Hello again,
We continued our journey from El Bolson, stopping in Bariloche to catch a bus that dropped us off in the Chilean border town of Osorno. Osorno is commonly known as a dumpy border town with little to offer, but we beg to differ. Its actually just a normal South American town without the glitz and glamor of the tourist industry. A more authentic vibe that we´ve grown to prefer. And speaking of authentic, lets speak about our hostel owner, the proud dueña of the Dirty Sanchez oops, we mean, Hospedaje Sanchez. Aka crazy bird lady, aka the bird whisperer. We dont know if any of you are familiar with the disease cryptococcosis (caused by accumulation of bird droppings, and she had at least 20 birds in her kitchen), but we´re pretty sure that her brain has been taken over by it...perhaps long ago. She was quite the character, thus adding to the local flavor, and to our love of Osorno. Plus we had cable tv in our room. Very luxurious.
Outside of Osorno is the national park of Puyehue, made famous by the volcan (volcano) located in the center of the park, and the various hotsprings that surround it. The original idea was to go on a three day hike, stopping along the way to take advantage of some natural jacuzzi´s, however it was still too cold and snowy to reach the second day of the hike. Our first night it even snowed! We had met some American study abroad students on the way to the park, and it turned out that they were heading in the same direction, so we all hiked up together and ended up staying the night in another convenient refugio, complete with a wood burning stove.....and two Israeli´s named Yotam and Nisan. Luckily for us, they had already been warming the place for about an hour, it was as if they had been expecting us!
Due to the bad weather, the next day we hiked down and decided to camp in the valley for two more nights with Yotam and Nisan. We stayed in a "quaint" (read: old and busted) shack down by the river. We hiked to some beautiful waterfalls, had some fun bonfires, and found the infamous "empanada lady", a sweet old chilean woman who made them from scratch in her kitchen. Muy rico!
After two days of our shack paradise, we had to pack up and pack out, in order to continue our journey northward. We stopped off at Valdivia to meet up with our new study abroad friends, and spent the next two days enjoying the comforts of a city. Despite the constant rain, we managed to have a good time, even going out one night and socializing to support a national fundraiser held every year to support disabled children in Chile.
Now we are off to Santiago to meet the third member of our party, Mr. Rowan Steele, who will be joining us in just four short days! Hurray!
Hasta pronto amigos, y gracias por leer.
Kamelia
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