Floating, not as straight forward as it seems.

Dec. 6-7 Puyhaupi to Chaiten to Hornopiren

Nothing like starting the day in wet boots, at least my socks started dry and because the weather had cleared a little it looked like we would not need the rain gear. We roll through mountains and more road construction on our way to Chaiten. The terrain changes a bit to include some farmland before returning to the mountainous landscape once again. The Chilean government must have spent a fortune on bridges in this area as we criss-cross rivers continuously, plus they go all out with the designs.

Chaiten is a coastal town that has had a drastic change in landscape since the volcano eruption in 2008. What used to be a city with a beautiful bay-side location is now a city with an extremely large beach, but not the kind of beach you would sit and relax on, it is mostly rock and dead trees for about a mile out until the water starts. This is also the town where we have to buy our ferry tickets for the journey ahead. There are two routes to choose from that will take us to Chiloe Island, we find the office easy enough but are told that one ferry doesn’t run until January (the busy season), and the other better option is not until Tuesday, but today is Saturday and we are not staying here for three days. The choice is made for us and we will continue on Rte 7 up to Puerto Mont. We buy our tickets and then find a hotel nice hotel up on the hill overlooking the town and what is left of their bay. Once we got cleaned up and Brenda defrosted a little it was time to find some dinner. Our general rule for ordering seafood is that if we can’t see the water we don’t order the fish, we could see the water and salmon sounded good. Turns out it is also huge, the filet was as big as Brenda’s arm and prepared perfectly.

And what would the day be without Dog of the Day.

Morning brought a mixed bag of weather, but it appeared to be dry so we set out on the 60km journey to the first ferry without our rain gear. Around the first mountain we ran into a wall of water. No need to put on the raingear now, we were soaked and of course my waterproof boots hold water in as well as out. By the time we get to the first ferry we are also covered with volcanic sand and black mud.

The British Columbia Ferry system would have nightmares about this day. The first ferry is scheduled for 10:30am, so after the ferry arrives and is offloaded the process of loading begins. This is not a drive through ferry so the vehicle either have to back on or back off. The choice is to back on and from what we have witnessed in Chile they are really fast but courteous drivers forward, but reverse is a comedy show. The only drivers that are proficient in reverse are the truck drivers. They wheel around and back down the ramp on the ferry no problem. The cars take a little longer and a couple of attempts. So between the ferry not showing up until 11:30 and the loading process we are finally on our way at 12:45. This is a relatively short ride of about 40 minutes, then a 10km road stretch until next ferry, we share the ride with a group of Chilean bikers who were very clean compared to us. How does that work.
This brings us to the dog and pony show portion of the program. This ferry landing is very steep, and has a hairpin curve at the bottom.  This is no problem for us, but we are thinking that the ferry must be the larger style that you can drive through, avoiding the need to turn around. Well when the boat arrives and it is the same style as the first one we begin to wonder how this is going to work, we are also wondering how the semi trailer that is parked at the bottom got here, we also assumed that he was getting on the boat, why else would he be sitting here.

Well, after the ferry docked at a 60 degree angle to the loading ramp, it lowered its front gate and it was like a scene from a WW2 movie. As soon as the gate hit the concrete ramp the cars starting driving off and up the hill they went. Then the ferry workers started dragging chunks of fir planks around and placing them at the end of the gate to create a smooth transition to the concrete. This was critical once the small cube vans, buses and semis started offloading because the overhang behind their rear axles caused them to bottom out as they transitioned from the boat to the ramp. Somewhere in this mix the semi that was parked at the bottom unhooked his trailer and drove up the hill, spinning his tires the whole way, and we wondered why he had put on his snow chains, they seemed to cause more problems than they solved.

Now it was time for the last of the semi trailers to offload, there have been a couple already that barely made the corner and the hill mostly due to lack of traction. This poor bastard hit the ramp and tried to gain some momentum up and around the corner, there was a loud thud from the trailer as his load shifted and then he was stopped. He had spun out. Now was a good time to start thinking of where he was going to roll, once he started coming back down the hill, as the group of bikes were the most at risk we all pushed our bikes as far out of the way as possible. Then the cameras, cell phones, and anything else that could take a picture were fired up. This was going to be good. The driver rolled back until his trailer tires were at the edge of the ramp, then he would take a run at the hill and we would all moan and sigh when he did not make it, over and over again. Everyone seemed to take this in stride, and some of the bikers just shrugged and said “This is South America” like it was expected or something. Finally they figured out that he needed a pull if he was going to make it up the hill. Anybody got a tow rope? Didn’t think so. How about a rusty old cable and some knarled up chain off the ferry, yup got that! Once again, I can’t make this stuff up. They ask a 5 ton truck to turn around and back down to within reach of the cable, then tied the chain in a big knot hooked on and hit it. The little extra was all that was needed and the semi was unstuck. The last semi hit the hill and curve at about 30kph, and as all he had was an empty highboy he flew up the hill as if to say “I’ll show you how to climb a hill!”

Great, now we can start the loading process, right? Oh no, not yet. The semi trailer that was left behind by snow chain guy had to get moved. At first I thought it was to allow the semis to drive down the hill forward then utilize the space occupied by the trailer to  turn enough to allow backing onto the ferry. Wrong again, when we assumed this trailer was going on the ferry is where we made our mistake, he was actually stranded here for the same reason as the other guy. No traction. Lucky for him he found a fellow trucker who was willing to pull his trailer up the hill, and he got it first try to boot.

Ok now we can start loading, and once again it is never safe to assume anything. Instead of backing onto the boat it is apparently better to have them turn around, ON THE BOAT!! Now I have seen it all, busses, trucks, cars, and semis all directed onto the ferry then told to turn around. All except the last guy, he just drove on and parked, I guess his reverse skills are good enough to conquer whatever the next loading dock has to offer. This whole process has put us at 3pm and it is a 4 hour ferry ride. I guess we are staying in Hornopiren tonight.The ferry is well equipped with a large lounge area, big screen tv’s and a cafeteria. We take advantage of the now blue skies and brisk wind to hang our wet clothes outside in hopes that they dry out a bit and do not get blown overboard.

Offloading was a breeze, at least for us, they let us off first and we did not stick around for the gong show that was about to start as we had seen enough for one day. Hotel, hang our wet clothes, food, sleep, wakeup, repeat.

What would all this rain be without _ Soggy Dog of the Day.