Puertas y portones

In one of the museums we visited in Santiago there was a comment about how important doorways and gates are in Chile both historically and presently. These entrances are statements about the organization or people they lead to. They might denote status or tell a story but there is frequently an investment in doors and gates. Doors are important in most places but when I think back over the last few weeks we have often noted the doors, details around entrances and even the gates we have seen. Granted there are some fairly prosaic ones (the first couple below) but many are very interesting. I did not really take a lot of pictures till we returned to Santiago but have collected some pictures of doors.   Most are around Santiago but there are a few from across south central Chile.

CONTRA LA DICTADURA PINTAREMOS HASTA EL CIELO!

Graffiti has a history in Chile as a protest medium dating back at least to the 1940's. There are more details at :

http://www.graffiti.org/santiago/brp.html

but the net result is over time, graffiti creators have become considered artists. There are government guidelines but generally Chile cultivates graffiti art. We have found examples in numerous cities and while there are a few examples of nighttime expressions done in a hurry, the vast majority we have seen are carefully and creatively done.

In Valparaiso, which we have not visited, much of the city has become a canvas for established and budding artists.  Here are a few examples we have seen.  But if it is sanctioned, is it still grafitti?

Los Perros

One of the things that has struck us from day one in Chile is the dogs. There are dogs everywhere from downtown Santiago to every small town we visited. 

Some of these dogs are clearly pets either in yards or being walked by owners but a large number and perhaps a majority seem to be ownerless and they wander around freely. 

Almost without exception, the dogs seem good natured and we did not see any malnourished although a fair number walk with a limp or rather stiffly. 

 There will be dogs lying on the sidewalk, at the side of the street, or sometimes well into the road. 

During the day they will wander around, occasionally following someone for a few steps and once in a while someone will feed them something. 

One of the Chileans we met said that there were in fact a mix of typical pet dogs and strays. 

There is a relaxed attitude to the dogs and people step, or drive, around them and they are part of the routine of the day.  

In some areas garbage in bags is hung from trees or fences to discourage scavenging , presumably by the dogs.

 We have seen a fair number that look like our dog so perhaps he is part of a pinnacle of random breeding or an example of entropy.

All in all they add an interesting calming presence to  the rhythm of life.

As we go

Both Alex and I have been keeping blogs on this trip that have been somewhat complementary both in terms of content and timing of posts.  Not really planned but two perspectives are seldom identical. Those of you only reading this blog may have wondered what happened to the trip to Ushuaia that was originally planned. 

After the first three days of riding we had a discussion about the trip as we realized that the schedule of travel we had set would lead to numerous hard days of riding. The net result is we decided this was more about the journey than the destination and so amended our approach and chose to travel less distance and spend more time wandering around. This cuts our total mileage travelled by more than half.

This fits into an interesting collection of events that have coincided for me. First, I was invited to join my son and his friends for the last few weeks of a trip to the end of South America. My son ended up changing his plans but the trip southward survived. As we talked we kept Ushuaia as the target but were both of the mind this was about the journey more than the destination. So once we started riding  we adjusted our route to a more relaxed tour briefly into Argentina but mainly around south central Chile. 

The second was the start of a new choir in the Kokopelli choir organization, named Vacillando. The intention there is not exactly vacillating, but not driven so much by the goal as the journey. This has been tremendously fun in the first few months and I look forward to many more.

The third was somewhat intentional in that I took ¨Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance¨ along as reading material on our trip. For those of you who have read this you will know this is more on philosophy than anything else told in the form of a Chatauqau. 

Overall the theme of enjoying the moment has been brought from several quarters.  So our trip has been focussed on more moments and fewer demanding goals.

That said we have both had our skills tested and developed by a variety of road surfaces, wind and turbulence, and of course rain. Arguably we checked another box as motorcyclists today when we took shelter under a bridge hoping the rain would stop.  It did, but as it turned out we caught up with the band of rain for another soaking. On a related noted I believe, based on a limited sample, that I own the brightest visibility raincoat in Chile. 

