting to the summit. What they forgot to say was that the entire mountain would be covered in snow and ice. After donning the gear, a windsuit, special boots, gloves, glasses, hat, helmet, ice pick, crampons, etc, I made a valiant effort at the climb for about, say, 40 minutes, until I could go no further and had to retreat down the mountain. Every step you take, the boot sinks 6 inches into the snow and slides back a few more. I realized that I'm not made to climb volcanoes and I think this will be my last attempt.

Day two brought even more physical pain when we went hydrospeeding, a sport which I'm sure they've banned in the US because it is too dangerous. We put on full wetsuits, booties, life jackets, helmets, gloves, etc and tried to hydrospeed down category 2 and 3 rapids in a whitewater river. The hydrospeed is a small hard plastic device which you ride head first down the rapids. You don't only have to hope that the rapids don't flip you and drown you, but there are rocks, and lots of them, just below the water's surface that you can't see and are constantly banging into your body as your flow down the river. Only after we finished were we told of a fellow traveler who had three teeth knocked out when her hydrospeed machine knocked her in her face. Good thing my dentist wasn't there.

The way you move the hydrospeed, besides the crazy river current is with your feet. We wore big snorkeling flippers and tried to kick our way out of the path of large boulders. But kicking in a freezing, fastflowing river only leads to cramps and full body pain. My calves are still a bit cramped up and this activity was almost a week ago. Pictures are included.

On Saturday, we were supposed to go ziplining above the forest, which is an easy activity which I've done before and enjoy. But, as it often does in Southern Chile, it poured all day and ziplining was cancelled.

One of the highlights in Pucon was a Churrasco sandwich of beef, cheese, onions, lettuce, avocado and mayo on a muffaletta type roll. Yummy. And the fresh juices. Chileans like to make fresh juice of all different kinds of juice, in a blender. And it's often really good.

Finally, I'm including some pictures of the activities. And will post others on facebook.

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