Lake District

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Armed with eight litres of rum, two litres of whiskey (Pete would later acquire a third through a victorious game of Bingo; as you do), and two litres of Pisco, a distilled alcohol widely drank in Chile and Peru, we embarked on our four-day cruise due north through the Fjords that lie scattered along the south-western coast of the continent. Boarding the ferry, it became apparent that we had been upgraded to a private cabin. This was entirely thanks to Oscar, the tour operator with whom we had booked our tickets.

The previous night, in celebration of our victory of Torres del Paine national park, we took to the streets of Puerto Natales. Before too long we had found ourselves entering the first bar we encountered in the main square (there weren´t many to choose from). It was here that we met Oscar. From that moment, the night descended into a drunken haze as we navigated the dark streets between pubs, clubs and pisco sours, ultimately ending up in what seemed to be somebody's living room cunningly (or poorly; it was hard to tell at the time) disguised as a nightclub.

The following day we turned up at Oscar´s office red-eyed, nursing hangovers. He seemed delighted to see us and, tapping away at his computer declared, "I must isolate you from the other passengers!"
Taking this as a joke tying in with the previous night´s antics, we were unaware at the time that Oscar was securing us a private dormitory with our own personal bathroom; a luxury that, we later learned, should have cost us double the original price. Oscar continued to joke saying things like, "I couldn´t find my house this morning", and, "you crazy guys".



As we set sail, the darkening clouds to the north offered a forboding glance into the eye of the next few days. Often, the weather prevented access to the upper deck of the ship, but on occasions we braved the wind and rain to lap up the island views, distant mountains, glaciers and volcanoes. In the meantime, however, we survived in the confines of the upper deck´s bar or the dining hall, learning and teaching obscure card games which, inevitably, involved copious amounts of alcohol.

It wasn´t until the final day aboard the cruise ship (I say cruise ship... the lower deck was occupied solely by crates of livestock) that the sun revealed itself. Finally we escaped the airtight bind of the bar and canteen and, along with everybody else, poured out onto the upper deck. The emanate sunburned noses and shoulders failed to deter us from basking in the heat for a full day as we travelled further north, away from the icy reaches of Patagonia and towards the tropics once again.

The day´s sunbathing provoked high spirits in almost everybody aboard the ship and the evening´s festivities began early. Before too long, the bar was heaving with people, some of whom spilled out onto the upper deck under the clear night sky. As the evening advanced, and night turned into morning, the masses began to disperse (we were to disembark early the following morning). This failed to deter Ben and I from our binge and, along with two Swedish travellers we had met (unsurprisingly, their names ecape us both), we set off to the bottom deck towards the livestock. What was our plan? To liberate the sheep and cows from the compact confines of their metal crates? No...

Neither one of us can remember what exactly it was that possessed us to head down there, but we have vague recollections (along with video footage) of what occurred. After crouching, ducking and weaving our way amongst the crates, navigating a route to the very middle of where the animals were being stored, we began to climb until we reached an equal height with the livestock. It was at this point that we, in our drunken stupor, became co-founders of a truly exhilarating sport; Cow Surfing. I shall leave the inner concept of the ´sport´to your imaginations, however I will discourage anybody from attempting it with sheep; they didn´t seem so keen to participate.



The next morning was a waking nightmare. Still half-drunk with our clothes caked in animal faeces, relics of the night before, we awoke late. Our bags weren´t packed and the two of us were in no state to walk, let alone tackle the stairs leading towards dry land. Somehow, I managed to navigate a course back to shore where I waited with Pete and Mike, who had already made it, anxiously for Ben. We were vigourously encouraged to board the transfer coach by its driver who immediately drove off, leaving dust, and Ben still aboard the ship, in his wake. Our attempts to tell him our friend was still on his way proved futile. It didn´t pose too monumental a problem however, as the coach only drove us off the main dock to the tourism office around the corner. Ben soon followed on foot before we reclined to the shade, recoiling at the memory of the previous night along with the now fully cememented smell of animal shit.

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