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Patagonia

Now the Chilean adventure commences in earnest, following advice that the holiday had been paid in full to the local South American agent and there are no concerns following the fall out of the Tempo fiasco in Peru

However, the planning is now going through a non existent Australian South American specialist, my agent and myself are flying a bit blind and it is a bit troublesome

Firstly, the travel program and tickets for the Chilean leg were supposed to be left in my Santiago hotel, but no such luck, so a flurry of emails resulted in the advice that….

Upon arrival in Punta Arenas “I go to the Fernandez bus station and my agent will be there with the program and all tickets” – easy peasy as I had an hour and half layover, despite the 30 minute flight delay, still good

BUT on arrival there was no F*&$%% bus station at the airport, the helpful Tourist office stepped in and made number of calls to the agent which went unanswered

Finally, a response and oh no the bus station in question is in Punta Arenas, took a frantic 30 minute cab ride to the bus terminal with an AC DC fan and rugby fanatic whose sole English was Yo and wallabies,

I arrived and no one seemed to know anything about the booking and my ticket, 10 minutes before the bus departs the agent casually arrived with no English and a pile of papers, – so the adventure begins

On inspection of the paper work the return bus ticket date is incorrect and there are gaps all over the program of what was paid for, but that was not a problem for the now, I was just in awe of the barren landscape more like a moonscape as the high tundra was whipped by winds and low clouds and then the road would dip down into valleys lush with historic forests

I arrived at the hotel the Antiplanico– its built underground into a hillside. Watson introduces himself in poised perfect English, “he speaks English gooder than me” it transpired that his name is Wad Sun from his native language “son of the corn” , but years of living in the UK resulted in him accepting Watson, I mentioned the IBM program with their Watson and he was amused

He was the perfect mine host and flipped fluently through at least 5 languages, funny guy

As I was chatting an English whinge arrived and rudely interrupted “my shower was only warm and your Wi-Fi isn’t adequate” – we are in the middle of a global wilderness!!!

I left Watson to deal with that

When you visit sites of interest the options are group or a private guide, with really interesting sites like Macchu Pichu, Rapa Nui, and the Amazon I have taken the private option and it most other cases the group thing has worked OK in Peru, today was Torres Del Paine

What I have noticed in Chile with the bi-lingual guides is there is long outline in Spanish with the phrases historico, archeologica, economico etc etc been bandied around with my limited entiendo and then the English arrives – “welcome to Patagonia, enjoy the trip and buckle your seat belt if you want, then a further 10 minutes in Spanish

Torres del Paine

The Guide for Torres del Paine, was very good at keeping us all equally enthralled, stopping for lots of photo ops and showing video footage shot in the park of a Puma, to reinforce to stay in the groups and don’t stray off the paths, the advice in the brochure if you meet a puma RULE #1 don’t panic – yeh that’s helpful as my jocks fill

These are all glacial lakes and they have an unusual deep blue hue, it appears as though they have been dyed.,its very beautiful

The tour bus was a full load [45 passengers] with a few English speakers, including a group of Indians

One of the Indian ladies obviously was not going to take the risk on “funny food” and had brought with her and array of Indian snacky goodies/dips for her travel companions. The bus took an aroma of the Tandoori House which perplexed our South American fellow travellers unfamiliar with the aromas

We arrived at Blue Lake and of course the minions all had to organise their own lunch, the agent had delivered, I had a table set up with my name and with “VIP” on the sign and a lake view. The young manager had just returned from working in Australia as an au pair for an Indian family.!! – she was not complimentary. Coincidently her eyes started to bulge out of the top of her head when my fellow travellers came into my restaurant

She sat them in the back corner with no view and the service provided was cursory. She come over for a chat, said she had met her Jewish Australian boyfriend, he is still in Australia but they are planning to meet at a kibbutz later in the year in Israel, interesting young woman, working 11 days on and 3 off, because this national park in 4 hours from Puerto Natales they spend their down time in the park to save money

As I was heading off after lunch to see the glaciers in the fjord………………………..

doesn’t that just roll off the tongue, what were you doing on Tuesday, nothing much just washed my hair and cut my toenails and yourself; same same really – just went for a walk along a beach in a Patagonian fjord looking at icebergs

Anyway one of my fellow travellers was a bit perplexed if time permitted for him to get to the beach [icebergs] and back again – in hindsight it didn’t!!!

He introduced himself as Luft, he was in IT and he was Chilean, before I even asked he filled in the gaps, the family came from Berlin in the 1930’s and he is Jewish. I think that is a story they all use, and Mrs Luft was a lawyer

The bus was due to depart at 2.00, all on aboard except the Lufts, 20 minutes pass and the guide is getting frantic ,anyway around 2.30 the Lufts appear, the Guide gently advised that as they had been delayed they would be unable to visit the church on the  way back, thats a bonus

When the guide was further expressing his annoyance

She just put her hand up, in a manner which I had seen somewhere before – talk to the hand it said. Mrs Luft said “I came to see what I wanted to see and I did!!”

As I returned to the hotel the Amazonian Chinese has been replaced with the English, in a tone  of a reprimanding schoolboy he said to Watson

My room has a double bed I asked for two singles, oh no the world has come to an end, I gave Watson a thumbs up as I passed bye and he adopted his high brow London tone to deal with the Midland turkey – you know what can happen in double beds!!!

The following day was in the boat and up the fjords, I found the perfect seat at the front of the boat, this was a big crowd, about 100 mainly made up of Spanish and Chilean groups. Two Chilean ladies attached themselves to me, Chileans are very inquisitive with direct questions, the lack of English was overcome with miming, hand signals and Google translate

The interrogation went a bit like this

• Why travel alone
• Married
• Children
• Shoe size
• Last bowel movement

After that, then normal conversation commences

There was lots and lots of young staff and during the life jacket demonstration one the hostesses was struggling with putting on the life jacket and was helped by 2 Spanish ladies, who received a loud round of applause – this is going to be an interesting day

After an hour on the water it was announced that all guests had to remain inside seated – it was very rough, the scenery was breathtaking

Joined an interesting group at lunch all Chileans, the young girl was a vegetarian, potato, pumpkin and a tomato cut in half, then the meal arrived BBQ – every conceivable type of local animal charred to within an inch of its life

I say modestly, I am normally the most interesting person at the table, but today I was glad to take second place, the young vegetarian was married to a member of the Chilean Coast Guard who is based on Isla Robinson Crusoe, he spoke good English so he was able to keep all the table enthralled

Most people think of a Pacific island as paradise, the problem with Robin Crusoe is its major weather comes in from the Antarctica and it is located at the same latitude as Auckland , no beach parties and Mojitos here

Missed my new friends at lunch but they had loaded up on the cupa vino

The weather turned real nasty and we all had to sit down, Miss L refused she wanted to dance and the negotiations were long and long and long and long

After 30 minutes of heavy buffeting half the travellers went to sleep after the big lunch and the remainder started to empty the bar and every time a big wave crashed over the bow which sent the boat skidding in different directions, a loud Olé was shouted by the every growing group of intoxicated Spanish tourist