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Published: August 9th 2004
Me claiming the Chilean Navy boat!
I probably talked it up to be a lot bigger then this but hey, it's still a Navy boat and it still took us on a six hour trip for free so I'm not complaining.Well as it turned out, when we turned up at the warf all excited about our 9:00 sailing some friendly local fisherman kindly informed us that we were infact a few months early for that service aswell. Bugger. So that was twice I'd got it wrong in two days, and since I was the only one with a bit of spanish up my sleeve I was sent off to see if I could find us a lift. At first it wasn't looking good, but after a few definate NO's and looks of berwilderment from various shopkeepers and other locals I went asked at the local Navy office to see if they new of anybody that might be heading that way in the next few days. And blow me down they did. It just happened to be the time of the year that there is an annual Navy Assembaly in the main port of Chiloe and their team was going to be leaving for there in one hours' time! and yes we could hitch a ride!! and no we didn't have to pay anything!!! God you little ripper!!!!! So there we were a few hours later getting escorted to Chiloe, free of charge, with the Chilean Navy!
and the trip was absolutely gorgeous, we saw heaps of seals, dolphins, pelicans, giant seagulls(1.5m wingspan!), seals eating giant squids, and all sorts of other crazy things... and the whole time there was a spectacular backdrop of a couple of snow-capped volcanos behind us and a maze of beautiful green islands all around us. Then after saying goodbye to our Navy mates when we arrived in the later part of the day we went and checked into a cheap hostel for the night($10 with breakfast) and went and grabbed some giant empanadas and a bottle of red wine to celebrate our success. What a great day.
And it just kept getting better. First of all we had t-shirt weather the whole time we were there when it's usually really cold and raining everyday at this time of the year here, and we also found this campground to stay at with a real nice view of the harbour and an everlasting supply of firewood for our BBQ. The first day we went fishing and lazzed about by the fire which was great, and then yesterday I went for a bit of an explore around the island before saying my goodbyes and crossing back over to the
Dolphins in the Castro harbour
We had about four of these beautiful creatures playing along side the boat for 5mins or so as we came into the main harbour on the island, Castro. Mainland from the north end of the island. Steve and Amanda think that they're probably going to hang around on the island for a few weeks before going back to Argentina, And I'm in Puerto Montt at the moment and am probably going to make my way north through the lakes district starting tomorrow.
I'm struggling alot trying to understand the Chileanos too because they speak quite a lot differant to the Argentinian accent I learn't with. and it's really funny beacuase they all say "po" all the time. They just throw it on the end of every sentance, even like old ladys and Bank tellers and stuff. It cracks me up because it sounds like the "bro" that all our little hommies use back home but it's a bit more widely used here... Well I'm going to go and try out the local Chilean cuisine now so I'll be back with more in the next few days. chau
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Savage
Mark Savage
Great Story
That's a great story about hitching a ride with the Navy! Very nice! heheh