"This is the best goat's neck cooked in a solar oven that I've ever had."

It was difficult to leave all the excitement in Pucon, but we still had a lot of ground to cover in Chile. We hopped on an overnight bus to Valparaiso after our hike to the monkey-puzzle forest. I was hoping to get a first class seat on the lower level of the bus (imagine seats bigger than airplane first class), but the men decided we were on a budget and I was sent to the coach seats on the second floor. After a quick 13 hours on the bus, we arrived in quirky Valparaiso.

In Valpo, the thing to do is to walk around and check out the murals and colorful buildings. We of course, had to first fuel up on breakfast before tackling the hills. Chris and Noah also got some light reading done, I guess still trying to figure life out with some help from Dr. Seuss.

The big attraction in Valpo are the funiculars (or as Rony calls them the funtaculars). These are short trains that take you up and down the hills. Although the price was right (about $0.20 to 0.50 per trip), they were pretty old and rickety, but the views they took us too were pretty amazing. We especially enjoyed watching the ships at the port being loaded with cargo containers.

That evening we took the bus to Vina del Mar for a Dulce de Leche Latte at Starbucks (so good), sunset and a yummy dinner.

The last phase of our adventure began the next morning as we picked up our rental car and drove north into the desert. Along the way we drove by several beaches, wind farms, and an island reported to have penguins which we spotted with binoculars from the beach-side restaurant. The next day, we drove north to the Parque Nacional Los Penguinos, passing cacti and alpacas along the way. After an hour's drive on a dirt road we arrived at a small fishing town where the local fishermen were weighing the days catch. After some dilly-dallying and negotiating we hopped aboard one of their more sea-worthy vessels to head out to the islands of the national park to spot wildlife.

The ride out to the islands was a little chilly, but the water was pretty calm. As we neared the first island we saw more and more birds flying about. The island as filled with seals, cormorants and pelicans to name a few. But only a few penguins were milling about, I guess it was a little early in the season for their winter vacation. But we did see a mommy and baby sea lion go through the full swimming lesson routine including coaching and nervous dives into the water.

The next day we drove into the Elqui Valley to check out the vineyards. Our first stop was the Capel Pisco Factory, where we got a full tour in English of the factory complete with a long tasting session. Pisco is the national drink of Chile, usually drunk as a Pisco Sour. However, there is some patent litigation ongoing regarding if it was actually developed in Peru first. Our timing at the factory was perfect, we got there just as one of the farmers was making a grape delivery so we watched them test the grapes for sugar (minimum of 12%) and then watched the grapes getting unloaded and their spiffy machine separating the grapes from the vines.

As we left the pisco factory we ran into a Chilean traffic jam. Who knew that one of these guys was going to be our lunch? We stopped for a meal at the Solar Restaurant where all the food is cooked in solar ovens. I ordered some soup to be safe, but the guys wanted Goat Casserole. We had no idea that goat casserole was Chilean for random goat parts. We were so shocked we forgot to take pictures; just sat there and stared at the "food". Noah got served up some yummy goat vertebrae and Chris got some goat knee. At least he got his week's worth of knee vitamins. I think his physical therapist will be happy.

But I guess eating goat knee and being in a beautiful vineyard-filled valley is tiring, soon Chris was taking a nap. But we had some more traveling to do. After the nap we headed to an organic winery nearby to try the local brew.

At this point we had a minor disappointment as the valley that is supposedly sunny 300 days a year filled with clouds and our visit to the observatory was canceled. We spent an hour that evening trying to get to the restaurant district near the new casino and finally gave up and had dinner at the casino. The food was pretty good and Noah even tripled his money ($2 to $6). Too bad we wasted it all plus some at the ATM to get money to pay for our hostel. Why do they refuse to take credit cards?The next day it was time to say good-bye to La Serena and head back south to Santiago. That evening we did a quick tour of the city checking out the main cathedral, the president's palace and a magic show before sitting down to our last dinner of the Icksperience at the impressive Bellavista patio.

Pucon: hot spot for geothermal activities

We arrived by bus to the adventure capital of Chile to find it completely deserted. It turns out it was the bottom of the low season, and we were pretty much the only ones in our hostel. On our first day, we hired a bus (yes, a whole bus just for us) to take us to one of the one of the nearby geothermal hot pools. Our driver, Max, proved to be an excellent guide, and was able to exactly predict how long we wanted to spend at our destination. The hot pools were a lot of fun, and we had them all to ourselves. We were thoroughly cooked by the time we headed back to the hostel.




