Archive for November, 2012
Carretera Day 5: Valle Murta to Puerto Río Tranquilo
The secluded area we found to camp is so beautiful and peaceful we linger through the morning and into afternoon. On the road by 1pm we complete the short drive to Puerto Río Tranquilo. Early on in the drive the road begins to hug the shoreline of a breathtakingly bright turquoise lake known as Lago General Carrera to the Chileans and as Lago Buenos Aires to the Argentineans. The lake is huge and we read that it is South America’s second largest lake. We pull into Puerto Río Tranquilo, a two block town, around 3pm and are immediately gre...
Carretera Day 4: Coyhaique to Valle Murta
When you’re camped on the street in a residential area you wake up early because you start wondering if people notice you sleeping outside of their house. The challenge is that you want to leave all of the window shades on until you’re ready to leave, and our thick insulated curtains don’t allow any sunlight to tell your body it’s time to wake up. After waking up to the dreaded alarm we get some breakfast at a cafe and check our emails to see if we have any new information on how, or if, we are ever going home. We respond to a few...
Carretera Day 3: Villa Amengual to Coyhaique
Waking up before the sun comes over the mountains we see the lake we’ve camped by is small and calm, surrounded by snowy peaks on all sides. We make breakfast, chat with a Chilean architect out fishing for the day who gives us advice on our route, and hit the road into Coyhaique—the largest city of the area—for supplies and WiFi. During this portion of the drive the narrow valleys and high cliffs open up into farmland and pastures still surrounded by tall mountains. There is a rainbow of wildflowers—yellow, purple, pink, white, red, ...
Carretera Day 2: Parque Nacional Queulat to Villa Amengual
After staying up a bit later than usual, we sleep in while raindrops sprinkle on the window above our heads. We finally get up and make breakfast and the clouds begin to clear just as we finish our coffee. We hang around camp for a while making friends with another Californian heading north by motorbike and by mid-afternoon finally motivate to see the glacier. The hike up to the glacier takes us through temperate rainforest where we hear frogs, see hummingbirds, and are surrounded by ferns, moss and other water loving plants. A dinosaur s...
Carretera Day 1: Villa Santa Lucia to Parque Nacional Queulat
While the road is silent at night—save for the rushing of water—morning brings a steady passing of box trucks heading south loaded with supplies. We wake up, have breakfast riverside, and get back on the road. All morning we wind through forest, passing by one waterfall after another, each leading to a little stream with a tiny bridge seemingly too small to have its own name, but with a sign indicating otherwise. On the road we run into Jordan and Anne again and we all head to La Junta for a typical Chilean lunch of meat smothered in butter...
La Frontera to Carretera Austral
Introduction: Carretera Austral The Carretera Austral, formerly known as Carretera General Augusto Pinochet, is the result of an ambitious plan by the former dictator to unite what he saw as vital but isolated parts of Southern Chile with the rest of his country. Prior to the construction of this 1,240 kilometer stretch of road many villages between Puerto Montt and Villa O’Higgins were accessible only by plane or boat. Construction of the highway commenced in 1976 and over 100,000 Chilean worked to build it. The Carretera first opened for t...