Visiting the End of the World, Hitchhiking across Borders, Swimming through Volcanic Ash, and Eating Meat with the Locals.

My, oh my, where to begin?!? I swear I wake up every day wondering to myself - what wonderful, amazing, completely unexpected adventure will I have today?!? For sanity - and logistical - reasons, I make rough plans, but often they get thrown out the window and something completely different, but far more wonderful happens. So now that I have more than 5 minutes to use a computer, I will attempt to catch you up on the events of my life over the last week - and what a week it has been!

First of all - to put my dad at ease - I made it safely hitchhiking from Esquel, Argentina across the Chilean border into Futaleufu - an incredibly beautiful and remote pueblito deep in the Andean Cordillera. After busing it 20 kms to Trevelin, I was dropped off at the end of the town and planted myself on the road to Chile. And waited and waited as nearly no cars passed by. Two cars stopped, but were not going far enough, and I did not want to get dropped off in the middle of nowhere. I am in a really really rural place, after all. But after about an hour a truck stopped, and I climbed aboard to cram myself in the cab with 3 smelly, burly Chilean men transporting beer to Futaleufu, and I could not have been happier. Hitchhiking is a completely different experience here. In the States, I would rather walk 100 miles before climbing aboard an 18-wheeler with a strange man, but here it is commonplace to hitchhike as few people have cars and buses so rarely pass to this relatively isolated part of Chile (the only way to arrive is to pass through Argentina from the North or take a ferry and the buses only go about once or twice a week) and those most likely to pick you up are truckers. So off we went the final 50 kms crossing the border into Chile to make it to Futaleufu. And to add excitement to the whole adventure, Chaiten, a volcano 100 km to the north, erupted last Thursday sending large amounts of ash into the air and blanketing the entire town of Futa so much so that for about an hour in the middle of the day the town was completely dark until the ash began to settle. The town of Chaiten had to be evacuated and many people made their way to Futa to stay with friends and family. But upon arriving, other than a thick dusty layer of ash on everything in town, the town of Futa looked to me to be continuing with life as usual. So here I am and now back to how I have found myself in this incredible place!

When I last wrote, I was in Puerto Natales, Chile. A town one goes to for the sole purpose of reaching Torres del Paine National Park. There's not much to see unless the clouds decide to lift and then you have an incredible view of the Andes, but from what I gather, the clouds do not do much lifting. They mainly sit and then occasionally they dump large amounts of water and then sit some more. As I was leaving, I finally got a glimpse of the fabled mountains, and they were breathtaking, but in the blink of an eye los nubes came back and did some more sitting obscuring any sort of view. Yet, I fell in love with the town - with its ragtag appearance, fishy smell, and the lovely Chilean woman in whose hostel I stayed. But other towns and more long long bus rides were calling my name.

So last Tuesday (oh man, all this has happened in only 7 days!), I boarded a bus headed South to Ushuaia, Argentina, the southernmost city in the world. The 12 hour journey involved a border crossing (back into Argentina again) and a ferry ride to the island of Tierra del Fuego to reach this city at the end of the world. And what a sight! After hours upon hours of nothing but flat, dry desert, these gigantic mountains shoot out of seemingly nowhere and the sight of lush green forests, snow-capped mountains, and glacial lakes is almost overwhelming. The city itself is located at the base of the Andes mountains and dives straight - and steeply - into the Beagle Channel with views of mountains everywhere you look and only a small island (and many many miles of ocean) separating you from Antarctica. On Day One at the end of the world, I meandered along the steep streets, ate some yummy vegetarian food, and went for a great hike (with the hostel owners dog) to the top of a mountain that rises up right behind the hostel and offered amazing - although cloudy (cloudy and cold was essentially the theme of my trip to Patagonia)- views of the city and the surrounding mountains. On Day Two at The End of the World, I coughed up the ridiculously inflated foreign rates to enter Parque Nacional Tierra del Fuego and went for a beautiful hike along the coastline of the Beagle Channel, visited the southernmost post office in the world (and, yes, got a stamp to prove it!), and walked to the end of Ruta 3 so I could be a total tourist and take a photo of myself at the end of the road at The End of the World. Woohoo!

