Hotel Cumbres Patagonicas Puerto Varas

... of where we were going and what our accommodation options were. She had been with the bus company for a month and was very enthusiastic. We stopped overnight at a hostal in Monday 23rd March. The bus left and it was a long drive south where we arrived at Santa Cruz and interesting town where a rich man lives who made his fortune dealing arms and now he is wanted in the US so is basically captive in his own country .He thus spends all his money here ...

... is about $74 USD a night for two bedrooms, bath, kitchen, living room, dining room and back yard). Lindsey giving Ben a piggy back ride at the beach. Great times! Sunset on lake Llanquihue Every day we tried a different type of German Kuchen - apple ...

... The lake was beautiful, more like what I had been expecting from the Lake District all along, big mean snow capped mountains plunging down into beautiful blue green waters complete with a volcano towering over it all at one end. As it turned out me and my new friends all wanted to get a boat out to an island in the middle of the lake, but the Chileans were one step ahead of us, with lots of boats all charging crazy prices to go out there - something like $120 for four ...

We really outdid ourselves this time. The bus to get here lasted no less than 32 hours (okay, so I fudged a little in the title.) Mostly because of the bizzare route it had to take through Argentina, on account of how Chileans don´t like to live or build roads in the middle section of their country. Also because we had to cross the border over and over again. For some reason, the longer the bus ride, the less likely a nicer class bus is available ...

... vacation town which, when weather permits, has stunning views of several volcanoes across the peaceful surface of Lake Llanquihue. Sadly weather only permitted for a day, then clouds moved in on our adventure literally and figuratively. Tuesday night, after a nice day trip to neighboring town Puerto Montt and what might have been *too* affordable a lunch, Eli awoke with a fever, chills ...

... from Argentina-somewhere who was re-named Sancho Panchez) on our first night at dinner and spent most of our time with them practising our Spanish (which surprisingly got much better with some boxed Chilean wine) and laughing at Sancho Panchez who turned out to be even crazier than first thought....some of his craziness involved spurts of screaming-yelling-squawking at the on-board guide during bingo and getting the blonde up to dance ...

... would be there at 8am to take our luggage- at least I think that's what he said- anyway eventually someone turned up and our great Andes road/lake trip begun! Billed as one of the most beautiful journeys in the world and I think it would have been if much of the scenery hadn't been covered in a veil of mist and driving rain, but from time to time ...

... known for their delicious steaks and grilled fish. Yet again, it was 8:30pm and we were the first people to arrive at the restaurant. We ordered a couple steaks with Papas Fritas, I had a Pisco Sour and Andrew his usual beer as we dined on our spectacular, perfectly grilled steaks and delicious roasted potatoes. We were in heaven. When we got back to our hotel the beautiful full moon was rising and I took a picture right before bed, not knowing that 10 ...

Le 28 Janvier fut un jour de voyage, vol Punta Arenas a Puerto Montt. A Puerto Montt nous appelons Claudia pour savoir si on devait aller la rejoindre a son boulot et elle nous dit que Nadia nous attends. Loin d'imaginer que ma soeur pouvait deja etre arrive, nous commencon a penser que ca devrait etre une amie de Claudia qui doit attendre pour nous donner les cles ...

Puerto Natales, was where, that evening I would start a 3 day/4 night boat trip (1000 miles) in the mainly sheltered water through narrows and fiords up the coast of Chile back to Puerto Montt. Before boarding the boat I met a friend Manny, a guy I`d met at Torres Del Paine and at the after trek party. After a big feed at a place which gave portions of salmon so big I couldn't finish them (for the extortionate amount of $4!!!) we proceeded to the nearest supermarket ...