Pucón...

This past weekend I traveled about 9 hours south to the small town of Pucón. In Pucón, you can climb a volcano, go river rafting, relax in thermal pools and take boats out on the lake. In four days I felt like I did just about everything.

My friends, Tasha, Angela and I arrived Friday morning after spending the night on the bus. We had about an hour or so to recuperate and the we were off to go see the parade because Friday was Chile's independence day. After exploring the downtown and taking in a bit of the beautiful breath taking scenery we headed back to the house. By the way, the house we stayed at belongs to Tasha's "Chilean" aunt and it was a gorgeous wood cottage about 10 minutes from the city center.

Next we went to an asado at Tasha's "Chilean" Uncle's house. We ate so much delicious meat and pretty much had a great time hanging out with the uncle, his two sons, Tasha's "Chilean" brother and the aunt's boyfriend. Apparently a very typical and chilean diesiocho.

On Saturday we walked out to Carburga pretty much just to see Lake Carburga. It was definitely on eof those "lost in translation" sort of situations because we thought we were going to some waterfalls that were in reasonable walking distance. Instead we ended up walking for 3 hours with our new friends out to this "beach" and by "beach" they meant lake. We still had a good time but were pretty confused for a while.

Sunday was rafting day. My first rafting trip and I loved it. I think I'm hooked... The water was such a clear turquoise and all around us was this amazing landscape. Mountains, volcanos and clear blue sky. We couldn't have asked for better.

And on Monday, our last day in Pucón, we climbed Villarrica Volcano. Wow. What a trek that was. The company we went with equipped us with 2 leathered Chilean guides, ice picks, cramp-ons, ski pants, helmet and boots to name a few. The climb was probably the most difficult thing I've ever done. The volcano just goes up and up and up and you have to switch back in order to get anywhere. Your feet weigh a ton plus you're constantly trying to remember that if you fall, you need to swing your ice pick into the mountain and lift your feet up so you don't roll down the volcano. Definitely a lot to deal with.


Unfortunately we couldn't go to the mouth of the volcano because there was too much sulfur smoke but I was pretty happy with the altitude we did get to. And the best part is that after climbing for hours and hours, you get to slide down the volcano on you butt! So fun!

By the time we got back to Santiago at 7am Tuesday morning Tasha, Angela were beat. But it was a weekend entirely well spent. I would love to go back to Pucón but I think I'll just have to wait and see where the rest of my travels in Chile take me.