Pucon - both cosy and adventurous!

The overnight bus to Pucon was good. My seat was a bit smaller than expected (now I’m used to complete luxury seats), but I still got a good sleep. When I woke up, everyone else had their windows open. There was a pink view of the snowy mountain and lake. I walked from Turbus to the hostel on the waterfront.

The town seemed so familiar, just like any alpine adventure town, wooden houses in the faux-Swiss chalet style, the smell of pine smoke from fireplaces, loads of sportwear shops, crisp cold air. I walked into the hostel on the waterfront and this lovely French lady greeted me. The hostel has a treehouse room and the living areas all have views of the lake! Check-in took a while, but I was in no rush. She took me through all the activities on offer – heaps of hiking, white-water sports, kayaking, skiing, mountaineering. I opted for the 1pm excursion to the hotpools because I could see at least 5 other’s names on the board under it. I also signed up for the volcano summit hike because the receptionist was doing it on Friday.

I put my bag into my cosy 6-bed dorm that seemed exactly like our bunk-beds in Ohakune and headed out to town to get some more cash out and go to the supermarket. I could see with all the activities, I was going to have to compensate the cost by cooking every meal.

I had time for some quick avocado on toast for lunch before putting my togs on and heading to the hotpools. It was a 2 hour drive around the other side of the volcano. I nodded off on the drive. We arrived in a steaming canyon with snowflakes falling on us. There was a series of 20 pools from hot to cool running down the narrow canyon with steep, fern covered sides. All the steam rising up made certain areas invisible, all the pools were connected with red painted walkways.

There were two American girls Emily and Maria, both solo travellers who had been living in Santiago, and a Brazilian guy called Thomaz, backpacking alone on a short two week holiday. We had a great time together jumping around all the pools. Maria could definitely withstand the hot the best (the hottest was 45 degrees!)

Unsurprisingly, because he was from the warm weather of Brazil, Thomaz struggled with the frozen feet between pools the most. Although I did think the water on the walkway had turned to ice by the time we got out.

We had three hours to enjoy the pools. I was hungry at the end, so I bought a chocolate brownie from a cafe! Then it was two hours back to the hostel, we arrived at 8pm. Thomas and I immediately cooked pasta together, we were starving. I had no idea the hotpools would take so long, so I had no snacks. Then I had a local craft beer in the hostel bar, talking to Emily and some Belgium/Germans who lived in Australia. They had lots of tips for Easter Island.

Hydrospeed day

I had wanted to go skiing today but left it much too late and ended up getting up at 9.30am. Thomaz was in the kitchen and said I should join the hydrospeed trip (or helter-skelter as I kept calling it). Doing something that terrifies me was preferable to spending the day alone, so I signed up. Then I went on a short walk of town, to the black sand beach and the Christu statue. It was wooden and slightly terrifying. A man on the street told me I was muy linda (very nice).

Then it was back to the hostel for a quick lunch of orange and two minute noodles because i was feeling rundown. Perhaps not the best conditions to jump into icy cold water.

The hydrospeed people picked us up at 1pm. We had a twenty minute drive to sign our lives away and squeeze into more wetsuit pieces I’ve ever worn in my life; dungarees, jacket, socks, lifejacket, helmet and board. I actually couldn’t move my limbs. We were driven to a very green, freezing river. The wetsuits did their job and although you could notice the cold, it didn’t instantly give you brainfreeze and make you drown.

Our guide, this man who said to call him ‘Black’, made us practise rolling the board and getting back onto it. It had two grooves for your arms to slot into and a wee handle to hold onto for dear life. I decided my plans was just to not let go of the board, even if I flipped.

An Austrian girl called Sandra was the third person on our trip. She wasn’t so good at rolling the board, so got the best spot right behind the guide. We started down the river. The first rapids were pretty big on a board, it felt like you dropped about a metre and then smashed into a wall of water. The second ones had big rocks, where Black would suddenly yell, everyone get on the right side of the river. You kicked as hard as you could but barely seemed to move. We whoosed past several enormous boulders creating their own current.

In between this mayhem, there were lovely smooth green parts of the river where you could see the river stones sweeping beneath you. Black told us what we had just done was a grade 2/6, but the last one was a 4/6. That truely terrified me. We went through several more 2s, rushing between stones. I actually felt exhausted and Thomaz was stuck behind us, unable to catch up. Then it was the 4. Luckily, it was so fast I didn’t have time to think. Several parts of the river joined up, at one point I saw Black and Sandra disappear over a wave for a solid five seconds, then it was me, whooshing down a two metre drop and plunging through another wave headfirst, getting soaked. It was hard to stand up when we finally paddled to the shore.

We were given hot, sweet black tea and driven home. I changed from my togs and Thomaz said he’d cook for me – stroganoff, but not as I knew it. That was lovely of him. Unfortunately it had cream in it, but it tasted delicious so I ate a lot. I bought wine for the both of us to share.

Then I went to watch the sunset with Maria, an English boy she’d spent the day with called Caleb, Emily, a crazy Chileno called Luis and Thomaz. Everyone spoke Spanish apart from me, so most of the conversation was in Spanish, but I could mostly just follow along. It was nice. The sunset was pretty. It was Maria’s last day in Chile after a year – she was getting an overnight bus so she didn’t want to leave the beach. Two black labradors adopted us and chased down police cars on the beach.

I was getting ready for the volcano climb when the cream came back to get me. I wanted to be in bed by 10pm, but I wasn’t asleep until 1am or later because of the upset stomach and dry, raw throat. Not a great start for a massive day.