Day two provided perfect weather (good luck, considering the rainy season had more or less fully arrived) and we decided to make an assault on the town's premiere adventure attraction, Volcan Villarica: a snow-capped, 9000 foot, active volcano. The previous day had not been rainy, but we heard that ice and fumes had prevented most teams from reaching the top. We hoped we would fare better. We rose before sunrise, collected our gear, joined a 12 person group with four guides and drove up to the foot of the volcano.

A ski area has a few lifts scattered in the rock and ash at the bottom, and when running, these can save you an hour of climbing. They were not running. We started up from the base lodge climbing along the lift and sheltered at the unloading station at the top for a snack. We then struck out up the desolate rocky slope, past some buildings that were destroyed during the last major lava flows in 1984. More than an hour later, we reached the bottom of the glacier. After a short lesson on how to self-arrest with our ice axes in the event of a fall, we strapped on our crampons and gaiters and started zig-zagging up the steep slope. After some thought, we realized this must be to prevent a falling hiker from taking out the whole party.

As we climbed, the going got icy in spots, but our guides felt comfortable pressing on. The slower members of our party dropped back, accompanied by some of the guides, and eventually only seven of us were left with the trip leader. As we neared the summit, an occasional gust of swirling wind delivered choking fumes that burned our lungs. We quickly understood how it would be impossible to continue if the gas exposure was sustained. After five hours of climbing, we reached the top, and were greeted with superb views of the lakes and other volcanoes nearby.

In an arrangement that would never be allowed in the States, we strolled right up to the edge of the crater, a shear drop into a suffocating cloud of volcanic gas. To make things more exciting, our necessary position on the upwind side of the crater meant the ferocious gusting wind was certainly capable of toppling the unwary tourist over the edge. We braced ourselves and peered over into the smoke. At first things were a bit disappointing. The tortuous throat of the volcano obscured our view of the lava pool, and nothing much seemed to be going on. As our fingers and toes began to go numb, we considered heading back to the shelter of a nearby rock pile, where many of the climbers were hunkered down. However, we stuck it out a bit longer, and were rewarded for our patience.

When I first saw lava jumping up in the air, it was out of the corner of my eye, and I almost thought I had imagined it. But as we focused back down into the pit, we were treated to several massive explosions of bright orange goo, that splattered onto the opposite wall of the crater and glowed for several seconds before solidifying into gray rock. When the wind died for a few seconds, we could hear the sloshing, churning and hissing of the lava pool below. What a treat.


The fumes were sporadic, and if you were careful to feel for the change in air temperature, you could hold your breath until they passed, but eventually, coughing and freezing, we retreated from the crater, still dumbfounded by what we had had just seen.

After loitering at the top for an hour or so, our guide told us it was time to head back. We were pretty exhausted and the idea of a knee-cracking five hour descent was not so welcome. We were thrilled to learn that we would suffer no such fate. After a few minutes hike, we strapped on "ass-protectors" and slid, Shackleton style, down the snow fields, wedging our ice axes into the snow to control our speed. This went on for miles, and in barely an hour, we had made it all the way to the top of the ski lift, continuing down snowy gullies well past the end of the glacier proper.

Even the last stretch of the descent was a lot of fun, as we bounded and slid down a ramp of soft ash that was easy on the knees. All and all, the volcano was a great finale to our trip, and exceeded all our expectations. After disappointments in Hawaii and Costa Rica, we had finally seen lava!

Our third day in Pucon, we headed out to Herqueque National Park for a hike into the monkey-puzzle forest. This bizarre tree looks like spindly overgrown artichoke, and dominates the canopy above altitudes of about 1100 meters. Max brought us to the base of the hike, and suggested a nice lakeside spot for lunch. On the way up, we passed some impressive waterfalls.

After an extended climb, we entered into a sort of bowl between peaks, filled with small ponds and bizarre vegetation. Strange fruits and nuts rained down on us as we ate our lunch, newts sunned themselves on the tree roots and woodpeckers banged away at the branches. Fall colors adorned many of the trees and we enjoyed a peaceful end to our stay in adventure city, CL.

And then there were three; Chris joins the Icksperience

For Chris's first and only day in Argentina we decided to drive south to give him a sampling of northern Patagonia. We drove into the national park to visit Volcan Tronador, the highest volcano in the area, and the black glacier nearby. Just getting to the park was quite an adventure as our tour was cancelled and we had to rent a car at the last minute. We had to leave early because there was to be some tree clearing going on and the road was closed. It was a good thing we had plenty of time, as we did not consider how long it would take to drive the 50km on dirt roads to the trail head. But the drive was gorgeous, entirely through a beech forest alive with orange foliage.

