HOY ES HOY Y AYER SE FUE NO HAY DUDA (Neruda)

We are growing a tiredness of buses. It seems like we are either sitting in a bus for at least six hours or hiking for six hours.
What we do with the rest of the time?
We look for a place to sleep, collect food, try to gather information and talk to strangers.

We are now half way on our trip. We still have two months and one week left, but it feels like we are running out of time. We have crossed most of Chile, but there is still so much left to do.
The south couldn´t be more different from the north. In the north the view was invariably dry desert, while here it rains a lot, is therefor very green and has many lakes.
Our favourite spot so far was Pucon, where we stayed in a lovely hostel ran by a Dutch guy.
We climbed up a volcano. Dressed in hired trousers, jackets, sunglasses and a helmet (yes I looked very sexy) we struggled 4-5 hours through the snow. I don´t think our guide thought we would make it, as the only thing that came out of his mouth was: ' vamos chicas' . Of course we made it up to the crater.
Going back we sat down on our behind and slided down the steep slopes. You should try to scream (scary) and laugh (funny) at the same time...not easy!

oh, and yes! We saw penguins..OK, I wasn´t able to converse properly with them, as they were on a rock and I in a rubber boat, but it was worth it!

Summer is approaching. We are travelling in the direction of Antarctica, so it is COLD! We also notice summer is on its way as buses and hostels are fully booked at times now. But that is not always bad. We were stuck here (Punta Arenas) for a day, with not much to do, but it was nice to just relax and watch TV for once and not constantly being on a hike or planning ahead..

The big news is of course the death of Pinochet. We don´t notice much, except for a few communists on the square. It all seems to be happening in Santiago. What we did notice, is that the papers don´t seem to refer to him as ´ex dictator´ as I am sure the European press does. Let´s just hope they won´t stop the investigations.