On The Road After Dark

I need to pose a question to the On The Road peeps:

How would you feel about moving After Dark from 10pm to midnight?

Would that work just as well for most of you?

Work better for some of you?

Would it eliminate After Dark as something you read at the end of the day?

Would you only see the midnight After Dark in the morning along with the regular On The Road?

Anything else I should be asking related to a time change?

Please answer in the comments.  ~WaterGirl

lashonharangue in Chile

Continuing south from Ventisquero Yelcho we took a short detour off the Carretera Austral to Futaleufú. This is a small town that has become an adventure destination for white water thrill seekers from around the world. Since we didn’t fit that demographic, after a night stay in a cabaña we headed back to the Carretera Austral and made our way to the tiny port town of Raúl Marín Balmaceda. 

Unfortunately that involved a ferry crossing in the smallest vessel of our trip. Unlike the others it was not roll on roll off. It had only one ramp. The ferry had room for just one other truck and our SUV. There was no place to turn the car around near the ferry ramp. I had to turn around about 200 feet up the hill, and back down onto the ferry using the side mirrors (the back was filled with our gear). I managed after several attempts that included some jerky stalls trying to work the clutch.

When we didn’t want to camp we usually found a hotel or cabaña using the internet and Bookings.com. We have a neat wifi hotspot device that we pay a flat fee for cellular based internet access regardless of carrier or country we are in.  

We arrived in Raúl Marín Balmaceda and it was pouring rain. The village is built on a sand bluff above the surrounding water. It had about four streets and none seemed more than about three blocks long. Unfortunately there is no cell service there and we had no reservation. We started driving around looking for a lodging sign and saw a man walking down the street. In our broken Spanish we asked about where to stay. It turned out he had a lovely cabaña available next door to his house. Yay!

Raúl Marín BalmacedaDecember 10, 2018

The next day the weather had cleared. We and another couple took a nature tour in a small boat with a local guide. His English was very limited but my understanding was he had been mostly living off the land until the road and tourism had recently arrived. The boat drove around the estuary and we spotted lots of animals.

On The Road After Dark – lashonharangue – Southern Chile Road Trip Part 3Post + Comments (34)

Thanks to everyone for all the ideas this week!  I read all the comments in real time last night and then read them again today.  After this lovely road trip to Southern Chile is complete, let’s go with Parks After Dark for our next series.  National parks and state parks are good – that gives more people an opportunity to submit their photos.

Parks After Dark will start in just over a week, so start your engines start sending in your photos! Also, I don’t know how long that series will last, so please also start sending in your photos for Fall Colors and for New Orleans.

We’ll have another powwow in a couple of months to figure out where to go after that.

lashonharangue in Chile

We drove off the ferry in Caleta Gonzalo and arrived in a temperate rainforest. Thick wet vegetation closed in on both sides of the gravel road. A few miles after disembarking we arrived at the Sendero Cascadas Escondidas campgrounds. This is at the northern end of the million acre Parque Pumalín. It was early season and there was only one other camper there. We set up our tent and started hiking up a wet trail that left from near our campsite.

Sendero Cascadas Escondidas December 4, 2018

The trail up to this waterfall was a series of wet wooden stairs. This rainforest is known for its endangered old growth Alerce (fitzroya) trees. They can live for three thousand years and the park has about a quarter of those remaining in Chile.

On The Road After Dark – lashonharangue – Southern Chile Road Trip Part 2Post + Comments (19)

Today is the start of Chile After Dark – with lashonharangue – who will take us on a road trip to Southern Chile while we figure out where we want to go after Paris.

I’ll introduce the series with this first post, but will let the other individual Chile posts speak for themselves.

In this 8-part series, we’ll be treated to a story arc that starts from a place that had been developed for over a century, with paved roads and power poles, and tourist destinations with tour buses.  We take a ferry ride and drive onto a gravel road in a rainforest, but the story ends at a place that is at the “end of the world.”

lashonharangue highlights how recent the Carretera Austral was (Chile’s own Rt. 66?) and how it is impacting the people/places in the south.  He tells me that there have been a lot of environmental battles in Patagonia, and that ecotourism and adventure tourism are alternatives to more destructive economic development.

lashonharangue includes a fair bit of text to convey what the trip was like so that we might feel like we are along for the ride.  He tells me that you can find as good or better photos of Patagonia online – but that’s not the point.  His hope for the series is that we can share his adventure and see both the good and challenging aspects of all of it.

Let’s get started!

~WaterGirl

lashonharangue

Soon after retiring my spouse and I prioritized our bucket list trips. Top of the list was visiting Chile, specifically Patagonia. We flew to Santiago, spent a week there, and then drove south in a rented 4WD SUV along with our camping gear. It was the first time we had driven a stick shift in four decades. We spent four weeks camping and hiking through Patagonia, including driving most of the Carretera Austral in Chile, and ultimately reached Tierra del Fuego. 

We stopped in several cities (Concepción, Valparaiso, Temuco) on the way to Puerto Montt, which is at the northern end of the Carretera Austral. This road, built by the Chilean army, was started in the mid-70s but its full 770 miles were only completed in 2000 at the small town of Villa O’Higgins. The road stops there because it is blocked by a giant ice field. Some of the road is paved, but much is a two lane gravel road, with sections connected across bodies of water by ferries of various sizes. 

Puerto VarasNovember 30, 2018

We spent a few days exploring the Puerto Varas area just north of Puerto Montt. We drove around Lago (lake) LLanquihue. You can see the influence of the german immigrants who arrived in the mid 19th century in architecture, food, and beer. 

Compared to Chile, California is geologically tranquil. All the Chilean towns we saw along the Pacific had tsunami evacuation route signs. Signs for volcano evacuation were also a frequent sight. And major earthquakes are distressingly common. 

I find signage fascinating. What is this image trying to communicate? It is important to hold hands when evacuating from an erupting volcano? Mothers don’t forget your child during an eruption?

On The Road After Dark – lashonharangue – Southern Chile Road Trip – Part 1Post + Comments (28)