Although the weather was a bit on the dreary side, we did an easy walk to the base of a glacier. We had lunch at the bottom of the cliff and waited to see the ice break off and come tumbling down, but it did not seem like any action was going to take place. Then, just as we turned to head back to the car, we heard some rumbling and were just able to glimpse some small chunks crashing onto the rocks. We now understand why the mountain is named Tronador- the thunderer. As our reward for dealing with the weather, we were greeted at the bottom with a perfect rainbow. Unfortunately, by the time we got to the black glacier the weather had turned and we decided to call it a day. For our last night in Bariloche we finally went to Alberto's Parilla (with "ll" pronounced as a "j" in argentina) recommended by Maya. Wow, this place did not disappoint. The meat was so fresh and tasty, real quality, especially the lomo (tenderloin). We're not sure of the secret ingredient (maybe its the grass fed cattle), but we are not looking forward to getting back to the American Industrial Food Complex.We also had to say goodbye to our favorite chocolate shop, Rapa Nui, which unfortunately we missed the last few days of our stay due to their shortened hours. The hot chocolate and alfajores (argentine special: sweet cookie sandwiches dipped in chocolate) here were to die for.
The next day we hopped on a bus to Chile. Our bus had 20 people on it, 15 of which were Israeli. It was pretty amusing. The ride through the lakes region was gorgeous and we arrived in Puerto Varas Chile a quick seven hours later. That night we went out to a really fancy dinner and were introduced to Pisco Sours, our new favorite drink. Our first day in Chile we decided to try our luck with the weather again and hike around nearby Volcan Osorno. Unfortunately this horribly out of focus picture taken from the bus was the best view we saw of the volcano all day. The second we got off the bus and started hiking, it started raining. Chris did all he could to point us in the right direction, but after two wet hours we decided to turn back.

To get a little more adventure that day we had the bus drop us off at some waterfalls near our hike. The falls were not that remarkable, but we were fascinated by the huge fish living downstream.

A whole week in one place

We arrived in Bariloche ready for a week of lakes, mountains, and chocolates, and our time there did not disappoint. We had eight days of amazing weather and outstanding hosts in the Tognettis. Pablo and Gloria welcomed us into their beautiful home and really took care of us. After all the traveling and my getting sick in Patagonia we needed a place to recouperate. With a view of the lake and Gloria's beautiful flower garden, we took advantage of the opportunity to relax. Until, that is, they took us hiking. There are many hiking opportunites in the Bariloche area most of ours entailed running up the mountain after Gloria, trying to keep up with her pace, while Kelly the fox terrier ran around hunting for lizards.

After a few days of fun with the Tognettis, going on short hikes and having amazing steak dinners with them and the rest of the family, we decided to trek out into the mountains. The Frey Refugio trek came highly recommended and we set out on bright sunny day. We had to catch the number 20 bus and then transfer to the tourist bus to take us to Catedral where the trail head was. We got on the first bus no problem, but decided to double check with a woman if we were standing at a good spot to catch the second bus. She told us that we had the summer bus schedule and that our bus was no longer running and we needed to go into town to catch a different bus. We stood there a little unsure of what to do (and slightly panicked) just when a bus going into town came by. I was practically on the bus when Noah said we should just wait a minute to see if the woman might be wrong. Within two minutes (right on schedule) our bus to Catedral roared by. We were so surprised we almost forgot to flag it down!

We hiked around the base of Catedral with beautiful views of the surrounding mountains and lakes and through a burnt forest. We then walked up a ravine between two mountains and emerged at beautiful foliage-filled mountain ridge.The refugio was really cozy, with dinner and drinks provided. That night Noah experimented with some night photography.

In the morning we set out to climb out of the bowl and over the ridge. We quickly caught up to the group ahead of us and followed their frozen footprints up the icy slope. When we got to the top the view of the surrounding mountains was quite breath-taking but with a long hike ahead of us we quickly continued along the ridge.As the ridge continued, the trail became more and more rocky, and we started singing a Blues Traveler tune: Doesn't this seem most precarious, doesn't it seem like a chance to take? Doesn't this seem most precarious, why does it feel like a big mistake?

Although it took us a while, we made it to the end of the ridge and then walked for two hours back down to Catedral almost 1000m straight down the ski mountain. Quite a long day.

The next day we took a boat ride into the National Park known for its cinnamon Arrayane trees. We also went to nearby Victoria Island for some short walks and a look at some cave paintings.

The next day we moved into a hostel in town and started preparations for Chris's arrival. Although we worked hard, it was tough to get anything done because it was Labor Day weekend. So we took the opportunity to sit around and get some reading done.