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Published: February 28th 2011
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I´m tired. It´s a cumulative exhaustion. Anyone who tells you that travelling is relaxing is either full of shit or not moving around enough. We have been on the move for the last three weeks extensively, so i suppose that it is time for a solid update.
After Jess and I parted ways, i came back up to the Frey for another week of climbing. I met a dude from Aspen (yes, colorado. No he was not rich) and he became my climbing partner for the week. His name is Pete. We climbed several great routes together, including the Normal route of Torre Principal, and the best route i have done in the Frey called Siniestro Total (Totally Sinister!). 7 pitches. 5.10d. Incredible! So Pete and I had a fantastic week climbing.
My good friend Luke hiked up to the frey after a bus from Santiago. His girfriend is taking a TEFL course in said Chilean city. Luke is a character and a ball of energy. He is creative, funny, and witty.
I have a sneaking suspicion that this energy level correlates to the amount of caffeine, alcohol and nicotine he puts into his body. At any given moment,
he can be found ingesting one of these substances.
Luke is one of my best friends from Grand Junction, and as can tend to happen when you get together with someone you haven´t seen in a while, we got drunk the evening he came up. We sang loud songs, reveled in times past and were, in general ¨those obnoxious americans.¨
The following day, we had Multipitch climbing 101 with instructor Matt. Luke has never multipitch climbed before. I tought him how to remove gear, lead belay, etc. We climbed 6 fantastic pitches that day and he did great. That night we hiked down to Bariloche with a girl we met en route, name Adrienne. She is a geologist type from California. Recently graduated from college. We told her of our plans to head south, and she said she´d enjoy tagging along. We hatched plans to do a (what looked to us) 4 day hike from Lago Puelo (in Argentina) to Valle Cochamo (the yosemite of south america in chile). In other words, cross the border on foot and end at 1,200 meter granite walls! 9 days later, we arrived. It´s hard to describe those 9 days justly. As it
is frequented by caballos, the trail can be up to knee deep in both mud and horse shit. We hiked through incredible temperate forests and saw some of the most beautiful land i have ever seen. Some memorable moments include day five when, after staying in a barn the night prior (due to heavy rains and a nice farmer), we realized that our rations were not going to last. As we pulled up to the next farm, we were discussing how incredible an asado (barbecue) would be.
We asked the farmers if they were going to have an asado that evening, at which point one of the men pointed to the sheep at his feet, bleeding out. Two minutes prior, he had slit the sheep´s throat. Ït´s in the works.¨he said jokingly. Odd to be connected so intimitely with your food i imagine. They cleaned the lamb (which we watched. Kind of an incredible process) and had lamb with bread for dinner at this family´s house. At this house we met a lawyer who is working with familys in the cochamo valley to get their titles to the land (most do not have them). He aims to preserve the land
and help the people. And he is trying to create a park to preserve the land for its own sake. Incredible guy. We are going to Bariloche this week, because he promised us a brewery tour.
After buying bread off of the nice woman who made our dinner, we were on our way. The next several days wandered through more incredible virgin Chilean forests. It rained a few days, and we had deep mud up to our knees at points. We lived largely off of bread and lamb and cheese we bought from local farmers. All home made of course. Finally, after 9 days, we ended at Valle Cochamo. The promised land. It was rainy when we arrived, but the following morning was like being birthed in Zion. 3,000 foot walls towered overhead. Incredible Granite everywhere. As we were short on food, we headed out promptly.
We spent the next few days bouncing around Puerto Montt (a port city) and Castro, which is a small town on the island of Chiloe. They were having a ¨Biodiversity¨fair that weekend, so we went out to the park to check it out. It turns out that biodiversity really means local customs,
fried food, and expanding waist lines. We saw a lot of larger Chileans, mullets, artiseans selling their wares, and a lot of beer stands, but not much in the way of different life forms. Chile is kind of like a cross between Iowa and Mexico, firmly stuck in the 80´s cut into one long strip, deep fried and topped with a dash of a bad accent.
The following day we went to the Pacific. It was deeply relaxing and profoundly beautiful. The might Ocean.
We then headed back to puerto montt to catch the ferry across to Chaiten, a small town, roughly 16 hour ferry ride away. Chaiten was the site of a 2008 volcanic erruption, but the town survived. It was an overnight ferry, and incredibly cold at that. None of us slept. We were zombies the following day, but proceeded north to Parque Pumalin. Parque Pumalin is a large natural preserve bought by the guy who started the North Face. It is supposedly the most biodiverse area in Chile. We saw waterfalls, incredible Alerce trees (think Sequoia but smaller) and chilled out fairly hard for two days.
From there, Luke and I parted with our friend
This is Campinille Esloveno
WE did a 5 pitch route called Imaginate up the right side, almost on the right skyline. Adrienne. We have been hitchhiking the last three days from town to town. Amarillo. Futalafu. Esquel. Some days, we have waited up to 7 hours for a ride.
All great towns, but just blips on the radar of this trip. We are currently in the town of El Bolson, which is like the Arcata or Boulder of Argentina. Very hippied out but nice.
Whew. That´s it for now. I am exhausted. Next we will go up to Bariloche again to visit our lawyer friend for a few days. Then north even further to the town of Mendoza, where the wine flows like, uhhhhhh, beer. or something. There are great vineyards there! And then Luke will split for Santiago. Back to his girlfriend. If he still has one at that point (it´s been a month since they have seen eachother!) and i will go to buenos aires for a few days before flying back to the USA.
Thanks much for reading these ramblings. It makes me feel loved. I miss yáll dearly, and can´t wait to get back to the land of the free, home of the brave. I arrive March 13th!
On The Loose,
Matt
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Matt Bynum
I LOVE this place! Cochamo looks great too! Have fun and I love you sooo much.