One way to travel from Puerto Montt to Puerto Natales is with Navimag on the Evangelista. Considering the bus would be a 24hr ride (more than 1900kms) the prospect of a bed to sleep in, 3 meals a day and a view of the fjords made the ship more enticing. The various blog and reviews all had one common thread, keep the expectations low as this is a freighter that has a side business of taking walk ons.
We boarded around dinner time with the understanding that we would leave later than planned due to sea conditions. We had booked a shared cabin with 4 beds, and ended up just the two of us, both in a bottom bunk and our gear unpacked into the lockers...time to explore the boat! With three different deck areas, and a small cafe on the top deck...we were set up and ready to sail.

Most of the sailing is through channels, 4 days & 3 nights, due to our late start we would be on the ship an extra night. We learned that there are rules for some of the narrow passages around sea conditions and daylight etc...15 hours of the journey would be open seas before we headed back into the channels. Our guide was clear on the fact that we would experience 3-4m swells on the open seas. He was great explaining the route, the birds and vegetation we would see as well as the sea life. With a few foggy patches and a bit of rain our journey was underway and rather smooth! We were due to hit the open seas on the evening of our first full day of sailing, and that we did! We started with 3-4m swells around dinner time and by the next day at lunch we were experiencing 7-8m swells, with furniture moving if it wasn’t nailed down (no worries mum...all good)! No yoga that day...LOL!

It was explained that the swells were not the norm and that at this time of year the weather can be unpredictable. So laughter was the prescribed medicine, with a couple of people we had met at the first dinner, along with listening to the suggestions of the crew. By dinner time we were back into the channels and just like that everything was calm again. Over the 4 days we had a few early mornings to see the narrowest passages including the one town we would stop at to deliver supplies and a community police officer moving there with his family.

Our arrival into Puerto Natales was smooth, which isn’t always possible due to the high winds they experience (stay tuned for the Torres blog) and by midday on Tuesday we were settled into our next hostel and setting up to explore the park!

All in all the journey was one we are happy we chose to experience!