Patagonia
Trip Start
Jul 13, 2005
1
20
32
Trip End
Mar 02, 2006
Punta Arenas,
Chile
Thursday, December 1, 2005
Coming to you all the way from the tip of the world, its time to update you on all the travels I´ve been up to the last couple of weeks!
Well Saturday Nov. 26th we flew down to Punta Arenas. We are a group of three: Sarah Robinson from Albion College, and Jessa Copelin who is from Colorado, and me.
Also on our flight were Jake and John from CIEE at la Católica. The three segment flight on LAN Chile was like nothing seen in the us. It was like a bus, we had 2 short ´stops´ where the plane landed for like 20 minutes and we switched passengers. The also fed us on every hour leg of the flight. Incredible service reminiscent of the 90´s in the states. Now they don't even give you peanuts (literally and figuratively).
When we got in everything was closed since it was a Sat, but there was this one lady offering a hostel for cheap. So, we went to her place. It was cool, 2 blocks from the Straight of Magellan. We walked over to that in the crazy Patagonian wind. Punta Arenas is a nice city, very colorful (they paint their roofs all different vibrant colors!) We also walk to the famous cemetery that is here. We walked around for a looong time looking at all the graves sculptures and other cool stuff. Unfortunately we spent a little too long and the gates had been locked. I wasn't quite ready to be spending nights in a cemetery so we went to the other side where the guy was just locking the last gate. He was nice enough to let us out. (silly tourists)
We walked downtown to the plaza where there is a big statue of Ferdinand Magellan. On the way home we found a cool little restaurant on the way back to the hostel. We all eat centolla (King Crab) which is a big hit here. It was very good and very rich and filling. Afterwards we got to stick little pushpins in these big maps they have from where we are all from. I stuck one in Rochester and Kalamazoo!
We went back to the hostel tired and go to bed. The sun here doesn't set until like 10 something. We all awoke at like 4:30 and thought we had way overslept (the sun seemed like it was at least 11 am)
Sunday we get up early, eat our included breakfast and then get a lift from the hostel lady (Ely) to the docks for our boat to Tierra del Fuego.
The boat is a car ferry (manufactured in Miami, FL) and the trip over is a sunny but windy 2.5 hours. We arrive in Porvenir a lonely little town at the tip of the end of the world. It's pretty quiet on a Sunday, but we walk around nonetheless, the town is fairly quaint and pretty. We have lunch in a nice little restaurant (but they only had one menu...)
After seeing most of what the town had to offer, we went back to catch our shuttle bus to the ferry, driving around town to pick up the locals at each of their houses....very small townish. Then we hear on the radio that the ferry crossing has been suspended because of the conditions on the Straight, and as if on cue the wind starts heeling the trees over, and we wonder how it will be to spend the night here!! We help out some travelers from Alberta, Canada who didn't really speak much Spanish, and they bought us coffee at a cool little place while we wait to see if the ferry will depart later.
Luck was with us and the conditions improved enough to make the crossing, so we went around and collected the same locals again, and then drove to the ferry, boarded and made the crossing back. It was rough, and really cold, but we still sat outside and froze, because I didn't want to get seasick!! and I didn't!
The next day we slept in a little and then walked around the city. I had to go to an internet cafe for a couple of hours to finish a history paper to email back to Valpo, while the others went to the store and stuff. Then we walked up to the hill overlooking the city and the Straight of Magellan, there's some signposts up there that give the distances to many other major cities around the world. Fascinating how faraway this place is!
After that we parted ways with Jake, John, and Kate who were heading up to Puerto Natales to go do Torres del Paine. We stayed in P. Arenas for another day to go see the penguin colony at Isla Magdalena.
We cooked at night to save money in the hostel kitchen. Made some yummy pasta and enjoyed hanging out and sleepin' in. At 4pm the next day we went on the same ferry again to the penguin place. The boat ride was really long and when we arrived the crazy things were swimming in the ocean and everything, then we actually landed on the island got off and walked amongst them. Part of this was kind of weird, a lot of the stupid tourists were getting way to close to the birds and their nests for our liking, and there was no one there controlling them. Some of the penguins looked really confused and upset by all these invading humans, the three of us just stood tranquilos near the water, and a couple curious ones came over and investigated us, but all in all it was neat to see them.
The boat ride back was really pretty rough on the Straight and lots of people were tossin' the cookies on board, we felt bad for them but I sort of enjoyed the ride!
ABRAZOS!!!!
