Chile here we come....

27th Dec, Campsite Petunia to Petrohue. (28M)


Up and packed again. It feels a while since we´ve been on the move on the bikes. The day started with a relaxed 13km ride to Puerto Panuelo. Stunning views of the lake. From there we caught a boat to Puerto Blest. Another very peaceful 3km bike ride to Lago Frias. On the organised tour there were busses to transport the other passengers so we got out bags transported for us.
Across lake Frias in another smaller boat to Argentinian customs and then bikes fully loaded again we had 27km of dirt track to get to Puerta Peulla and Chilean customs. The first 4km was very steeply uphill. Hard work when you´ve had virtually a week off the bikes and only flat riding for a while before that. It was however lovely and quiet, as the tour bus had left before us, we had the road to ourselves.

After 4km of ascent we reached a sign welcoming us to Chile. Then began one of the steepest roughest descents I´ve had to do for  a long time on a fully loaded tour bike. Hard work on the arms and more technical riding than ususal, it did level out after a bit but the stoney road continued, explains while the tourist bus was a chunky 4WD! We met a couple of tour cyclists heading the other way and stopped to exchange a few words,  I´m thankful that we were going in our direction however,
they had 23km of bumpy hot uphill.

Through customs and despite declaring that we had a few food items such as dried milk and raisens that we thought might be a problem on entering Chile, our bags went unsearched and we proceeded to our final boat crossing of this trip. 1.75hrs later, again through beautiful lake and volcano scenery even though some of it was slightly obscured by volcanic dust, we arrived at Petrohue a small village at the foot of the very impressive snowcapped volcan Osorno.
Having reloaded our bags back onto the bikes we were planning to look for a campsite. We didn´t actually have anywhere further to cycle today however as on leaving the jetty area we were directed back onto a small boat and taken across the river to a small farm with camping areas surrounding it. Surrounded by chickens, a few cows, pigs rooting around in a pen nearby and the ususal campsite contingent of dogs it was a lovely site made better by the stunning views of Volcan Osorno across the river.

The only real nuisance were the huge number of insects, swarms of small sandfly/ midgey like things and humungous horseflies. Thankfully for me they seem to find Gareth more attractive and generally leave me alone. Big and generally slow moving they are relatively easy to swat but there were certainly lots of them and they didn´t seem detereed by the relatively windy pitch we chose either.
First opinions of Chile, volcanoes, lakes, greener scenery, and huge huge horseflies.