Road Tales

11.01.2010

The little hostel at Coyhaique was practically an ordinary house whose owners have separated two guest rooms. The most important was that there was Internet and whole two computers. The web-side needed an urgent update and ever since I came inside that was the first task I took up. There were two boys from Argentina at the house – one of them was a drummer and the other one was a photographer and a director living at Switzerland. At the moment he was going around South America to shoot some documentary film. His resemblance to Jack Sparrow from the Pirates of the Carribean was great and even his hair was braided into dreadlocks. Soon he would take part into a festival at Buenos Aires exactly because of that resemblance.

The following day at the house I spent entirely in front of the computer. On the second day I didn’t feel ready to continue yet. Furthermore I had bought milk and flour and I wanted to carry into effect my plan to make pancakes. For the first time in my life. That French guy at the hostel at Chalten had explained to me how to do that and warned me that the first pancake is always messed up. Until that moment I had that delusion in my mind that the pancakes are absolutely elementary to make. With the very first spoon of flour I put in the milk that delusion was crushed into pieces – mainly because of the flour itself since I obviously needed a blender or a liquidizer in order to whip it. Luckily the people had a liquidizer and the mixture was ready in about fifteen (!) minutes. My first pancake had become worse than I had expected. The second one was considerably improved and after the fourth one I already tossed them with a dash. In the end I reached the conclusion that I’d rather eat them than make them.

Then I went on hanging about in front of the computer – I thought of compensating for I had paid the price for staying for the night with the prime cost of the Internet if I had to use it at some cafe. I even managed to download the last EP of Pain of Salvation – that was something I had already been expecting for a month. While I was listening to the music two kids who have come together with one woman at the house clung to me with the insatiable desire to talk to me about something and to take my earphones so that they could hear what I was listening to. They were little ones and I didn’t understand their lalling at all and they on their behalf seemed to not want to understand my “I don’t understand you” and went on persisting.

I left on the third morning and turned my steps to the exit of the town to the north. The road to Puerto Aisen is an asphalted road so there is more traffic and I didn’t have to wait at all. The second driver who passed took me and I reached a road fork with it where two Israeli had come into a position – Eli and Gilad. Actually I don’t remember well the name of the second guy but I will call him Gilad so that it would be easier. It turned out that we had common acquaintances – Max and Coby, and Aviv herself. They remained utterly shocked by the tale of my misfortunes by Lago O’Higgins. Furthermore, they asked me what I thought of the Israeli. When I described a sort of profile of the Israeli traveller they laughed quite a lot because it was an accurate description.

We didn’t wait that long when a little truck stopped and loaded us up at the carriage. After I had seen so many people at the carriages of pick-ups and trucks finally it had happened to me as well. At that part the road was not significantly beautiful but it was fun. We went down at a little village – Villa Maninguales – and we kept on waiting and talking. A little bit later we remained at a distance about 100 meters from each other so that it would be easier but the second truck driver that passed loaded the three of us at the back of his truck. This time we didn’t even knew where exactly the truck was going. The most important was that it was going to the north. There were hardly any road forks anyway. The nice weather was more than welcome because that carriage had no tentage unlike the previous one. The truck driver was driving like a madman on the gravel road and the dust he was raising obscured the surrounding hills. Finally we arrived – at some place that was not even marked on the map. It consisted of a few huts and a sand-pit among the lush greenery of the surrounding woods. I liked the place and I couldn’t care less that none of the passing cars stopped.

At one point a beaten-up pick-up that was loaded with rotten trunks stopped but there was only a free seat for me. It was also going to the seaport village Puerto Cisnes and that meant 18 kilometers at my direction. There was an elder person inside and a younger one as well. Both of them had the wish to speak to me in English no matter that they couldn’t do that very well. I went down on the road fork for Puerto Cisnes but there was a maintenance crew therefore the little pick-up had to stay there for a while. I decided that there was no harm in looking at the little village so I went back at it. This road was going 35 kilometers to the west and the greenery around changed. The hills were very steep and rounded, overgrown with a few types of tall trees and a plant that looked like a bamboo and the local people had named cana. I could sense the humidity around through the wind-screen. It was not raining at the moment but everything by the road was flooded. At that area the rainfall is about 4000 mm yearly.

Puerto Cisnes was not very beautiful place, probably because of the cloudy weather. I bought some bread and went to the graveyard I had seen when I was coming. It was located about a kilometer outside and there was an enormous penthouse – that was something crucial if I had to spend the night at that place resembling a jungle. No matter that it was already dark I tried to go back to the road fork and a late car took me there. There were two front-rankers that flashed in the darkness by the hut on the crossroad. At once I recognised whom did they belong to. Eli and Gilad had gotten in here with the help of some little buss because for a long time no one would stop for them. They have pitched their tent at the hut whose roof leaked. There was an even cooler place for me – a sort of corridor at a bungalow on the other side of the crossroad. There I didn’t even have to pitch the tent.

