Monday, November 8: A New Level of Southern Hospitality

Words of the day:
archipiélago- archipelago, group of islands
milcao- local food, sold in the street everywhere. Made from fat, potato and bits of meat...It was kind of gross although warmed you up, I guess. Another food to add to the “How are Chileans skinny?” list.

Today we headed out to another island close to the big one, known as Quinchao. We went to the biggest city, Achao, no more than a little town really, but quite charming. The ferry ride and the bus ride were very beautiful with views of the ocean from many different angles, the roadsides were lined with giant yellow-flowered buses and there were many sheep filled farms with beautiful old houses. We went down to the beach and wandered a bit, checking out fishing boats beached with the tide, a giant rock formation off the coast which is a hang out spot for sea lions (this one live!) and cliffs lined with vegetation. After a funeral had departed , we checked out one of the oldest and most famous of the wooden churches of Chiloe, this one dating back to the 18th century and with a beautiful all wood interior. It’s so interesting to think about the contrast between the heavy presence of Christianity on an island that originated a very unique paganistic mythology. We grabbed some delicious empanadas from a nearby mini-mart, beef surrounded by potato and then lightly fried. Quite possibly the best empanada I’ve had in my time here, and I’ve had my fair share...
While trying to find where the buses back to the main island departed from, we had a very interesting experience with a “local.” We asked a woman with a baby for directions and she replied that since she had only lived here for a year, she didn’t know exactly the name of the streets to tell us where to go, but could bring us there herself. Not wanting to bother her, we replied that we would just find it. But she replied that she didn’t have anything to do at present and before we knew it though, Thomas had been handed her baby, we were packing into her car, and Eric was sitting on top of the baby’s car seat. She told us she was originally from Easter Island and had lived in Santiago before that and as something of an outsider herself, liked to help foreigners out. She offered to let us use her bathroom and completely seriously said she would have given us oysters if she had only run into us earlier. This is what I mean when I say people in the south of Chile are ridiculously nice.
Then sadly, after a bit of time in Dalcahue, a small ocean side town with lots of fishing, a beautiful church and an artisanal fair that is especially famed on Sundays, when artesans from all over the area come with their wares, we made our way back to the mainland by bus and ferry combo. Just as we were about to leave the island, up by the city of Ancud, it got sunny, really sunny, with the ocean turning a beautiful shade that was practically turquoise. Tricky Chiloé, Tricky.
I got a little taste of Puerto Montt today while we were waiting for a bus connection. All the tour guides describe it as nothing really special. It’s grown quite large in recent years, meaning that it doesn’t have a lot of character, with American style housing developments packing the outskirts, and a few high rises going up. It definitely was interesting to see a southern city that wasn’t especially touristy though. It was very bustling and kind of grating, in a sort of off-color port way, although there was a reasonably nice park area right by the waterfront, with a beautiful view. There were tons of homeless people wandering around, which kind of surprised me. I guess they ended up there because it’s the biggest city in the area, but it must be a horrible climate for them to live in, with all the rain and cold. Curious if there’s some other factor involved.
Basically, the streets were just crowded with people, ethnically showing the dual Mapuche and German influence of the region, fruit vendors outside of grocery stores, even more stray dogs than usual, buses and collectivos, a lot of construction work and diner style restaurants. The bus station was even more crowded and random, filled with dogs, a random clown, families traveling in groups or wishing off their loved ones, African nuns, and the usual food sellers hawking their wares.
Found a bus back for even cheaper, $17, and for a nice semi-cama. Going to miss this aspect of traveling in Chile a lot.

Sunday, November 7: In to the Wild

Words of the day:
púdu- a Chilean deer, which supposedly inhabit the national park. Didn’t see any though.

Today, since we had a full day which promised reasonable weather by Chilote standards (some rain instead of exclusively rain) so we figured it would be great to see the national park, on the side of the island furthest away from the mainland. It was a beautiful ride, very rural for the most part, but more forested than the other side of the island, and past two large lakes as well. Everyone seemed to know each other. The bus driver acted almost like a mail carrier- people would hand him packages to give to friends along the way. The park was one of the most beautiful, deserted and weird landscapes I’ve ever seen. Wild horses blocked the path. We had an entire beach to ourselves, minus a dead sea lion, once we finally found it due to unclearly demarcated paths. Rain clouds swooped in and out. Giant nalca, a plant looking similar to rhubarb (perhaps related) sprouted everywhere, giving everything a pre-historic feel. Birds were everywhere, from sandpipers to parakeets. As with many of the best experiences of this trip, words don’t really describe it well. So, I leave you with pictures.

Saturday, November 6: Fields, Boats and Rainbows

Words of the day:
Chilote- of or relating to Chiloe and its people
curanto- a delicious collection of sea creatures and land creatures assembled in a way that somewhat resembles a soup. see above image.
palafito- houses on stilts

We arrived in Castro around 3, by the time we took the bus between Puerto Varas and Puerto Montt and then another bus on a ferry across the bay, to the mainland where we drove to the “city” of Castro. The owner of the hostel where we were staying was very friendly as well, and as a sign of welcome, gave us shots of licor de oro, a local liquour made from milk, lemons and some other things that was surprisingly good, as well as hard ring- shaped biscuits. After another warming lunch (it was still raining), we went for a long walk, heading out of town a ways, passing some palafitos and winding up by a pasture and a beach. We climbed up a hill and got a great view back over the little town and the surrounding fields. However, by far the best was the gigantic rainbow that came out across the sky, a full arc and very bright. Sadly, my dying camera didn’t capture it, but it was undoubtedly the best one I had ever seen and welcome too since it stopped raining for a bit. We had a late dinner at a nice restaurant on the water. Had an excellent curanto, probably the best sea food I had ever had, and there has certainly been competition...

