Mountains & Cities in Chile

CHILE


Torres del Paine

After driving for days of nothing but flat lands til the horizon we suddenldy see in the distance rugged snow capped mountains that are the Torres Del Paine. We did a full day hike up to Torres which I would´t lie was pretty hard, but the views were well worth it. It was foggy and rainy when we 1st started off but when the rain and fog lifted it left way for some amazing views. Our Campsite in Torres had a wonderfull of the mountains and opening up the tent evrey moring to those views was just amazing. On the last day, despite the cold, I left the tent flap open just to marvel at the views. Although we payed dearly for the views as one night, due to the lack of shelter, the wind blow the whole night long and ripped through the flapps of the tent so at one stage I thought we were actuallly going to blow away, I was a bit scared I wouldn't lie !

PUCON

This small quaint little town, lies right next to a Volcano. We had all planned an early morning start to hike up the Volcano, but unfortunately the weather didn´t want us to enjoy see the ash and the lava. Secretly I was quite happy that the weather was not in our favour as the thoughts of hiking for 4 hours up a steep hill, really didn´t appeal to me. So instead I spend a relaxing time in the village, wandering around the shops and enjoying it´s wonderfull food. Although on the last night, our cookgroup had to cook for the final time so we cooked up a storm of Beef Fajatias.

SANTIAGO

From Pucon we drove 800km aka 14hours (service staion stops for toliet every 2 hours plus a lunch stop plus a traffic jam, it all adds up to a 14hr truck ride) But seeing as it was our last time on the truck ever, everyone was in good form, we had tunes playing and then to celebrate we bought wine and beer so as we came closer to Santiago the atosphere was very festive indeed :)

Santiago meant civilazation yet again, which I class as having full mobile coverage, internet that works at a resoanable speed, and malls with food courts that show that mass globilazation is still alive and well. Yes this food court had KFC, Mc Donalds, Pizza Hut, Taco Bell, Burger King and then a few local ones too and after a long search through the grid like streets of Santiago I also found a... Startbucks oh yes ! A Starbuck in South America, oh believe !! of course I had to go, even though I don´t actually drink tea or coffee I got myself a nice cinnamon HOt Chocolate and bought a collecters mug for my collection.

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