Into the Mountains

Happy 12-12-12!  It's an auspicious day, and also marks one week since our arrival in Chile.  We've been taking advantage of Cristian and Mary's hospitality and reciprocating with baby sitting, dish washing, errand running, and cooking on the wood stove (I make a mean french toast).  Our base camp has undergone a couple adjustments, mainly due to high winds that blew over my MSR tent and snapped the support pole of our shelter in half.  They are now both securely pitched in a grove of trees that serves as both protection and support; to fix the shelter situation I sewed a loop of p-cord to the peak and suspended it from a tree.

On Monday Mary took us up into the national reserve that you can see from their window.  There was a trail she wanted to scope out for some clients, and we were all curious to see how our out-of-shape legs and lungs would handle the hike.  The trailhead was situated down a gravel track that was an adventure all on its own.  From there we walked through green cow pastures up to a glacial river, where we refilled our water bottles, and then continued climbing up the ridge where convenient signs informed us of photographic opportunities: Cerro Castillo was above us to the right, Cerro Viaja (spelling unknown), and pointy Cerro Palo which you can see in the photo below.

 We reached the first campsite in about two hours and continued through the lush woods of linga trees and wildflowers into the gathering clouds.  It got colder and wetter the higher we climbed, until we came out into an open meadow at the foot of the mountains, snowfields and hanging glaciers peaking out from the mist.  By that point we were wearing all our layers and realizing that we wouldn't get out of the woods until at least 9:30 (thankfully it doesn't get dark until 10:30).  After a quick snack we turned around and booked it down the mountain.  The map below shows the whole reserve of Cerro Castillo; we hiked the short section by Carl's elbow.

 The next day Carl and I were on our own to explore, so we packed some sandwiches and turned south on the Carretera Australe.  Chile's north-south highway turns to gravel right at Cristian and Mary's house, and this is where we began walking, over the Rio Ibanez a quarter mile until a left hand turn onto an even smaller gravel road.  This track took us parallel to the river and we kept glancing over our shoulders at the mountains playing hide-and-seek with the clouds.

 45 minutes later we reached the end of the road and a trail heading up the hill, with signs announcing the National Monument of Los Manos.  We passed various, awkwardly translated informational signs (one proclaiming the area had once been under a nile of ice) up to a large outcropping of igneous rock.  The draw, besides the scenery, is a series of pictographs thought to be 3,000 years old.  There are hand prints spread across the wall, big ones and little ones, prints and silhouettes.  I guess it's even in the book "1,001 Things To See Before You Die".  Check.

 Today Cristian was kind enough to let us tag along on his trip.  It was the first time on a horse in a very, very long time for both of us; needless to say we're both a little crippled right now.  This time we headed into the reserve by a different route, still starting out in cow pastures and trees.  Normally the route heads all the way up to a glacially fed lake at the base of Cerro Castillo, but with the thick clouds overhead we detoured to a bluff overlooking the valley instead.  There were some steep climbs up slippery trails, and even steeper descents. At one point my horse lost its footing on its hind legs, and Carl's steed got spooked by an aggressive cow, but we all returned in one piece, slightly damp and smiling from ear to ear.  We'll get to that lake on of these days.