Trekking in Parque Nacional Conguillío

Claudio and I have just got back from our second big trip of the year, which was to Parque Nacional Conguillío in the south of Chile. This was a part of the country that I'd wanted to visit for a long time, so when I found out that it was possible to take a weekend tour there, involving two nights travelling by bus and one full day trekking in the park, it seemed like a great opportunity to see the area relatively cheaply and without having to take any time off work. 

Of course, this type of travel also has its downsides, which is something we discovered during our trip. But we're glad to have tried this sort of experience, and overall, we enjoyed the weekend.

We arrived at the park entrance in the early hours of Saturday morning to freezing temperatures and snow on the ground. But there were still some Autumn colours left in the trees.

Then we got back in the bus and drove into the park, stopping at a spot with great views of Volcán Llaima. This was where we began our trekking.

The first place we trekked to was Laguna Arcoíris (rainbow lagoon), a very green lagoon with a little waterfall flowing into it. I wasn't sure where the "rainbow" part of the name came from, but now I've noticed that a rainbow has appeared over a couple of my photos of the lagoon, so perhaps that's why!

We walked all around the lagoon, seeing it from every angle, and then we had breakfast sitting on some fallen trees nearby. Eating was actually a bit of a challenge, as was taking pictures, because my fingers were almost burning from the cold every time I took my gloves off.

The next part of the trek took us over a little wooden bridge across the waterfall, and up towards Casa del Colono, a traditional wooden cabin that I believe has been there for many years.

This was actually the part of the trip where things started to go not according to plan. I needed to go to the bathroom, and as there are basically no facilities within the park, I had to find a spot in the woods. Afterwards, we tried to catch up with the rest of our group, and we found two others who had also got left behind. We followed the route that we thought the group probably would have followed, but it started to get very steep and slippery, which was at odds with what we'd previously been told about the trek being relaxed and low difficulty. So we decided to walk back the way we'd came, as it's not the best idea to start hiking unknown and potentially dangerous routes without a guide.

The one good thing about our time following this route was that we saw a couple of Araucaria trees, also known as monkey puzzle trees, or pehuenes. These are the national trees of Chile, and Conguillío is famous for having a lot of them. In fact, they are known to be thousands of years old, and even existed in the time of the dinosaurs, which is why Conguillío was chosen as a filming location for the documentary series Walking With Dinosaurs!

When we were walking back to the bus, the other two from our group decided to turn back and start climbing up the steep route again, but Claudio and I continued, because we were sure the guides had said something about returning to the bus at 14:00, even though the original itinerary on WhatsApp said we would be returning at 18:00. 

So we rested in the bus for an hour or two, ate some lunch, and tried to get a bit warmer (which was impossible). When 14:30 came and went, we realised that the group wasn't going to return. So we had to decide what to do - we didn't much feel like walking around in the cold, but we didn't want to spend several hours in the bus with no heating and very little internet, either. In the end, we realised we should make the most of the trip, and explore this place filled with so much nature on our own, while being as careful as possible.

Fortunately, there was a trail that started right behind where the bus was parked, Sendero Ensenada. We followed this trail through a forest, and it took us to Laguna Verde (green lagoon). This lagoon was much bigger than Laguna Arcoíris, and even though it was more grey or blue rather than green, it offered amazing, dramatic views of trees, mountains, and volcanic rocks. And because we were on our own, with no one else in sight, it really felt like we were the only two people in the world.

We also discovered this tiny little lagoon surrounded by snow, which looked very wintry.

We followed the trail back to the beginning and then walked round to see the other side of Laguna Verde. This side was a little less spectacular than the first side we saw, but it still offered stunning views.

We got back to the bus at 17:00, just as our group were arriving back. We actually drove round to the side of Laguna Verde that we'd just visited, and then most of the group got out to look at it, while the rest of us waited in the bus.

It turned out that we'd missed out on a couple of nice sights, including seeing lots of Araucarias. But on the other hand, the rest of the group didn't visit Sendero Ensenada, which for us, was the highlight of our trip. All in all, I was happy that we'd seen Volcán Llaima, a few Araucarias, and a couple of lagoons.

The rest of the trip wasn't especially memorable - we went to a strange restaurant, which was in a big log cabin, and Claudio and I eventually came back to sit in the bus after a couple of hours, having still not been asked for our order and stinking of wood smoke. Some of the other members of the group had a much better time at the restaurant, and we ended up leaving much later than planned. After another uncomfortable night in the bus, we were very grateful to arrive back at our apartment in Santiago the following morning!

Overall, we're happy to have been on the trip and to have seen some beautiful sights, but our bodies did not react well to the two nights of sleeping on the bus, and we both agree that spending all day trekking in freezing temperatures is not for us either.

However, we would like to return to Conguillío at some point in the future, and also visit some other nearby places like Pucón and Villarica, but we would do things a little differently. For starters, we would go when the weather's warmer (to be fair, we were meant to go three weeks earlier, but the trip was cancelled). We would also drive there in the car, stopping at places on the way down in order to break up the journey, and we would enter the park in the car, so that we could drive to various viewpoints and trails without having to spend the whole day trekking.