So today we returned to the mainland and start hopping our way back to Santiago.  Yesterday we visited a lighthouse and then wandered around town for a few hours.  

Today we diverted enroute to the ferry to visit a beach that was a bird watchers paradise as well as providing opportunity for locals to harvest from the wide flat beach.  There were even a couple yokes of oxen (cows?) pulling carts.  

We rode on to the ferry, saw a seal, and reached the rain just before docking.  We donned our "human pylon" rain gear and pressed on.  The gear works remarkably well but we were still a bit soggy on arrival.

This afternoon we wandered around Puerto Varas and looked at some of the older houses; many with strong german influcence. Much of this area of Chile has a strong german presence and in fact today was the Kuchen festival with tables laden with what looked to be a crossover between cakes and pies.  

Our gear is slowing drying and my friends I'm here replying, I have written so that you will know. take it slow, is how we go, make it so

Goodnight  

Chiloè

We have been on the Grand Isla de Chiloe for a couple days now and are seeing yet another part of Chile. The trip to the island was by ferry from Chaiten, along the Careterra Austral, to Quellon. As we left Chaiten (about one hour late) on a 4 hour or so trip, we were just past high tide. This put us into port just before low tide. Turns out this is a problem as the ferry was unable to get to the ramp to off-load vehicles so our arrival at 1530 allowed foot passengers to disembark but vehicles did not leave till 2030. Tides are fascinating and relatively predictable but somehow this turn of events appeared to be a shock to the ferry company.  We could have missed something in translation but they acted surprised.  

This late departure naturally lead to an evening trip through the southern part of the island as we had booked a room at Castro about 60 km north.  So although the sun was setting soon we thought we still had some daylight and as we were about to ride the main north-south road we should make good time. As it turned out there was road construction on the first half where traffic took turns through various stretches of road.  As a result we rode most of the trip in the dark so did very little sight-seeing. We arrived at the hotel by 2300 and settled in for the night. 

Wednesday we wandered around Castro a bit, took some pictures and then saddled up to head to Ancud where we had a hotel booked for three nights. Enroute we diverted to the East coast of the island to visit a small town (Quemchi)  and to see a 500 metre foot-bridge to a park on a small island with a church on it. It started to shower while we were on the island and we returned to shore expecting a wet ride to our hotel.

Fortunately the shower passed and we had a pleasant ride in, and through some remarkable navigation and patience, Alex managed to convince the GPS to guide us to our hotel. We wandered around town a bit and as it started to shower again we were convinced to come sit in a local restaurant for supper.

Food has not been very prominent on this trip in that it is not dramatically different. In this restaurant they had a variety of sandwiches which have a generous serving of meat, usually avocado, perhaps mayonnaise or mustard, and a slice of tomato. The sandwich is usually on a shallow bun that is very white and tasty. There was also a variety of seafood dishes with lots of shellfish and crab in this area as well as farmed salmon and various wild species. Often meals are ordered piece by piece although there are completo options as well. The food is good, affordable and generally familiar to our palates. That said we have not eaten shellfish options which is apparently a local speciality. This evening I ordered and h'orderves  was translated on the menu as "crab cake" but was really a crab and cheese soup. This was followed by a white fish (Hake?) which was delicious and unusually for me bone free.

Chiloè is famous for its potatoes with some large number of varieties in various shades of the rainbow.  We have had mashed (served cold), sautéed, deep fried mashed potato balls and boiled.  All were good but generally looked yellowish so we still have some colours to try.

Chiloè is also one of the spots to see penguins in Chile which is part of our three day stay here in Ancud to find a pleasant day to visit. When we awoke this morning (Thursday 30th) and removed our earplugs there was the sound of heavy rain and splashing vehicles. We assumed today was not a penguin day so went shopping for tours. Our tour of choice was full (Austral Adventure) but the owner provided some excellent and enthusiastic advice on things we should see that would be easy by motorbike. By this time the rain had stopped and blue patches of sky were showing up so we set off to see penguins. 

