Time to don the hiking boots again, this time for the 5 day "W Trek" in the Torres del Paine national park. Unfortunately this has nothing to do with the chain of luxury hotels of the same name, rather the rough shape of the route followed. After yet another rude early awakening, a coach took us and many other fools the couple of hours or so to the park entrance. After shelling out the entrance fee, watching an instructional video about park rules and signing an...

Arriving in Puerto Natales late afternoon on the 3rd, we checked into our comfortable hostel (full of people we recognised from the boat), dumped our washing on the local launderette and took a look around the town. It is in the middle of a barren wilderness, and somewhat barren itself but has a good feel to it. There are a few interesting old wooden buildings dotted around the centre. In a half-hearted attempt to eat local (lamb, pretty much the first time we'd ...

November 30, up early to catch a bus down to the port of Puerto Montt where we were to catch the Navimag ferry for the 4 day journey down to Puerto Natales in deepest darkest Patagonia. After checking in and then killing a few hours in an uninspiring Puerto Montt we boarded the boat early afternoon. Our two berth cabin did the job, at least we weren't sharing with unsavoury strangers. Although the website did specify that the private bathroom was "outside the ca...

Having used all our energies on 2 wheels the day before we opted for a 4 wheeled mode of transport the next day and hired a car to go off for a couple of days exploring the island of Chiloé. So first thing a, surprise surprise, VW Gol was dropped off at the hostel and we drove the hour or so to the ferry which would take us over to the island. According to the guide there was a chance of seeing dolphins on the crossing however we only managed a couple of sea li...

We asked Pierre, the hostel owner, what he suggested we do in the Puerto Varas area for one day. We had hoped to go canyoning, which is basically white water rafting without the raft. However a tourist had met with a serious accident a couple of weeks earlier and so the tour company was under investigation. Not a good plan. His top tip was to rent a couple of bikes (from him of course) and cycle along the lake to the nearby town of Frutillar. Frutillar is a pictu...