Valparaiso is one of those places that defines a country. It is a loud mouth of a city, colourful, unapologetic, it has trade and a good climate that puts Santiago to shame, (more…)
Tag: South America
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Puerto Montt
The bus journey from Castro to Puerto Montt was a lovely journey. Green rolling hills, a ferry across the Canal de Chacao standing on deck with spray in the face from a wind flecked sea. (more…)
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Castro
I had a weeks work to do in Castro so I found a neat little house to stay in with good Internet at the Hospidaje Familiar under the watchful eye of Orfilia and buckled down.
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Castro was a lovely place to spend the week, brightly coloured houses gripping the side of a steep slope leading down to the sea, one of the last enclaves of the Spanish in South America. My hospidaje was a funny old place, it was above one of this bars where scantily clad women served beers to drunk sailors up until 11pm sharp when it would close it’s doors. The noise would be quite loud upstairs but I didn’t mind, it had character. -
Futaleufu
The early morning bus ride with a hangover, dealing with customs, gorgeous mountains, back to Chile. I love the idea of stitching my way back and forth across such a grandiose mountain range, as if it were a playground ride, something to skip over, surf down. This time to the rafting mecca of Futaleufu.
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Esquel and Trevelyn
Esquel, supposedly Welsh as are some of the villages around the area. I stopped by for a cuppa in one of the ‘tea’ houses in Trevelin, just down the road.
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Paragliding, Tragedy, New year and Refugios
I found a lovely bunch of people running a paragliding hostel a short half an hours walk from town. The welcome was wonderful at the house of Martin and Mariella, there were a few other paragliding folks and Martins’s brother Diego. We all got on well, talked of flying and the freedom it brings, we didn’t even begin to suspect what would happen the next day.
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Refugio Cordillera
I once hitched through Europe with an old friend. We saw a lot of roadsides on our way and arrived in Cadiz dustier than a couple of dingoes, so I popped on the budgie smugglers and leaped into the sea to cool off. I looked around to see that my travel chum Alex had made a few friends, which was great, until I realised that one of his buddies had nicked my bag.
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St Martin to Bariloche
St Martin, A quick note on St Martin – it looked like a Disney tourist place with regular little streets and chocolate box perfect chocolate shops. The bus ride there was a bit crap as I had one of those spoiled Israeli girls (more…)
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Work, hot dogs and another addiction….
After a good while spending more than I was earning I had to shut myself away for a while and do some work. So I moved to a lovely wee town called Villarrica and found some cheap digs.
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