Carretera Austral – Part 1 – Pumalin NP

Our original plan had been to get to Pumalin National Park in one day, with a very early start from Puerto Varas. Instead we split the travel into two days. The first day we left Puerto Varas mid-morning, did some grocery shopping en route, took our first ferry from Caleta La Arena to Caleta Puelche, and arrived in Hornopirén mid-afternoon.

The next day I made Tom get in the queue for the ferry 2 hours in advance, which proved somewhat unnecessary. My understanding was that the ferry route from Hornopirén to Caleta Gonzalo usually runs as a bi-modal route, with two ferries split by a short drive in the middle. Information I’d read suggested that the second ferry was a smaller vessel compared to the first, so not everyone would get onto the first sailing. So I was trying to ensure we would be on the first sailing of the second ferry… except our ferry ended up just going all the way to Caleta Gonzalo!

We were quickly off the ferry and just had to find a park since our first trailhead was at the pier. Unfortunately the Cascadas trail had been shortened (now 3km?) in the previous couple of years, and the most interesting section no longer part of it. Most people probably have no idea – but if you look at old descriptions they say things like “Parts of the trail are made by going up and down wooden ladders and using ropes to get over the rocks along the way”. The powers that be clearly decided this was all too dodgy as now the trail is much shorter and doesn’t involve any sketchy river crossings but ends at a very civilised wooden platform.

We felt quite at home here – the vegetation could have been NZ or Tassie – until you ran across the Nalcas!

Our second walk was the Los Alerces Trail (1.4km) which leads you to some impressive big trees. Fortunately by doing the Cascadas trail we almost missed the bus loads of passengers that had been taken here straight from the ferry.

Our last walk for the day was the Lago Negro Trail (2.2km). I was pretty disappointed we didn’t have any camping equipment with us at this point. The trail starts from one of the camp grounds and it was a beautiful evening. We were going to have to drive back the next day to do some of the other walks, so it would have saved us a couple of hours of driving. But, with no tent, and a cabin booked in Chaitén, there wasn’t really any option.

The next day we headed back up the road almost back to Caleta Gonzalo to walk the longer Laguna Tronador trail. As was to become a bit of a theme, it had some “peligro” (“danger”) tape across the trailhead. We were pretty annoyed since we’d driven an hour to get there, and there had been no indication on the official websites about any closures. There was no information besides the tape so we decided to start off on it, we figured we were experienced enough walkers that we would be able to assess whether the track was dangerous. It was a pretty steady ascent, sometimes up ladders, alongside a canyon at times, to get to the underwhelming Volcan Michinmahuida lookout.

I hadn’t appreciated when looking at the map that the route went up to the lookout and then down to the laguna. We continued down until we got to a nice lookout. I questioned whether there was value in continuing on down to the lake but Tom wanted to, so we went on. In retrospect it wasn’t worth it – once upon a time there was camping at the lake but I’m not sure how many years its been since it was maintained. The camping area was completely overgrown and we ended up heading back up to the half-way lookout for morning tea. That section definitely had some rotten stuff and you needed to be careful where you walked on some of the raised walkways.

From there we backtracked up the ladders to the high point, and then down the ladders back to the road. Surprisingly (or not) we encountered a few other hikers on our way down, who like us had decided they could assess the danger for themselves. I think the route would have been unpleasant/maybe a bit precarious in rain – which in November is common – however, it had been (unseasonably) dry for over a week. I tend to think it was more the park didn’t have the flexibility to adjust its opening schedule based on the actual weather.

One of the couples we’d bumped into said they’d ended up there because the Cascadas Escondidas Trail (different from the Cascadas Trail) was closed for maintenance. We had hoped to do that trail next so we figured we’d go have a look. Unfortunately that had very official signage notifying of its closure and we didn’t feel we could justify ignoring that, so instead we had to settle for having lunch at a roadside lookout.

We’d also discovered that it was a good thing we hadn’t planned on camping because most of the campsites don’t open until mid-December – not that you’d be able to find that on any of the websites! (Though maybe my feedback was taken into account as I see they are now updated)

After lunch we continued back towards Chaitén to the Volcan Chaitén Trail. The car park at the trail head was packed! Not content with having put +/-500m vertical in our legs in the morning, we did another +/-600m (+?) on the Volcan Chaitén Trail in the afternoon. The trail was brutal being pretty much straight-up (650m ascent in 2.2km), at times quite steep. The good news was that everyone was on their way down, and by the time we got to the top there were only 2 other people there. We enjoyed the glorious views and the solitude (and rested our aching quads!) before heading back down.

Our last stop for the day was Playa (Beach) Santa Barbara. We were hoping to see dolphins here but the water was so flat it probably wouldn’t have been enough fun for them. We did acquire a dog for a walk along the beach (of course).

The next day we headed south to the El Amarillo Sector of the park. We were a bit confused when we got to the park entry and it was chained shut – with a sign saying it was closed “Opening hours 8:30am-5pm”* – given it was 8:50am. Eventually we worked out that there was an admin office a couple of hundred metres back down the road. The ranger there assured us the park was open (and hurriedly sent her offsider to go and unlock the chain!). Surprise, surprise, the trail we’d planned on doing (El Ventisquero) wasn’t open for the season yet, so we had to settle on two other shorter walks.

A couple of German backpackers turned up at the office as we were getting our briefing, and it was clear they didn’t have a car. I offered them a lift into the park which they gratefully accepted (otherwise it was a 5km walk in to the trailhead). Though that meant we awkwardly kept overtaking each other as we both tackled the El Mirador trail first. We got views over the glacier we’d hoped to walk to as our consolation.

After lunch, in one of the few picnic areas we’d encountered on the trip, we did the Darwin’s Frog Trail. No Darwin’s Frogs spotted. And to be honest the trail was quite boring. Back in Chaiten we tracked down an ice cream store – but I rolled the dice on the flavour (since it was in Spanish). I thought it looked like I was ordering something with chocolate chips in it – disappointingly turned out to be passionfruit pips 🙁

Our next challenge for the day was getting our first petrol. All petrol in Chile is pumped by attendants. We had no idea how to open the fuel cap – fortunately the attendant was able to eventually communicate to us we needed to unlock the doors and that would allow her to open it. We’d already had to google how to open the bonnet of the car (not that I can recall now why we needed to get into the engine) – turned out a nondescript lever was the answer. I thought Volkswagons were supposed to be user friendly!?

Unfortunately I got my first (likely) food poisoning of the trip that night. I’d had salmon & mash at a local restaurant and it all came back up again pretty quickly. Fortunately once it was out that was the end of it. I blame the salmon. Tom had gone for the local seafood stew and was fine.

Having done 7 of the 12 walks in Pumalin National Park (of which only 6 were open) it was time to head south. Pumalin is unique in the Chilean National Parks that it doesn’t have entry fees – we didn’t realise how good this was until we got nickel and dimed at every park (and attraction) after that. I assume this is something to do with the arrangements that were agreed when the land was donated to the Chilean government by Douglas Tompkins.

*Also, let’s mention how ridiculous it is to have a park closing at 5pm when it isn’t getting dark until 8pm or later…