When we arrived on the designated beach there were 30 minute boat trips out to the small islands where the penguin rookeries were. They loaded us into a cart, wheeled it into the water next to the boats and we boarded with dry feet. 

The drivers were expert at keeping a steady boat in a fair swell and maneuvered around so everyone got a good view of the penguins. Our side of the boat even got a good view of a sea otter with a crab in its mouth swim up to one of the islands. Very cool.

Afterward we rode toward town with a diversion down a small road to a secluded beach where although there were fishing boats and some buildings was largely deserted with the exception of some very large flies (horseflies perhaps but the size of big bumblebees). 

 

Carretera Austral

As I write, it is just past noon Chile time and we are on a ferry enroute from Chaiten to Isla Grande de Chiloe which will take us as far south as we will travel this trip when we land in about 4 hours at Quellon. When we disembark we will go to the southern most point of the Ruta 5 which I believe is also the southern most point on the pan-American highway.

We left Puerto Montt on the 26th with the plan to travel part of the Carretera Austral (Ruta 7) which is a highway south through Patagonia that extends about 1200 km. Much of the early part of this route involves ferry crossings ranging from 45 minutes to 4 hours. Since neither Alex or I are particularly skilled at, nor enjoy, riding gravel we chose to follow about 15% of the route and then head west by ferry.  As it turns out we may have travelled some of the worst gravel sections but by surviving unscathed (physically) we have demonstrated some newly cultivated and/or honed riding skills.  

Ruta 7 is cut through the middle of rainforest in some of the spectacularly rugged  terrain for which Chile is famous. We rode through dense forest where the route was like a tunnel, along the bottom of vertical cliffs with waterfalls cascading downward on one side and lakes or the sea on the other, around mountains and through valleys. Where roads were not feasible or there were channels to cross, Chile has developed a series of ferries to create a "multi-modal" route. This area is geologically active as they say so most spots seem to have a volcano nearby. Our first night on this route was at Hornopiren below the volcano of the same name. We could not find a hotel here on the internet so our guidebook suggested Hostal Austral which sounded quaint and affordable. Quaint may be a euphemism in this case, but the supper and breakfast were superb, the beds were tolerable and we were pleased at the final bill. The supper was simple which was locally farmed salmon baked with tomato and some sausage accompanied by potatoes and salad.

Chile has actively promoted fish farming in this region and although there have been some hiccups, there is a thriving industry of several different species of salmon. The farms are clearly visible from satellite and seem to be providing a fairly good business base to the region. Hornopiren has a fish hatchery for example.

The 27th started from Hornopiren with a 4 hour ferry ride down the channel which is essentially fjord-like with mountains plunging to the sea on both sides, heavily forested with the exception of a narrow strip at water's edge. There are occasional houses perched on the mountain sides, some small pastures or gardens but mostly heavy forest. Stunning. 

After the first ferry there is a 10 km road to the next ferry. On this leg the motorbikes and bicycles (4 on the trip) left the ferry last and headed off to catch the next ferry scheduled for about 30 minutes and 60 minutes later. Fairly easy on a powered vehicle but a concerted effort is required by the cyclists as the road is rough, climbs and falls often and is gravel or dirt. In this case all 4 cyclists made the second ferry (which we were waiting for), with seconds to spare  This 45 minute crossing took us to a 60 km or so stretch of road to our hotel for the night at Chaiten. 

This was very tolerable gravel with the final stretch broadening out into a gravel airstrip with gates on both ends to exclude vehicles when airplanes were landing. After the "aerodrome" we rode pavement the remaining 10 km which was pleasant and relaxing to ride. We found our hotel "mi casa" which was delightful. Chaiten was mostly buried in ash in a 2008 eruption of  a volcano (Volcan Chaiten?) and has been recovering with great determination since.We would loved to spend a couple days there but our ferry only runs once a week.