Pucon, Chile

Now this is what a volcano should look like. Volcan Villarica, Pucon, Chile
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I´m not sure if anyone is still reading these, but I´ve started so I´ll finish.

After the delights of Machu Picchu we flew back to Lima where we spent a couple of days enjoying the heat again. From there we took a flight back down to Santiago, Chile. Not much to report there except that we managed to find a thankfully quieter hostel, Hostal Forestal.

We took an overnight 10 hour bus with Tur Bus down to Pucon in Chile´s Lake District. Almost fully reclining seats and a reasonable breakfast - the best bus yet by a distance. The Greyhound Bus in Australia needs to take a few lessons from these guys.

Climbing the volcano
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Pucon itself is a great little town where we decided to stay put for about 6 nights (We can now pack a rucksack in less than 30 seconds but it doesn´t make it any more pleasurable). There isn´t anything too spectacular about Pucon apart from the volcano which overlooks it. The most popular activity is Pucon is climbing the volcano, which at 2800 metres is twice the height of Ben Nevis (although admittedly you start the climb half way up).

Having had 3 days of sunny weather and great views of the summit I selected the first cloudy day to try to climb it. Naomi chose the sofa option. Our guides warned us that we were unlikely to be able to make the summit, but with the forecast for the next few days being even worse I thought I would give it a go. True enough, after about 3 hours of trudging up the icy slopes we had to turn back at about 2300 metres, which was probably a good decision given that visibility was about 3 metres. On the plus side we still got to slide back down, which was probably my main motivation for climbing up in the first place!

Breakast is served!
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The rest of the week was spent walking, cycling (not very successfully as the track resembled a cow field) and going to the local gym - with me trying to put some weight back on and Naomi trying to lose it.

From Pucon we took another (30% cheaper) overnight bus back to Santiago with Pullman. The bus seemed OK but when we broke down after an hour and had to wait around in the cold for another one to pick us up, I was starting to regret the penny pinching. We were one of the lucky ones who made it on the next bus. Some of them are probably still stood by the roadside. Breakfast on the bus was absolutely hilarious. We were grandly presented with a tray with several compartments perfectly sized for hash browns, sausages, bacon and scambled eggs. On it was proudly placed..... a packet of 4 chocolate biscuits.... and that was it. The cup of coffee which followed was discreetly thrown down the toilet so as to avoid consuming my annual sugar allowance in one sitting.

Our third visit to Santiago was thankfully very brief and we went straight to the airport for our flight to Buenos Aires.