Another bordercrossing back to Chile, and I made it to Puerto Natales, from where I left for a 7-day trekking and camping adventure in the "Torres del Paine" - nationalpark. We hiked the well known "W"-trail, adding some extra days for the most beautiful parts of it to make sure that we actually see the park, as the weather is just unpredictable (but we were so lucky with the weather, having only 2 days of rain on days where we could deal with it best ).We did the trek west to east - starting at the glacier Grey, hiking up into the Valle del Frances on a sunny day while leaving it the next day with the fog crawling into the valley and hugging the mountains tight so you could see nothing when looking back ....and ending the trek in front of the 3 "Torres del Paine".

I  boarded the ferry "Don Baldo" - leaving Chiloe behind on the journey further south..I watched the shoreline passing by before sunrise the next morning, breathing in the fresh morning air, and when we arrived in Puerto Chacabuco in the evening after a 26-hour trip, the mountains you saw ashore had white peaks. I raced to  Coyhaique,  from where I explored the surrounding during the next days: Hiking in the Coyhaique National Reserve, and one day we drove down the famous "Carretera Austral" through stunning rugged landscape all the way to  Puerto Tranquilo at the shore of Lago General Carrera, where  we took a little boat out to see the marvelous  "Capilla de Marmol"- beautyful caves and rock formations. Well, sooner or later I managed to leave Coyhaique behind, traveling down to the little village of Chile Chico to cross back into Argentina the next morning, and then taking a bus from Los Antiquos down the "Ruta40" to  El Chalten - the whole day nothing but argentinian steppe till finally the impressive "Fitz Roy" and "Torre"  mountainranges appeared  at the horizon. And luckily I had amazing sunshine the next days to hike to the "Lago Torre" / enjoy the stunning panorama, also when I went further down to El Calafate and the magnificent glacier "Perito Moreno" yesterday.

I kept heading south - ZIGZAGGING between Chile and Argentina: I went to Valdivia in Chile, where I ran into a german "Bierfest" - what else would you expect here, german settlements, immigrants and influences everywhere !! Then I crossed the border once more to get to Bariloche in Argentina to do some more hikes in the lake-district. Back in Chile, I had a short stopover in Puerto Varas before getting on the Island(s) Chiloè, where I got stuck for the last few days - watching penguins; hiking through the national park and along the coast; looking at Palifitios ( colourful houses on stilts on the shore); seeing some of the wooden churches in the different villages of the island and having a fiesta in one of the villages where the locals were dancing CUECA, racing horses and cooking yummy traditional local food like curanto,empanadas ( filled with seafood ) and asado.

I traveled westward to Mendoza, when I arrived shortly after noon all the shops closed for a siesta of 4 hours to escape from the heat, probably to have a picnic in one of the shady parcs, definitly to have some MATE, a funny sight to see all those people carrying around their MATE-cup in one hand and a thermo with hot water in the other, sipping from it now and then. I crossed the Andes to get into Chile once more - SANTIAGO! I quite liked the city: the artist quarter Bellavista, one of the shiplike houses of Neruda, la Moneda, nightly projections of art upon the Mapocho-river......I also went to the habourtown of Valparaiso: colourful houses on hillsides overlooking the bay, some of them really seem to be hold together by the paint only -the mixture of colour and decay giving it a special flair, even the dogs and cats ( and there are maaany of them) seem to be more charismatic than elsewhere. I walked across the market ( all that fresh fish!), went on a little habourcruise and walked up and down the hills afterwards. I took one of those old lifts once, feeling like in a little wooden shoebox as we got up one of the hillsides. I had a look at another of Nerudas houses over there- what a view over the bay and the whole Valparaiso! I finally made it to the lake district, a place called Pucon, you really can´t blame the Chileanos to choose it as a holiday destination. The vulcano Villarrica greats you with some smoke, and there are nice hikes in the nearby Parque National Huerquehue.  For a stunning, beautiful view of the surrounding vulcanos and mountains I hiked up to a "mirador" in  the Cañi- sanctuary, accompanied by the dog of the information center who obviously had chosen me to take him for a walk that day.

 

I stayed in the oasis of San Pedro de Atacama/Chile for a couple of days to see the surrounding marvelous landscape, especially the "Valle de la Luna" with the vulcanos of the Andes ( the dominating "Licancabur") as a beautyful background and the amazing sky filled with stars at night. I crossed over to Argentina, to a city called Salta, strolling over the main plaza with nice cafes and restaurants certainly made you feel a bit shabby in your old backpacker clothes. The nearby city of Cafayate is surrounded by wineyards, I certainly eared a new pair of shoes there, walking a lot. I went to see the Ruinas de Quilmes ( and the wide land filled with cactuses), I started early in the morning, and it was a nice walk while the sun rose, I saw some birds flying over my head that somehow reminded me of the macaws that I saw in Peru, cows were staring at the "early" visitor (me) as I was passing by, a big hairy spider crossed the dusty street right in front of me - the way back with the sun further up in the sky was a bit more sweaty. In the afternoon I walked to some nearby river to cool off a bit, but getting there took quite a while, and I felt relieved when I finally got there and could put my feet in the cold stream. Another bustrip brought me to Cordoba while the heat was increasing. From there I made a daytrip to the little town of "Alta Gracia" to see the "Museo de Che", and one evening we went to "Jesus Maria" for the Festival of "Doma y Forklore", nice to see all the gaucho dressed up in smashing clothes, there were bands playing music while gauchos struggled with wild horses, even staying on their backs when they went down to the ground.... not to forget the awesome smell of grilled meat from countless BBQ's stands everywhere and other traditional food.