Hotel Puelche Puerto Varas

... like the suspenseful music in a movie leading to a climactic episode. The vibrant water, pouring swiftly into the basin below, was creating a masterpiece of sound and color. The frothy white waves emptying into a turquoise blue, the kind of colors only seen if fine hand guided jewelry. We stood in awe drinking in, with inaudible amazement, the wonder and beauty of nature in its rawest form.

We continue to walk following one trail after another ...

... and as it was full of people we figured they weren't trying to kidnap us so we got in. what we quickly realised was that this trip was going to be a whole lot more interesting than previously thought as it was entirely in spanish. But hey ho, we'll be fine we thought. 5 minutes later, we had driven from our b&b to the waterfront. Where we stopped for 30 minutes to take pictures. In the town where we had just spent the previous 2 days. Then we set off, we knew ...

... Building, which was built to look like a giant cell phone and is now outdated for today's cell phones, has blocked the otherwise unobstructed view of the Andes. We finished another wonderful day with a wonderful meal (Mom and Dad, this was the place ...

... the bottle labels and the local currency. Ordinary table wine here is very reasonable (remember, there are no bad wines in Chile) and extraordinary wine, though much more expensive, is still a bargain at an average of about $6 per bottle. By the time we made it back to the pier to tender to the ship, the rain was coming down in buckets and the swell had picked up considerably. The tender ride was easily equivalent to a two E-Ticket ride at Walt Disney World.

... their parents. It was a mixture of Germans and Chileans who were lots of fun. The waiters average age was about 70, so service was slow and we actually didn't get any noisemakers or champagne until about 12:10. January 1st is also our year anniversary, so I couldn't think of a more entertaining way to celebrate. There was a live band so Pete and I did a whole lot of dancing. I made him dance with a lady that ...

... melted. The insurance man said that he could see how it could´ve have melted but if it had then where are the bags? He got sent to jail for fraud so if you ever plan on pulling this scam, don´t forget to buy some empty sugar bags. Anyway, the ship was all rusty and looked really eerie in the mist. Not long afterwards we arrived at Puerto Eden and we disembarked en masse wearing fetching orange lifejackets which we had to keep on the whole ...

... our way back. From El Chalten we headed back to El Calafate for a night before moving onto Puerto Natales in Chile for a couple of days. We came across the Chilien border with ease and found our hostel pretty quickly. It was cool, very homely and warm and the owner bill provided us with some invaluable information on Torres Del Pienne National park, which is the mother of all parks in Patagonia. A very popular trek here is the W trek, 3 ...

... running along in front (like she knew where she was going), then checking back to see that we were ok, before running on ahead again. On our last night (not only there, but in Chile as well!), we decided to buy more supplies and just stay home. We ate & drank out on the hostel's varandah, which was high up and had a nice view of the town and the lake below. It was an enjoyable night before another early bus the next day ... Argentina, here we come!!!!

... chasing the tourism opportunities! In the afternoon the sun actually came out so there was a mass exodus onto the deck with people sunbathing, playing giant chess and generally admiring the view. The early evening saw the one rocky part of the journey where the boat had to leave the fjords and travel on the sea for a while. This made for an amusing dinner time with people trying to carry their dinner trays back ...

... a nearby cruise ship as they were a breed we hadn¨t seen in these parts before, lots of politeness and flapping about the smallest of obstacles. Imagine 20 or 30 Jerry and Margo¨s from the Good Life and you´ll get the picture. Still, made for some entertainment and at least there were orderly queues rather than the usual pushing and shoving. We made a break for it though and clambered off trail down some rocks to find a ...