21 February 2019: A fun store.

A bit of a quiet week. Puerto Montt turned out to be a not so exiting city. We had a bit of trouble finding accommodation as well. The property Nienke booked on line turned out to have a wig in the toilet and another one the bathtub on inspection, so we hit the road again like Speedy Gonzales. The camping just outside of Puerto Montt everybody was raving about on iOverlander had ceased to exist. So eventually we ended up in an overpriced cabin of a rather overweight man who luckily did not have a cardiac arrest when I was there. Huffing and puffing he showed us our temporary home and to our great relief managed to leave the cabin without collapsing.

In our second attempt we managed to find Puerto Montt airport early in the morning and boarded our plane to Santiago. Jetsmart, the budget airliner was called. We can't fault them on anything. Ryan air, Easyjet and Jetstar can certainly learn something from these people. We headed for Santiago to visit WOMAD Chile, since this year we would miss WOMAD in New Zealand.

It turned out to be quite an experience. When we arrived the gates had already opened, not that we could find the gates. A nice staff member (I assume because of his yellow vest he was one and not an anti-Macron protester) gave us directions and suddenly we were standing in front of the main stage, not having passed any gate. We slowly walked to a gate to buy tickets anyway (honest Dutchies ay) and found nobody even slightly surprised we were coming from the wrong direction. We were quite surprised though, because although the festival had already started, we were about the only guests there.

Luckily a few more people turned up later on and we still had a great night with some good music from the Chilean band Guachupe, which has fans like they were a successful football club (flags, shirts, etc.), and Maria de Lurdes Pina Assunção (Lura for friends) from Cape Verde.

The biggest surprise was the Italian band Canzoniere Grecanico Salentino. We'd seen these guys a few years back in New Zealand and tonight they were just as good again.

Next day I briefly visited a dentist. Not sure why, but one of my molars started sending mixed signals and with our upcoming trip on the boat for 4 days and Patagonia after that finding a dentist in Santiago seemed like a safe bet. The sweet cake and fizzy drinks on the receptionists desk made us think we were at the wrong address, but since we were already 2 hours late. 'Doce (pronounced dosse) quince' sounds exactly the same as 'dos y quince', one means 12.15 and the other 2.15) we opted to stay. A very nice young lady dentist told me I was very healthy (what's new) and the only explanation she had was one of my wisdom teeth (of course) pushing forward against it's neighbour. Nothing to worry about and certainly not something an ibuprofen and a Pisco Sour couldn't solve. So we headed for WOMAD again.

Last night when we tracked our Uber outside the stadium we found two desperate people looking for a taxi in this strange town. We offered them a ride and they turned out to be one of the artists from AfroTronix and the manager. Obviously we had to visit their act. Not sure why the IKEA lamps in Chad were no success, but they looked OK on their heads. The music was OK and we had a great night. Contrary to the Friday, the Saturday was a very busy night and Sunday even more.

Another Chilean band, Santaferia, again made the masses dance. And again flags in their colours dominated the dancing squads. Even a humongous one.

Although tired we tried to find a famous restaurant for lunch the next day. At one point we passed this odd church. Churches here are often surrounded by high fences and often the doors are firmly locked. Apparently the bishops and priests have better things to do than looking after their flock. In this case the faithful were even held at bay with nasty barbed wire!?
The restaurant was a very quirky place where the decor was all built out of recycled houses. Would be a great idea for Wellington. After a really nice lunch we headed back to WOMAD again. Again a nice night, but 2 night staying till the end (2am) kind of wore us out and we quietly sneaked away, just before a few DJ's were starting the Terremoto drums.

We picked up our car on Puerto Montt airport ( a drizzle had given it back it's original colour) and headed for the ferry to Chiloe island. We were quite peckish and decided to eat something on the ferry. The Chilean cuisine is actually a bit boring. Every menu looks the same. One of the most horrible things they eat is a 'completos', a bun with a Franfurter (sausage) with a fatty salsa, covered with avocado and then a thick layer of mayonaise and often even mustard or ketchup. The name probably predicts the degree of blockage of the coronary arteries a month from then. Anyway, we ordered it (since the menu lacked any 'haute cuisine'), without salsa, mayo or other silent killers. An order like that (just like our coffees without cream) is often met with a look of 'estas completamente loco' (you are crazy).

We found this guy alongside the road, around 4 pm I think it was. No, no hit and run and I don't think he is dead (he is still holding on to his bottle). What else could you do on a nice sunny day, buy a bottle of Chateau Migraine and have a nap in the sun!

Chiloe island is a nice green hilly island with small fisherman's villages and a lot of picturesque churches in a very typical building style.

We found a nice spot on an inlet close to a beach. Our cabin was kind of swaying (literally) above the incoming tide. You couldn't walk from one side to the other without creating the impression of a 4.6 on the Richter scale Terremoto.

A few pictures of the churches on Chiloe island.

And we end with one of the weirdest '-rarias' we've seen in Chili. You see panaderia (bread), ferreterias (hardware store), carneteria (meat), sandwicheria, heladeria (ice cream), etc. This one though might be a bit odd. No, it's not a store were you can get 'fun', quite the opposite, it's a funeral home.
Tomorrow morning we boarding the ferry to Puerto Natales and we'll be at sea for 4 days. See you next week.