Molly and I travelled to Pucón the weekend before last, which marked our first venture to Chile’s infamous ‘south’ that has left Santiago feeling empty from its inhabitants enjoying vacation down there during the hot summer months. Pucón is in the northern part of Chile’s lake district, which is full of lakes, rivers, waterfalls, and volcanoes all nestled between the cliffs of the Andes. It’s absolutely unique and beautiful down there – that’s why it’s a permanent vacation spot for so many Chileans as well as other world travelers. The only problem Molly and I had, though, was the weather. Oh, the weather.
The town of Pucón is situated on a peninsula between Lago Villarrica and the enormous Villarrica Volcano. The lake and the volcano are pretty well visible from any open space in the town, the only problem is that we never really saw the infamous volcano that makes the town so perfectly picturesque because of the constant veil of clouds concealing the top of it. This was disappointing because you could see the enormous mountain rising in the distance and see the beginning of its snow-covered top only to be abruptly stopped by the cloud line. Despite the four days of cloud-covered disappointment, we were able to see much of what makes the Lake District so amazing beyond its volcanoes.
We arrived on Friday after a 10-hour overnight bus ride and decided to check out the volcanic sand beach on Lago Villarrica first. It was a cold and cloudy morning that eventually gave way to a hot summer afternoon as clouds began to break up to bring patches of intense sun that brought people out of their homes and hotels. As Molly and I lay on the beach, we would go between uncomfortably hot in the sun to uncomfortably cold in the cloud cover – a temperature difference that had to have been around 15 degrees or so, something I have never quite experienced before. When we started to see the streaks of a rain cloud making its way across the lake, we decided to give up and go to our hostel to plan what to do for the weekend amongst the many options.
After a night spent in the town with a great meal and a bottle of wine, we woke up early to check the weather situation to decide what to do for the day. At 7:30 in the morning, I made the call based on the mostly-clear skies to take a bus up to the beautiful and enormous Huerquehue national park to spend the day hiking to numerous lakes and waterfalls – despite the weather report predicting a pretty decent chance of rain. We took the bus up a winding dirt road past ranches carved into the hillside while clouds started to build. Once we got to Huerquehue and started to make our way on its miles-long main path up the mountains, we saw how incredibly beautiful the place was and we forgot for a second about the threat of the weather based on our surroundings. About an hour in, it started to rain and it never stopped – but we pressed on anyway due to my obstinacy overcoming Molly’s well-reasoned skepticism (sorry again, Molly, if you’re reading this…). Despite the rain, despite the cold, despite the increasingly difficult path up the mountains, I had to keep going on because of the beauty of the place only partially cloaked by the dreary weather. Climbing up the path through breaks of dense forest and bamboo (!) groves, we would get glimpses of the lake and valley below us that were beautiful beyond words (of which I have pictures of that do it no justice, I assure you). Also, the fact that the map I had in my hands showed so much to see ahead of us, I could not allow us to turn around despite the rain soaking through our layers. We got to the top of the mountain, saw two more beautiful-beyond-words lakes, and decided to head back. It took about 2.5 hours to make our way back as the trail started turning itself into a series of mini-waterfalls and ponds down the side of a mountain. Even this was beautiful in hindsight, but our cold soaked bodies only wanted to be on the bus back to Pucón with its hot showers, dry clothes, warm beds, and bottles of wine… I still say it was worth it – check out my pictures for further proof of this. Even Molly agrees with this, to an extent.
Our third day was spent in Pucón getting our clothes from the previous day washed and dried while we explored our surroundings. We found the cemetery on the edge of town situated on the side of a hill, walked up and through it, and found an amazing view of the sights below and in the far distance. We made our way back through the less touristy parts of the town where kids played football (the real kind, of course), music emanated from the tightly built houses, and people walked about on the open streets. I am still jealous of their lives surrounded by such all-encompassing natural beauty compared to the flat, non-volcanic lands of Michigan. Hell, I’ll go as far as to say that the black-sand beaches and the mountain-surrounded crystal-clear lakes surely beats any Great Lake – even the amazing cliffs of Lake Superior. I’m a passionate Michigander, but I’m telling you this place is far more impressive in its natural beauty. But, I digress.
Our fourth day – Monday -- was predicted by the forecasters, our hostel workers, and various tour guides as ‘the’ day to go out and see the sights. It was supposed to be the cloudless, sunny, perfect day that we were all hoping for when the sun fought through the clouds on the previous days that gave us so much hope and optimism. It turned out as grey as the other days, perhaps even more so than the previous days, but at least there was no threat of rain. We rented bikes and made our way down a black dirt road towards Lago Caburgua to the east. We rode along the side of the Rio Caburgua up a valley where many ranches filled the spaces between the mountains and the river. We stopped along the way as we saw the cloud line just above us on the mountains to our north to eat a lunch of Molly’s perfect concoction – peanut butter and avocado sandwiches. We eventually made it to the ‘Ojos del Caburgua’, a spot of numerous waterfalls falling into turquoise, crystalline pools in a dense forest of knotty trees with exposed roots over the rocks. It was beautiful. We took several pictures and kept moving to get to the lake of the same name. The dirt road took us out to the main highway with 5 km to go of nothing but uphill. We eventually got to the lake to relax on its beach and enjoy its perfect (albeit cloudy) vista for a bit before heading back on the (thank god) mostly downhill road towards Pucón. We enjoyed an amazing barbeque cooked for us by hostel hosts before quickly jetting off to the bus station and on to Santiago through the night.
Despite the persistence of the cloudy, grey, and rainy weather, we had an amazing experience in Pucón and its incredible landscape. Rather than dampen our spirits of the place, the clouds acted to cover up only what we want to see more and what will eventually lead us to come back. Next time, I promise myself we won’t leave until we find that perfect day.
No comments:
Post a Comment