A fine rain was drizzling the morning and the forest that resembled a jungle was swimming in fog and clouds. I didn’t take the trouble to get up yet because I could see the Israeli standing by the road – I made a rough estimate in a state of being half-awake that two of three cars have passed in our direction. Quite later when I already had gotten up one more boy and a girl arrived. They were friends of Eli and Gilad but that didn’t change the fact that we were already 5 people. The dilemma was solved an hour later when a car stopped and the guy announced that there was only one free seat – that meant it was for me. The man and the woman at the car were Germans who had been living at Chile for five years. The man taught history at some private German school at Vina del Mar. I was surprised by how much he knew about Bulgaria and how many things he asked me about. While we were talking we moved on an incredibly bad road among the rain forests. As we traveled we stopped at the preserve Quelon where there is a glacier situated over a high vertical rock wall. However, the weather was so cloudy that the rangers said we wouldn?t see anything so we continued and we passed by a group of 5-6 Israeli who were jumping and waving under the rain in an expectation to be saved from this place.

The Germans left me at Puyuapi – a very small village on the shore of a big lake. The place was not charming enough therefore my staying in there consisted only of waiting by its exit. There was also a Chilean guy waiting in there – a salesman of watches and various cheap jewels who was wandering around the area by hitch-hiking and was trying to sell his stuff. He confided in me that he didn’t like the Israeli because they had no respect to the local people.

There were hardly any cars passing and an hour and half later the Chilean decided to go a little bit behind so that we could wait separately. He had barely reached his new spot when the same Germans came and took him. I myself was taken by a truck that was full of trunks and as I took a nap I reached La Hunta – a bit bigger village whose main street was excavated because of the laying of some big draining pipes. I turned my steps to the exit in order to find the deserted building that the Chilean had told me about. It was a sort of old gas station – dirty and windy. I pitched the tent inside, I ate and a little bit later I went to sleep. In the morning I was woken up by the roar of trucks that were taking out the soil from the diggings. I went around the little shops looking for food whose variety in those places is minimal. As a compensation the prices are maximal. Later when the weather improved significantly I decided to go for a walk. I went on a sideway that was meandering not far away from a high water river. Round about, among the green meadows with cows that were grazing, there were some lonely trees with strange broken crowns here and there. Every now and then the sun made attempts to break through the white fluffy clouds and gave the greenery that sparking colour that was typical for the late sunny afternoons. In the distance a snowy jagged peak was revealed that completed the landscape to the point of perfection. I had walked about 5 kilometers unnoticeably when the magical time of sunset set in. Yes, that was one of those magical sunsets, from those sunsets with a great atmosphere.

As I went back, in the middle of the road, a little pick-up took me and drove me back to the village. On the other day it was still cloudy so I installed myself to wait at lunch time. Two hours later a pick-up stopped and took me 70 kilometers to the north next to probably the smallest village I had ever seen – Santa Lucia. Enormous rounded hills were rising around that were covered with an impenetrable rain forest. Here I had to make a decision – whether to continue until Futaleufu and to finish Carretera Sustral or to go to Chaiten – the city that has been evacuated due to the eruption of the volcano of the same name two years earlier. I decided to go to this city anyway – it seemed way too interesting to be omitted. However, there were hardly any cars passing and I don’t even want to talk about them stopping. Then a Japanese on a bycicle appeared, I beated the retreated and we pitched our tents together on a field – it was just beginning to rain.

The Japanese whose name I naturally don’t remember had been on his way to climb Aconcagua but he didn’t find himself a partner. So he took up another adventure – he bought a bycicle at Santiago and directed himself to the south. That was a convenient occasion for me to learn the cost of the bycicles and to consider the idea to eventually cross Bolivia and Peru that way.

In the night it was raining a lot and when by lunch time I decided it had stopped and I could fold the tent the Japanese guy had been already gone for a long time. I came across four Chilean boys who took some buss a little bit later. Then an Israeli guy and two Israeli women appeared. They were all going in the opposite direction. I went to take photographs at a spot I had found at the previous day. When I got back the three of them had moved to the other exit of the village and Eli and Gilad were waiting under the tentage. Just by that time I realized that from Koyayke until now I had taken picture on 1 Mps and I cursed for a long time. After that I got up and tried to repeat some of the pictures no matter that the good light was gone. The worst part was that the photographs from La Hunta could not be repeated. Whatever, never mind.

Meanwhile another hitch-hiker showed up – he was a Chilean. Unfortunately no one would stop. I didn’t even wait and I wandered around. In the evening some microbus stopped and asked 3000 till Chaiten and the three of them agreed. I myself refused and went on lounging about. An hour and a half later when I passed by the crossroad three cars stopped for something. I waved at one of them and they picked me up. They were Argentinians from Caleta Olivia, that little town on the eastern shore. I had slept at the piper near the road by it. A man, his sister and their mother. As I spoke to them I came round to the opinion that the Argentinians spoke so pure in spite of their weird accent. The Chileans spoke in a fast and blurred manner and in most cases I had to make serious efforts in order to understand them.