November 5: Southern Hospitality

Word of the Day:
kuchen- German for cake, it is pretty much just that. but with tons of delicious variations involving different fruit, crumbles, and creams. The Germans have given Chile a lot of really nice things by my estimation...

I awoke around 6: 30 which was absurdly early given that I had arguing with seatmate Jon about politics until about 1 in the morning. Luckily, it was beautiful when I awoke. Pastoral countryside, green, lush, trees and forests, rivers and gigantic azaleas and rhodedrehons.

We arrived in Puerto Montt around 9 am, to a lot of rain. It was sort of cold and reminded me of the Adirondacks, maybe a Saranac Lake crossed with a bunch of German immigrants and a vague Hamptony touch. Unfortunately, our original plan of kayaking around Lake Llanquihue with the Volcano Osorno reflected in the water seemed unlikely to happen. It was downpouring, but more importantly, the volcano was absolutely nowhere to be seen with the heavy fog blocking it and remained invisible for the rest of the time we were there. We wandered to our hostel, perfectly adequate and as the oldest hostel in the town, full of interesting quirks such a floors and stairs that were completely slanted and woodstoves. After, we went exploring for a bit, checking out the Church of the Sacred Heart, a beautiful and very Germanic castle looking national landmark. Then it started to sleet! Deciding there was not much we could do about the weather, we wandered a bit more looking for the historical neighborhood with Germanic style architecture for which the town is famed. This sort of failed as we ended up in a random neighborhood for a bit that was purely residential and not notably historical. We called it quits for a bit and searched for lunch, stopping into a little hole in the wall for some delicious cazuela, soup with beef, part of a corn cobb and a potato, which warmed my freezing bones. Since it was still raining after, we figured a little kuchen and coffee couldn’t possibly hurt, especially after questionable amounts of sleep the night before.
Afterwards, we finally found the Barrio Historico, which was quaint and pretty. We ran to a small verdulería get some vegetables for dinner and ended up having a half-hour long discussion with its Costa-Rican owner. People in the south love to talk, and since its rude to rush away, we found that this meant that it was wise to pad the amount of time planned to accomplish activities by a least half an hour. It was nice though, and certainly great for getting language practice :)

Afterwards, we climbed up into Parque Philipi, a beautiful vegetation laden hill with some nice views out towards the towns.
We went back to the hostal where I cooked dinner, which was wonderful as I hadn’t cooked anything since I’d been up in the desert. The cooking process was interrupted for a good 45 minutes though, when I ran into the hostal owner in the kitchen and became part of an extensive chat about everything from employment and crime in the south of Chile, president Piñera, experiences with the earthquake and the woes of Haiti. Eventually, I got back to cooking, and the hostal owner gave us some homemade ají, let us dry our clothes by the woodstove, offered coffee, all very "acogedora": welcoming. We had a lovely dinner and after a bit of hanging out listening to music we crashed hard.

Thursday, November 4: On the Road Again

Today was a just a real feel good day. The morning was admittedly stressful as I had to finish a somewhat challenging law exam outlining the links between democracy and human rights in international law. Challenging since a) they are pretty much related in every way b) explaining this in only 2500 words in spanish was an added twist and c) I had no internet at my house so I couldn’t rely on word reference to look up words I didn’t know, such as “treatise” or “jus-cogens”. There’s an adorable café near by house that I went to though, and I got in a groove and felt excited and accomplished to be completing real school work and actually learning non-language related material. Since I didn’t have to go to class, I got to eat lunch with my host family, which rarely happens on weekdays since I usually have class at times that coincide with Chilean lunchtime (anywhere from 1-3 in our house).
I really like my host family. Everyone is just “buena onda,” to use a Chilenismo, just good people, “good vibes.” My host dad always tries to trick me, jokingly, which he is often able to pull off due to his straight face and my incredible gullibleness. Today’s instance:
“Did you hear what happened to Chiloe?” Me: “No, what?!?” Arturo: “It sank.”

I made it by bus across the scorching hot city to salsa class (the crowded metro is insufferable in the summery weather), only to find that there were about 10 more women than men. It ended up not be a total waste though- my friend Molly came to class and was dancing with a guy who invited us for drinks with another Chilean friend and a German exchange student. It was one of those really random and unexpectedly fun afternoons- we ended up hanging out with them for 3 hours or so, making random comparisons between our respective countries, learning Chilean slang and poking fun at the way different Spanish speakers talk in different countries. I ran to get the bus in Los Heroes and made in just in time for the 12 hour ride south. Buses here are ridiculously cheap which is one thing that makes traveling reasonably priced, at least for extranjeros. In this case, we found a bus for around $22 US, not semi cama, but we figured we would rough it out for a night. I can barely even get to NYC from my house in Jersey for that much anymore!
Our group this round included the first man dominated travel ratio in Tufts in Chile 2010 history: since the other female who had planned to go on the trip couldn’t make it, it was just me and the boys, Jon, Eric and Thomas.