Several things happened this days I've
spent here in Punta Arenas, from taking some days off the bike and
hitch hiking to the southernmost point of the continental mass of
land till having the bike checked several times because something was
wrong with it. I have been thinking what to do with life for the
winter season too. I wasn't supposed to get to Punta Arenas in the
first place yet here I am. Last days have been kind of crazy but here
is a brief of all that has been going on.
Faro San Isidro and the coldness.
Alejandra is from Punta Arenas but she
left this city 10 years ago to study at the university in Temuco. She
didn't know much of the area and one of the goal of coming back for
her was to visit as much as possible before getting into a job so we
teamed up in order to do some trekkings and get to know the area.
Among all the places we visited we decided to take a trip to the last
of the lighthouses in the american continent, the Faro San Isidro,
located around 80 kilometers south of Punta Arenas.
Initially I thought about going by
bike, but the bike was unrideable by that time so I took some days
off the pedaling and decided we would walk our way to the lighthouse.
We left Punta Arenas with not much luck
for hitch hiking, after around 15 kilometers of what someone picked
us up and we made it before sunset to San Juan, a small village and
the last of the villages south of Punta Arenas. We camped at a
reddish forest next to a river and with a crazy level of humidity. It
was kind of cold too so we tried to make a fire, unlucky us though,
all branches, trees, and whatever it was lying around to make fire
was so wet, that making the fire was impossible. I decided to make a
fire with the nuclear, but even for the stove, the small twigs I
found around were too wet to have a good fire, still, we are talking
about the nuclear here, not your regular wood stove, so anyways,
after sometime, I managed to make a steady fire that allowed me to
drop in the wet twigs I had for cooking. With the leftover of the
fire we tried again to do a huge fire, but it was impossible.
Finally we gave up as it was really really cold and hit the tent to
sleep.
We departed really late the next day,
but we knew the lighthouse was 4 hours away from our starting point
so we took it easy. When I say we departed late that day, it was
really late, we woke up around 11 am and ended up leaving our camping
place by 2 pm. It was quite weird to sleep that much. Despite having
slept more than 10 hours I woke up feeling tired and spent the rest
of the day feeling sleepy and with not much energy, quite weird
considering I have really active days almost everyday when on the
bike.
The walk went quite slow but steady
nonetheless, still, we arrived to the lighthouse after sunset which
made it kind of difficult to inspect the area and find a nice camping
spot. I've been getting used to night talks anyways, and after a
couple of rounds to the place I found a nice camping spot to spend
the night. The next day would be tough and we needed to rest.
On the third day we were going to do
what we were there for; take a swim in the cold Magellan strait
waters. We decided this before leaving Punta Arenas, it was a must do
once you reach the southernmost point of the continent. Lucky for us,
there was kind of a clear sky and a good sun to warm the body, the
bad thing, good weather means wind, and winds over here and not your
regular warm wind, over here the wind is what makes everything cold.
After not much of thinking, Alejandra went really slowly into the
strait. I could hear some nonsense and swearing from the distance
till her head disappeared under the cold waters. She came out being
someone else and thanked the sea for the dive. Then something
happened and she went into the water for a second time. Tough girl.
For me, the thing went quite different.
As usual, and as the chicken that I am when it's about getting into
cold waters, it took me a little longer to get into the strait. I
slowly started taking out my clothes in order to get used to the cold
winds, which were very cold indeed. Once naked I stared at the sea
for a couple of minutes till I couldn't hold it any longer. I ran
into the waters and the coldness hit my body at once. It was quite a
surprise to notice that once in the strait, the water wasn't thaaat
cold or at least that was the initial feeling. I took a small swim
and headed back to the beach. It was then when I noticed my knees
where purple and I couldn't feel my feet, every single finger was
numb. Yep, the water was cold. Instantly after getting out of the
water I started shivering and the cold winds splashed against my
body. Slowly, because my body wouldn't allow me to move faster I
dried myself and put all the clothes I could on. My feet were still
numb. Alejandra was already inside a small hut we found and having
chocolate to let the coldness go away. Despite the water being soo
cold, I thought it would be much much worse. It wasn't that bad and
the coldness helped a lot to wake up and get some energies.
After having some soup for lunch to
warm up we went for some hiking and ended up doing a night trek,
again. The landscapes at this latitude are simply amazing, and quite
different from what I was expecting. North of Punta Arenas, the only
thing you can find is pampa, but south of the city, trees and forests
started to show up. It was quite weird even to see that what I
thought would be red and orange colors on the mountains were still a
strong green with no signs of going red soon. We reached the now,
southernmost point of our walk, bahía del aguila. Quite special
place. When we decided to go back to the lighthouse and the hut, the
sun was already gone, night trek again. I'm getting kind of used to
the night treks and have got some experience in order to not get lost
in the woods when it's pitch dark, which is pretty good.
We came back on the fourth day and it
didn't take us long to come back to civilization. After taking a bath
in the Magellan strait when winter is almost here, you are ready to
face whatever comes towards you, so the walk that took us 4 hours the
second day, it took us around 2 on our last day. We reached San Juan
really early and with such a luck that the first pick-up we saw that
day picked us up and in no time we were back in Punta Arenas.
The bike is wrecked.
The rear wheel failed pretty badly
before I arrived to town, besides having problems with the inner tube
the wheel was also fucked. After a close inspection and having three
different guys taking a look at it, they all agreed that I had to
replace the wheel, the bad news, none of them had a replacement for
me. It took me 4 days to finally find a place where they had an
acceptable replacement 2 more days to find a place where they could
do the job. Damn it's difficult to find people with enough knowledge
about bikes in this latitudes!!. After having the wheel fixed I
noticed that there is something wrong with the frame too and the
inclination of the wheel, it's biased to one side which may be frame
problem or the wheel being wrong, I am not sure and have not had more
time to check it. I think I will have to wait till I reach some place
with someone experienced who can give me a hand on fixing it.
And now what?
Well, by the time I am writing this I
am still in Punta Arenas figuring out what to do. I wasn't supposed
to reach this place from the beginning, I was supposed to turn
towards Argentina south of Coyhaique and then head north to Buenos
Aires to keep on north. But for some reason I came all the way south.
I have options for the future but the season is coming fast and soon
it will be really hard to keep on pedaling through this area. I could
stay here in Punta Arenas though and spend the winter here, but that
means getting a job doing something, living in the city is expensive
and demanding. I've tried some options already, but so far, I haven't
found something interesting to do. It's mostly regular jobs which
don't seem interesting at all. Still I am waiting for a response from
the ski center they have here in town, which sadly, is not a big
thing. They don't have money for hiring now but still the
administrator of the place told me she will talk to the main board in
order to request budget to see if she can hire me or not. I have to
wait for that response and see what I do with life.
Recently I moved from Ale's house to a
hostel where I am taking care of some small things in exchange for
food and accommodation. I was feeling kind of weird being so many days
at Ale's not doing much for life, so I found out about this hostel
that needed help and they happily said yes because they needed some
things done. So far I've been painting things that needed to be
painted and helping in general things around the house. Fair deal for
me at least, I do some work in the morning till around 2 pm and the I
have the rest of the evening free to do as I please, I get all the
food I need plus Internet access. At least I'm feeling useful while I
wait for the answer from the ski center.
So for the future, uncertainty is what
rules my life. I have no idea what I will do or where I will end up
during the winter, which is certain though is that the bike needs to
be repaired and I need to do something with life for the winter,
after that, it's most likely I will continue pushing pedals.
Till then.
Cheers.
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