And while The End of the World was great and all, I was itching to get back on the road after two full days and hoping to maybe get to Futaleufu to meet back up with Joe before Sunday to make it to Futa in time for a big kayak festival Jon was helping to put on. So Friday morning, I hopped back on a bus at 5 am for a 36 hour journey back to the north of Patagonia to the small town of Esquel. And in the first 12 hours of the journey, I had to go through 4 border crossings and take a ferry once again to cross the canal back to the mainland. I highly recommend you look at a map to understand this, but Southern Patagonia is very undeveloped and consists of a lot of islands divided between Argentina and Chile - there is clearly some serious tension between the two countries down there. So in order to go from Ushuaia, ARGENTINA to Esquel, ARGENTINA, I had to pass through Chile. And even though I was in the country for approximately 4 hours and the bus never once stopped en route, we all had to get off the bus four times to go through the various customs offices as we left and entered the countries - talk about some good times! And on Saturday evening, 36 hours after leaving the end of the world, I was back in the thick of the Patagonian wilderness with my eye on crossing once again back into Chile (I may have to get a new passport for the sole purpose of the many many stamps I am having to get for all the Arg-Chile border crossings I am doing) to visit Joe and Jon Clark in Futaleufu, Chile. And this is where the real fun began!

Futaleufu, Chile is a town of about 2500 people that as I have already mentioned can only be reached by boat or by passing through Argentina. It is more or less isolated, but has some of the most gorgeous whitewater I have ever seen and, as a result, is a destination for some of the best kayakers in the world as well as tourists in search of an amazing rafting experience. The water glows with a turquoise tint and the mountains climb steeply covered green. So while at first I was not sure if it was safe to head there or not, people in Esquel assured me life was going on as usual - meaning that the kayak festival was still in full swing. So with an open mind and some extra food and water, I hitchhiked the 70 km from Esquel to Futa. And once in Futa, I still had another 25 kms of dirt road to travel to get to the festival, so I hiked a bit further down the road to wait for a car to pass by. It was Sunday, I was in the middle of nowhere - I assumed it would be hours. But as luck would have it, one Javier Alejandro drove by within 5 minutes and picked me up as he was headed to the festival with two friends. His son Marcos was competing and he himself is a somewhat important character in this tiny town. And over the course of the next 12 hours, I more or less became part of this family. They carted me to the festival, introduced me to a monton de gente, invited me back to their cabin outside of town for an authentic Chilean asado - we bought a living lamb on the way back to Javier´s cabin where he proceeded to kill it on his back porch, skin it, and remove its innards in preparation for the grill - as awful as the whole process may sound, I no longer flinch at it and actually find it somewhat captivating if you can try to understand that! So I sat around the fire with Javier, his son, about 10 friends and family chatting until the lamb was ready at around 1 am. We ate, drank, and then they took me back to their other cabin in town where I spent the night. I love this country - such things would NEVER happen in the States. A complete stranger picks me up on the road and within minutes - literally - they are treating me like family. What beautiful people! And then the next day (Monday), I hooked up with Jon and Joe and wandered around town meeting more people and ended the day with another asado with another family that invited me to join them!

So for a quick summary, in the last 7 days, I have traveled nearly 2000 kms, visited the southernmost city in the world, crossed the border 4 times, spent 55 hours traveling on bus and trucks, met some of the friendliest people, and have now found myself in a remote and beautiful Chilean town with two former co-workers from the Nantahala Outdoor Center. Im not sure what will happen from here, but the "plan" is to head to the island of Chiloe by ferry. However, I have to pass through the town of Chaiten where the volcano is located, and I am not sure what the deal is with buses and ferries since the eruption. But the theme of life and travel here is go with the flow...!VIVA!