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Published: February 27th 2010
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After leaving Santiago for the second time, we headed straight for the Colchagua Valley, one of Chile’s big wine growing regions. Being on a tight schedule, we only had enough time to find the most expensive hotel in town (best intentions to check into a hostel, but it was full - shame!), head out for a huge steak and some local wine. We set off again the next morning on our long route south, travelling down Chile’s major central autopista, Ruta 5, paying frequent and expensive tolls on our way.
We ended the day in a lovely spot, called Valle de las Trancas, just down the hill from the upmarket winter ski resport of Termas de Chilan. We stayed in a very novel place called Ecobox Andino - shipping containers converted into cabins. They were really nicely done and very cosy, with very warm hospitality offered by Alma. We had dinner cooked for us and delivered to our cabin and then treated ourslves to a hot-tub soak under the stars, running from the hot-tub to cool off in the swimming pool, before jumping back in the hot tub. The perfect treat retreat for the birthday boy!
We had planned
to spend 2 days here, but having looked around and driven up to the ski resort the next morning, we decided to leave the rather forlorn-looking ski resort and move on, heading south, gaining a day against our plan. (Have we mentioned before that we have a 60-day plan and only 53 days to do it in?!!)
That evening saw us in another fantastic Chilean national park, Tolhuaca, nearly 60kms off the Ruta 5, but at the beginning of a hopefully spectacular route called the Ruta de los Lagos (the Lakes Route). The route is marked on maps as being ripio (gravel), and being a specified route, we presumed would be a good road. The next day proved otherwise!!
The road took us right around Volcan Llaima; a spectacular snow-capped volcano, which last erupted in only 2008. We climbed right up to the lava flow and then around the side of the volcano, on a road which seemed to be made of sharp, lava rocks. The scenery was truly spectaculr however. We pressed on, covering a good 200kms on ripio, arriving in Villarica, fairly late in the day. Villarica, with it’s smoking volcano and spectacular setting on a
huge lake, seemed rather busy and full of tourist holiday-makers, so we kept going towards Pucon, supposedly the ‘Queenstown’ of South America. Again, too many people for us, now that we’ve been off the beaten track, camping in quiet national parks.
So, on again, and eventually, we found another national park, Huerquehue (pronounced something like Ooerkoowe) and a lovely campsite, on the shores of Lago Tinquilco. Fantasic site, run by a Canadian guy. Wins the best campsite award… so far. We were happy here for a couple of days, walking in the park and we even swam in the lake, which was surprisingly warm!
From here, we headed on south again, taking the scenic route around Lago Llanquihue and spending a night in a very rowdy lakeside campsite with all the Chilean weekend campers. We arrived in time to bag almost the last space on the site, the facilities were awful and the music went on all night!! Good candidate for the worst campsite award.
After the lakes, on to a different part of the country, heading on south to Puerto Montt.
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