Quino-Lafquen Pucon

... q fois qq signaux de fumee (et oui car certains st encore n activite, dailleurs la derniere eruption eut lieu en decembre!)<br>cest multicolore: le vert des forets, le blac du manteau neigeux, le bleu de la glace et du ciel.... splendide.<br>en plus deux guides pour trois personnes cest pas merveilleux !<br>environ 800m de denivele, le volcan culmine a 280 et des poussieres... on monte relative bien ts les 5. cets ds ...

... can be living at the base of a pretty active volcano!), yellow means its got a bit crosser so not so good and red effectively means get the f*ck out of town asap! siren goes off too every so often but its like a fire alarm sounding in ireland nobody seems to put any heed in it so we dont either... best thing about Pucon is theres so much to do around, now is kinda out of season so no skiing/snowboarding, but that still left us with enough to occupy us while we´re hoping for a day ...

... a bit of shopping around we booked a company to guide us up, unfortunately you get what you pay for in terms of services, so our bargain ascent meant our safety lessons came in the shape of "you've seen how they do it in the movies" when we were being instructed how to climb up the ice as well as faulty cramp ons. Craig's didn't fit so there was a constant fear (in Kim) of him slipping down a few hundred metres. Luckily we made it up all in ...

We are now in Pucón, part of what is called the Lake District of Chile. The area is beautiful, lots of forests, lakes and mountains, and ever present in the town of Pucón, a huge active volcano! We have clearly crossed into a different climat, Talca was very sunny and dry, where as the Lake District has more of an alpine climate, colder and more cloudy. Pucón is a ...

... hadn´t come across one yet, so i wasnt about to pass up such an offer this time!! So back to day one in Pucon, did the usual (found ourselves a bed, ate some food, etc) then it was off to wander the town and do a little exploring. The town itself has a very non-south american feel to it, with many of the buildings somewhat resembling log cabins, with big lakes to one side and mountains to the other, and the great Volcano Villaricca in ...

... alone. It was immense. Myself & Niall decided a swim was in order. We swam across the small lake area and managed to get behind the falls - it was brilliant. The water was freezing again, but of course we weren't allowed to show this! Next, Juan Andreas took us to another waterfall area that had a big cliff on it. This was a good 50-70 feet tall and Niall jumped off it into the pool below! Mental! Obviously, I was going to do it as well but ...

... and began our ascent at around 1400m. The first 400m were mostly on scree slopes and were fairly dull walking but we soon reached the snowline and made our way up the volcano proper. The sun was yet to rise, which was definitely an advantage, and the going was fairly easy, more or less like climbing a ski slope (at points I think we actually were as it is a small ski resort in the winter). When we got in sight of the crater, we had to put our crampons on ...

... 1400m to sumit at 2800...most of the walk was on the snow and took just over 4 hrs for the 5km walk...got great pics at the top and then got to slide the whole way back down on our ass...great craic..Chilled the next day and lay about the best hostel weve been in..

... it is too far down to see - and I wasn't about to get close enough to the ice funnel to get a glimpse. However, if you zoom in on the map above and you can look down into the crater and see the lava. "How deep does this go?" I asked my guide, peering into the smoking crater. "All the way to Hell." he said with a smile. For more on the Llaima eruption, click here: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi ...

... a cheap place for a couple of beers. <br><br>(I REALLY hate it when you receive a menu which has white squares over the old prices with new higher prices over the top! This always seems to happen in the places that get into the guidebooks and then whack all their prices up!) <br><br>We were in no rush so wandered along the main street until another place took our eye... <br><br>We ...