the rain had stopped, but over night the wind had worked itself into a frenzy. anxiously, we looked out the dining room windows as we put away another standard chilean hotel breakfast of white bread, butter, jam and tea. we packed up our bags and battled against the unpredictable gusts to reload the car. on the way south out of town the clouds teased us with brief, revealing glimpses of the ragged and dramatic cerro chicho mountain range that surrounded and overlooked the town.
we passed a group of what looked like israeli hitchhikers miserably waiting for a northbound bus, a warm reminder of the benefits being with el burrito in this harsh and remote place. an oncoming landrover with swiss plates slowed to halt in the road and we briefly exchanged notes from within car windows, a customary practice of the small community of european overlanders in south america. had conversation been more promising, the second stage of interaction would entail pulling-up on the roadside, the men spreading maps on bonnets and scientifically marking points of interest while gesticulating and nodding superfluously, and the women comparing sleeping arrangements and possibly alerting the other one to a campsite they stayed at which had a undernourished dog that they fed and if we stopped could we do the same. the ultimate recognition of an enjoyable and fruitful exhange of information would be swapping email addresses “in case you have any questions” – of course adventurers like to find out ‘from locals’ or for themselves so never do. in this instance, however, excessive broken attempts at determining a mutual language spawned a weak and unsalvageable conversation which was politely dropped and we motored on.
despite numerous attempts, we never found the 8000 year old telhueche hand paintings and continued without stopping until we reached puerto tranquillo, the first town on the famous lago general carrera which we would follow into argentina. a small motor boat was bringing three tourists back across a stunning green lake, and it bounced violently on the wind whipped water. as it pulled up at the pier, we recognised the backpackers from quetlat park, three israelis who weren’t airforce pilots. they told us the tour to the cavernas de marmol (limestone caverns) lasted an hour, was nice, but no, you didn’t get wet on the crossing. e-j’s risk of reducing snuggliness paranoia correctly caused her to ignore the advice and employ head to toe waterproof protection. i was relaxed and got soaked. the boat popped it’s nose underneath the rocks where it could, so we could take photos. occasionally it chipped away at the delicate structures which supported huge chunks of land above, and i imagined one day they would collapse on tourists, perhaps in another 70 million years. the sun was still hidden and our photos did not compare to the ones on the postcard. the return journey was equally bumpy but the awesome and humbling view of snow-capped moutains and forrests over the lake made it a pleasure.
back on the road, we got as far as puerto barnard, a riverside village of little huts and fishing lodges. we wanted a little wooden cabin with a fire and balcony on the water looking up to the mountains. a recky of pretty much every hotel eventually turned out the one we were looking for, campo baker and here we got exactly what we wanted for 45 bucks. the hare krishna managers brought a beautiful vegetarian dinner to our cabin and we sat on sofas by the fire and read.
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