Sunday, 29 January 2012

Puerto Natales & Punto Arenas


Friday 27th & Saturday 28th January

 
We head back into Chile mainly on good roads with the port of Puerto Natales our intended overnight stop, this part of Patagonia is mainly flat & not the most interesting, the wind can however liven things up.

 
At every gas station we stop for gas due to the intermittent shortages in Argentina, this one has no fuel but a delivery is due in 1 hour, fortunatly we don’t need to wait.

 
Puerto Natales is known as where the ‘Mountains Meet The Sea’ & is an attractive little town, we hear a lot of English spoken & several cafés are run by Brits, it appears that this part of Chile was originally settled by European immigrants mainly from the UK & Germany.

 
A rubbish receptacle to encourage the kids not to drop litter, they can do with these all over SA.


Small ferries run back & forth to surrounding communities, tourism is now the biggest industry due to the towns close proximity to several national parks including ‘Torres Del Paine’.

 
As small brew Pub in the main square tells us how far it is to get a decent pint of Fullers, 8,291 miles!!

 
Between Puerto Natales & Puenta Arenas we stop for a coffee, it’s a bit cold with the wind chill and we need to warm up.
Initially we are the only customers but then several mini-buses turn up & it’s heaving, & we thought we were the only travellers in this remote part of the world?

 
More featureless windswept & barren scrubland but we must now get to the bottom, it’s not far to go with a ferry crossing & about 300km.


More Chilean art in a remote place, anyone know what they represent?

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