Wandering off the Tourist Trail

After two glorious, sleep saturated nights, my fidgeting bank balance forced me out of the Dutch owned hostel and back into my tent. I set up camp at a site on the far end of Largo Vallairca, away from town. The spot was a good base of operations to nurse my slightly swollen ankle. These lazy days, I sat supine on the beach, people watching and sipping Cristal- not the champagne of course, but Chile´s favorite cerveza. Before long, the slothic routine became draining. Motivated again, I set out early one morning to fish Pucon´s Rio Trancura. The murky river snaked through the mountainous outskirts of town. Monkey puzzle trees covered the mountains making for a scene that I imagine exists in Colombia.

As the sun began to wane on the day, hunger and frustration compelled me back to town. My ankle still on the mend, I stuck out my thumb to hitchhike back to camp. A white van pulled along side me. Peering into the window, a man, women and child sat wedged tightly across the bench seat. The driver waved me to the rear of the windowless van. Opening the door, I was surprised to find six other passengers sprawled out on a old mattress in the back. Having already slung my pack on one shoulder and with the door now open, I was committed to taking the ride. I awkwardly climbed in, and took the only available spot on the mattress next to a women breast feeding a baby who seemed for too old to be breast fed. The baby glared up at me, and with his olive black eyes he seemed to ask ¨What? You want some?¨ The rest of the passengers paid me little mind as if they had been picking up hitchhikers all day. In this moment, I wished I spoke better conversational Spanish. Each silence soaked minute passed painfully. Everyone just stared out the back window as if not wanting to humanize me through conversation because they were just going to kill me anyway. When this unfounded paranoia crawled across my mind, I kindly lied to the driver, saying that this was far enough. I climbed out as awkwardly as I went in and waved everyone a sedated goodbye.

Back at camp, I found that my tent had suffered a major injury. After 36 nights, one of the main posts snapped in half. I gave it a crude fix, a job my contractor friends from home would cringe at, and slept in the tent for one last night in Pucon. One last night in Patagonia.

The following day, around 830 in the evening, I boarded an all night bus North to Viña del Mar, Chile. I arrived shortly after ten in the morning and walked out to meet my first city in nearly three months. The city scape had not changed much. An ambient stench of urine still weighed heavy in the air. Drunks still sat in squalor in the park. An overweight women sat on a street corner feeding hordes of stray dogs and drinking from a box of wine. Grossly underfed horses stood in piles of their own waste, waiting to pull carriage. The only display of humanity I enjoyed was a blind shoe shine sitting neatly on his shinebox, clapping and calling out to the passing footsteps.

Viña was in the midst of its annual, week long music festival. The event is broadcasted throughout Chile, displaying the country´s most talented and beautiful. I failed to glean a good sense of what the event actually entailed. The front page of every Chilean newspaper showed a man wearing a blond wig and a long red dress, dancing across the stage. On one arm was a tattoo of Che Geavara, and on the other, a tattoo of Christ. Whoever he was, the Chileans found him immensely entertaining. For my purposes, Viña week meant there was no space for me in the inn. So I jumped on a regional bus heading North to a little fishing village that won a brief blurb in my guide book.

After about an hour on the small, outdated bus, I realized I was the only remaining passenger. These are always uneasy moments- scanning the passing roadside for signs, wondering if you missed your stop. A sign separating me from the driver read NO HABLAR AL CONDUCTOR- Do not talk to the driver. I abided this mandate for as long as my growing anxiety would allow, then asked ¨¿Cuantos faltan al Horcon?¨ ¨Cinco minutos¨he replied sharply.

Five minutes later, I stood in the bus´s exhaust, plucking my pack from the rarely used compartment at the rear. Walking out of the dusty bus lot and onto Horcon´s only road, I spent the first two hours shopping for a place to stay. Holding the ripped out page from my guide book, I read that there was a place to camp. Staggering around the described location, a women with stringy black hair came out and met me. She explained that I was at the right location, but that she had never offered camping as the book had said. On the road, you learn very quickly that guidebooks are stuffed with much unfounded information. Having to cover large chunks of a country, often on a meager, free-lance budget, travel writers often make up reviews for places. With only a little paragraph describing Horcon, I knew this was the case. The women offered me her patio to camp. I thanked her, but turned down the offer, hoping to find a cheap bed. TO BE CONTINUED...

Note to family: I am heading on a night bus back into Argentina heading towards Mendoza. If the bus passes through a town called Uspallata, I am going to stop there for a few days. I will ring you when I get a chance. Love you!