Puerto Octay, Chile

After Iguazu, we flew to Bariloche and rented a car, and then went on to Villa Angustura in the Lake District of Argentina, with mountains, trees, lakes, and wild flowers everywhere. The wild lupins were the best in varying shades of violet and purple, pink, yellow, and white. Luckily my friends are as enthusiastic about flowers as I am, and we stopped many times along the side of the highway for pictures. The more we wandered and looked, the more we found.

We took a series of buses and boats into Chile from Argentina with the towering Andes nearby and snow-covered volcanoes. Hills covered with trees reached right down to the water. We met Erica again in Puerto Varas, a small lovely town of about 35,000 on the shore of the largest lake in Chile, Lago Llanquihui. We sat in the sun and Erica and I swam, but the water was too cold even to keep my face in for long. Another day, in Puerto Montt, we went from stand to stand admiring the seafood and fish. In the old days, in Angelmo, one could go from stand to stand and eat seafood. The old stands have disappeared and now one goes into restaurants. We had a lovely lunch of abalone, shrimp, crab, and fish. Later we picked up our rented car. What a luxury to have a car to explore the back roads. Forty three years ago we hitchiked everywhere, often waiting a whole day for a ride.

We drove to Puerto Octay to a lovely hostel run by a Swiss/Chilean couple. We had the upstairs dorm room of a wooden octangular building to ourselves. We ate delicious breakfasts with homemade bread and dinners with huge salads. Every day we try a different bottle of Chilean wine. We are also making sure that avocados are part of our daily diet since they are so delicious.

We could see Volcano Osorno (almost 8,000 feet) from the window on a clear day, and we had many clear days. Actually we had different views of that volcano and others for days. We made two hikes on the side of the volcano, one long hike where we almost reached the snowline and had a view of several other snow-capped volcanoes.

We have been very lucky with the weather because this is the area that gets the most rain in Chile. Everything is green. Germans first settled this area in the 1850´s, and later many came betwen 1915 and 1920. One can see the German influence in the wooden houses and churches in the towns. There are many vast dairy farms in this area.

We continue to cause quite a stir, as Sue puts it, many people ask if we are sisters. People casually ask us where we are from and when we say England, Scotland, Canada, and USA, they are all surprised, and then of course we have to clarify that we are friends from 43 years ago in Santiago.

Erica left us again after five days in Puerto Octay to be with one of her sons who lives in London and is visiting Chile. The four of us are on the road again heading north exploring more lakes, mountains, and volcanoes.