Puerto Varas, Chile

Last night we drove into this very neat little town on the coast of Chile....after having spent 5 days on the island of Chiloe (SA second largest island after Terra de Fuego)....We loved the greeness of Chiloe after our week in the very arid Attacama Desert....a breath of moist,green air was welcomed. We have been on alot of car ferries in the past 5 days...the ferry to Chiloe..about 30 min. with huge trucks, buses, and cement mixers all packed in with us....then ferries to smaller islands off of Chiloe...my main memory of Chiloe will be the many little wood and tin churches scattered thru the south part of the island..mostly built while the Jesuits were there..before l867 when they were made to leave SA. Several of the chuches are now UNESCO sites and are being refurbished. By looking at them you can tell they were built by boatbuilders...the ceiling often looks like the hull of a boat. They are painted bring blues, yellows, greens with a steeple that can be seen from the sea...a kind of beacon for the fishermen of each village. All are dedicated to a different saint....my favorite had stars painted on the ceiling.
We took a local tour on Sunday...a bus of 11 very friendly Chileans and us.... the most memorable event of the tour was our lunch...curanto..it is called.....This happened at a small ¨¨end of the world¨¨village...a homehosted lunch....a room is dedicated to cooking the curant which consists of digging a large pit..3 feet deep, lining it with hot rocks, then layeringwith clams, mussles, sausage, pork, chicken, potato patties..then convering that with huge gunnera leaves and dirt!! Then a platter of this was served to each person....more meat than Kristen or I would eat in a month!! But we made a valiant effort... (this was followed by eating wild Boar today....maybe we will become carnivores).
On leaving the island yesterday we made one last detour down a very muddy, washboard road on the north end of the island to go see the Magellan penguins and the Humboldt penguins---we finally arrived at the place..seas were pretty rough but smallboats were taking folks out...dozen of us at a time....and we not only saw penguins but sea otters as well...and we were told about a German woman who came there as a tourist a few yrs.ago, fell inlove with one of the boatman and now lives and works at the little restaurant there. The boat went too fast and the water was too choppy for either Kristen or me to get enough focus on the boatman to fall in love...
After a few days here in Puerto Varas,we head north to the Chilean lakes.....first to Valdivia(you might be familiar with Pedro Valdivia..the Spaniard who conquered and claimed Chile.....or you may have read the Isabelle Allende book..Ïnez of My Soul¨¨¨.
I thinkthe last entry I made is the evening we were going to stargaze in the Attacama desert....wow! was that a treat.....total darkness just before the moon rose...the milky way was bright and huge and the constellations were outstandingly bright....then we looked thru telescopes to see Saturn & rings, the Seven Sisters(all 7 of them), and then the MOON...it was huge and so bright thru the telescope I had to step away fromthe scope. That evening was a highlight of the whole Attacama week for me!! I hope I can get a photo thru the scope of the moon for you onto this site...
This long thin country is so diverse that as we move from one location to another it feels like we are in another country...very fascinating. Another fascinating thing: today we meet the two guys who we have worked with in doing some planning for us for this trip...had lunch with them...they have a company here....Perry is from Midland-Odessa, TX, went to U of TN, and was a customer in Davis Kidd in Knoxville....this 6 degrees of separation idea is true!!
Now to photos...