Chile: Carratera Austral (Cerro Castillo and Rio Tranquilo)

We arrived the next morning in Puerto Chacabuco and took 2 buses to reach Coyhaique. It's a quite rich city and touristic as well because it is he largest city of the entire region of the carratera austral. There were no buses to go to Cerro Castillo the next day so I bought one for the 7th. I went around the city to buy a tent to be able to do trekkings here. At the hostel I et te french family that I met in Puerto Madryn several weeks ago :) I met again Juan and Aitana in the evening at a view point and gave my old shoes and sleeping bag to Juan (they were going to hike in el chalten and torres del paine) so that I had enough space for the tent and other trekking equipments.

The 6th I spent the day in Coyhaique, finishing to get ready for the trekk I wanted to start the next day.

The next day I took a bus which dropped me at the begining of the trekk of Cerro Castillo. The weather was great and I was all alone for quite some time. I had to remove my shoes to cross small rivers a couple of times, it was fun but cold! A bit before noon, I met Jeff, 68 years old and continued with him all the way to the camping. Jeff is from England (Galles to be precise), looks like Bilbo the hobbit and is the probably the most bad ass adventurer I met so far. He traveled around the world his entire life, doing trekkings, hitch hikking,... He did a bunch of jobs and in particular teaching in lots of different fields. Really an impressive person! After reaching the first camping I went to do a hike Jeff told me about to get closer to a glacier but unfortunately I was too short on time to get close enough. The campings here are not like in Torres del Paine: it's just a place where you are allowed to put your tent, there is one picnic table, one latrine and it's free.

The second day I left a bit before 9am after saying goodbye to Jeff and started hikking. I did a long day as I walked 21kms and had to do 2 path pretty hard (steep and in the rocks). The weather was cloudy but I still had amazing views! I met one spanish guy and a group of 4 Chileans later with whom I spent a bit of time but otherwise I was alone most of the time. The 2nd path is really impressive (altitude of 1700m) and gives a great view on the carratera austral and the summits around. And the way down is really dangerous because very steep, in he rocks and with big wind bursts. When arriving at the campin down the 2nd path I didn't really liked it so I continued to camping Neozelandes while it was starting to rain. When I arrived I was completely alone in the camping and I was at my physical limit (I was starving!!). Two guys arrived later at the camping but I was already sleeping :)

January 9th: amazing weather for the last day of the trekk! I decided to go all the way to a laguna in which a glacier ends and I actually went to swim in it! Really cold but really cool! I then went back down to the camping and packed up to go down and finish the trekk to Villa cerro Castillo. Amazing views gain on the way down on the cerro Castillo (named like this because it looks like a castle), the mountains around and the carratera austral. As I was finishing the trekk on a dirt road, two chilean guys gave me a lift in the back of their pickup all the way to Puerto Tranquilo (exactly where I wanted to go). The road was amazing and seeing it from the back of the pickup was just perfect (except for all the dust when following other vehicles). A bit before Puerto Tranquilo we took 2 other hitch hikers from Israel. When we arrived, we found a hostel and directly went with the Israelian couple to do a boat tour to the marbel cathedral (marble caves with amazingly blue waters). Really beautiful and lot of fun when I went swiming in the marble cathedral but as well on the way back when the boat driver was having fun in the waves (it was a small fisher boat).