Chile Update Part III
Trip Start
Jan 19, 2011
1
2
7
Trip End
Apr 15, 2011
Villa La Angostura, Patagonia, Argentina
Thursday, February 10, 2011
This is going to be a real quick email. I'm at a tiny internet cafe in Entre Lagos, Chile, right now and my time is almost up. As such, I haven't had time to transcribe my journal (but I am still keeping notes of each day - I will try to email those at a later date).
We have spent the last week making our way continually south and I will just briefly mention some of the highlights. After the tour and tasting at Viu Manent Winery (near Santa Cruz) we drove south and were forced to make a stop at a dingy highway-side motel (because we nearly ran out of fuel, and daylight) south of Talca. After that, we made our way east to Villarrica and Pucon, which is a beautifully developed, tourism-oriented area. After the motel, we have managed to find a number of nice, well-equiped campgrounds. We visited a national park north of Pucon and did a short, 8km dayhike with some beautiful views of the nearby Volcan Villarrica. Yesterday we drove further south, to Osorno and then turned east heading towards Puyehue National Park (we were planning to camp in the park, but they wanted 3-times what we were willing to pay for a site, so NFG.) We drove back halfway between the Park and Entre Lagos and found this nice little site that we got for 2 days. Today has been a day to simply rest, recover and prepare for going into Argentina.
Tomorrow we plan to cross the border and spend the night at Bariloche, Argentina. We hope to get our bearings, change some money and acquire a road and campground map. We plan to follow Argentina's route 40 (rumored to be the South American equivalent of USA Route 66) and eventually end up in Punta Arenas, Chile.
But that is all the time I have for now. Maria and I are both well and enjoying ourselves. Ciao for now,
-K
