When I dream of Chile, I dream of a milodón...

---

I really feel like chilling out at the moment. The grand island of Chiloé appears to be exactly the right spot to pursue that goal, since it's not hard to get around here, not too touristy, but has lots to offer to keep you interested for a couple of easygoing days. the Chilote culture is very different to Chilean culture, and it's quite unique in a sense that mythology plays a very important role in the life of the islanders. The traditonal folklore involves some strange creatures, like Brujos, warlocks with black-magic powers, who try to corrupt and harm the unsuspecting Chiote people, Cai-Cai Vilú and Ten-Ten Vilú, the Serpent God of the Water and Earth, respectively, struggling against each other for supremacy over the domain, and Trauco, a repugnant yet powerful forest gnome who can kill with a look. So far, we haven't come across any of those lovable critters, but we've already seen one of the countless wooden churches, 16 of which form a UNESCO World Heritage site. Currently we're lingering around in the island's biggest city, Castro, which sports some great palafitos, houses mounted on stilts, by the riverside, a nice plaza, and a couple of wooden churches, of course.

The last couple of weeks featured extensive criss-crossing between Argentina and Chile, visiting the majestic Torres del Paine National Park, the Perito Moreno Glacier and the Parque Nacional Los Glaciares. In both parks, we finally got our asses going, and did some pretty tough and beautiful hikes through the most gorgeous sceneries - waterfalls, lakes, glaciers, mountains, forests, rivers, you name it. An interesting cultural experience was staying in the touristy El Calafate on the Argentinian side, not because of the local handicraft or the wine, but because we stayed in a cheap hostel owned by a family of German incest-Nazis. They lived in the backyard of the hostel, in a ramshackle cottage, and they looked pretty much all the same, blond and a bit fucked up in face and body, and the fact that only one man, but about ten female beings formed part of the family, and most of the females were pregnant, didn't comfort us either, so we moved out after one night in order to save our souls, and probably my DNA. So much for the German influence in Patagonia.

Another interesting detail was the giant plastic sloth in the Cueva del Milodón, to honour the discovery of the remains of one a hundred years ago by some German explorer. Its truly royal posture seemed to indicate that it not only owns the cave with all its inhabitants, but also a significant part of the Patagonian wilderness. Utterly flabbergasted, we took its imposing presence as an opportunity to take some tacky pictures as an eternal reminder of this monumental sculpture, forever imprinted on our hearts. To our delight, we discovered its twin brother as the custodian of the city of Puerto Natales, and we could once again indulge in the mind-boggling activity of pointlessly posed photographing.

Afterwards, we decided to take the passenger ferry from Puerto Natales to Puerto Montt, which I'm still not so sure if it was a good or a really shitty idea. The trip was supposed to start on Friday at 6am, and we had to stay the night before on board on order to leave early without the hassle of loading people in the morning. We didn't mind, it saved us a night's accomodation, but we weren't prepared for having to disembark instead in the morning, since they had to do a test run for the new motor without passengers. We were supposed to come back and leave at 2pm, but somehow they managed to delay it until 6pm. We still didn't mind, since we are not pressed for time, and it enabled us to catch up on souvenir shopping and hanging out in cafés. On board, we shared a cabin with two quite nice British chicks, and socialized with them, a Canadian-Dutch and a German-Chinese couple, sharing silly travel stories and other experiences. The routine on board was getting up in the morning, having breakfast, listening to a spirit-crushing briefing by the so-called travel guide, which turned out to be a German chick with a complete disregard for pronunciation in foreign languages and the charisma of sauerkraut with liverworscht; relaxing a bit on deck or in the cabin, reading, eating lunch, taking a nap, watching a movie in the common area, eating dinner, relaxing a bit more, and going to bed. The food was not too bad, and the vegetarian options turned out to be a lot more creative than the meat with sauce. What interrupted this lovely timetable was the fact that on the third day, we exited the Patagonian channels for a brief (read: 12 hours) crossing into the Pacific Ocean, which turned out to be a bit too choppy for most of the passenger's taste. Yours truly also had to succumb to the disturbing sea conditions, after bravely fighting for at least six hours, and spent the rest of day lying in bed, trying not to join in on the vomity concert from next door. A not so pleasant surprise was the next day, where it appeared to have calmed down after reentering the channels, only to become stronger again after a couple of hours. Thus we spent our last two days in rather unpleasant conditions, which soured the whole trip a bit.

We were quite happy to finally arrive in Puerto Montt, and took the first bus (and ferry) to Chiloé, far away from the loathed ship, in the comforting quiet of a not-so-remote island. So looks like the next days are gonna be more or less calm, we won't be overdoing it visiting a village or two and maybe the National Park to get our landlegs working again, before heading back to mainland Chile, and gradually making our way to the North, which is still an estimated 3,000 km away. In a long and slender country like Chile, you don't wanna rush yourself, especially considering how much you would miss on the way.

---

Comments

[city dactylic]

koschter kord-alias
ha! un mehr alliteratione, bidde!