I have really great memories of my first (and only previous) trip to the south of Chile, which was when I went to Huilo Huilo in 2018, and I guess I was expecting something similar from this second trip, and that wasn't really what I got. But we're still glad to have visited this very picturesque place, and we'll definitely be back to the south of Chile in the future - but we'll be waiting until spring or summer!

Life in Chile: Update 3

It feels like time for another update, seeing as I've got some news to share, and a few more little adventures to write about.

Our News

The most important thing that's happened recently is that Claudio has got a great new job with a multinational firm! Finding work is so difficult here at the moment, and it's been a long and tough process for him to finally get this job, so I'm really proud and happy for him. ❤

In other news, I actually took the decision this week to start phasing out my teaching job here, with a plan to finish it for good at the end of August. I had been having doubts about it for a while for various reasons, namely the low pay rate, the amount of unpaid work I have to do outside of classes, very early/late working hours, restrictions on the amount of time off I can take, a lack of sick pay/paid holiday, and the prospect of potentially having to work on Saturdays in the future. And then a demoralising incident that happened this week finally made me realise that I couldn't put up with all this for an entire year.

Although I've actually really enjoyed teaching most of my students, I feel relieved to have taken this decision. Of course I came here to live and work, rather than to take an extended holiday, but I didn't envisage spending this year doing hours of unpaid work every week, with few opportunities to take time off.

Getting this job gave me the chance to finally get the visa I needed to come and live here with Claudio, and I'll always be grateful for that. But now that I have the visa and am a resident here, I'm no longer tied to the job. So I'm going to be reevaluating my options in terms of what I'm going to do next, though I think it's most likely that I'll return to self-employment, which will allow me to earn around the same or even more than I'm earning now, with more regular hours and less work. Most importantly, it will let me set my own hours and take time off when I want, meaning that I'll be able to travel more. I was always aware that coming to live here was never going to be a way to get rich, so I saw this year as an opportunity to travel and spend time with Claudio. Hopefully from now on, that will get easier. 😊

La Ola Mall Sport

Aside from travelling to various places around Chile and South America, one of my other goals for the year is to have new experiences, and to try things I've never done before. This was something we had the opportunity to do last weekend, when we went to La Ola (the wave) at Mall Sport for a surfing lesson.

La Ola is basically a massive artificial wave that you launch yourself down on a bodyboard (my pictures show the area without the wave machine turned on). It is a little bit scary, and a lot more challenging than it looks, but also really really fun! I got flung around a couple of times, but by the end, I was beginning to get the hang of it, and Claudio was even able to do a couple of tricks!

We had a lot of nasty cuts and bruises afterwards, and some muscle pains the next day, but we were really glad to have tried it. It was a totally new and different experience and a great escape from the stresses of daily life. We'll definitely be surfing there again, and perhaps also at a beach sometime in the future.

Mall Sport is, as the name suggests, a mall devoted to sport. In addition to surfing, you can try out other activities there, including skateboarding, high ropes and climbing. There are also plenty of shops selling sports clothes and equipment, and an area of restaurants around an artificial lagoon, so it's a nice place for a day out.

Mirador del Alto

After our surfing lesson, we drove to Mall Alto Las Condes to get some lunch. This mall has a great viewpoint from the roof where you can look out over the city and the mountains.

Monasterio de Carmelitas Descalzas de San José

This monastery is another place we've discovered while walking around our neighbourhood. It caught my attention because of its traditional Latin American architecture and its peaceful-looking garden.

Palacio Vásquez/Castillo de Macul/Municipalidad de Macul

Today's outing was to the town hall (municipalidad) of the neighbouring comuna of Macul. The building, which is also known as Palacio Vásquez or Castillo de Macul, is not quite as well looked after as the historic buildings we've seen in Providencia and Ñuñoa, but it's very elaborate and interesting to see.

There is also a restaurant next door which is built in the same style!

So that more or less sums up my life in Chile over the last two weeks!

Speaking more generally about my time here so far, I'd definitely say that the good parts have outweighed the more challenging parts, but I'd also say that I'm starting to experience some realities of life here that I didn't experience when I was studying here in 2018. Back then, aside from some personal problems that I had during the first three months of the semester, I really had an amazing time, especially during the last month (after I met Claudio). I felt like the quality of life I had was actually just as good, if not better, than what I had back home in Wiltshire and Nottingham. 

But Chile has changed a lot over the last few years. Crime has increased, often-violent protests are taking place on a weekly basis, inflation has risen significantly while salaries remain low, and most people are feeling the pinch. After my semester here and during my final year at university, I honestly thought that I might end up settling here for life, but because of all the less-than-positive changes that have taken place here in recent years, and also because of the great experience Claudio had when he stayed with me and my family, we are becoming more and more convinced that our future probably lies in Europe.

That's not to say that I regret coming here - I'm still really happy to have taken this decision. We have a lovely apartment in a great neighbourhood, and lots of family support. In addition to that, we've already been on one incredible trip to Iquique, and we've got plenty more places to discover around this beautiful country and continent throughout the rest of the year, starting with Parque Nacional Conguillío next week!

So, overall, I'm feeling positive about things and I'm looking forward to making the most out of the coming months. 😊