The largest recorded earthquake (in modern times?) was here in Chile on May 22, 1960, which was rated a 9.5, and it lasted for an incredible 10 minutes! Since then, almost every year has had an earthquake, and they are all registered at over a 7.0! So why was I surprised to find a string of volcanos down here just inside the coast?
Because I never put two and two together to come up with an 8.5! Of course volcanoes and earthquakes are related! Don’t worry, I am not going to launch into another diatribe of Mr. Plate Tectonics and his Friends, I’ve bored you all enough with that while on the World Cruise. But nevertheless, here we are in one of the most “active” regions on the planet.
Since we were basically clueless to just about everything having to do with Chile, we chose Excursions that sounded like fun. So, Volcanoes, Waterfalls, and Lunch! sounded just right.
We pulled into Puerto Montt, a small city on an inland bay that served as our starting point. This was the first of (too) many Ports where we will need to use the Tenders to get back and forth from the dock to the ship. We were strategic members of the illustrious Red 12 (stickered) group. This was a popular activity because we found out that there were groups from Red 9 all the way through to Red 13 who all had the same itinerary, thankfully on different buses!
The competition was fierce between all of us as the drivers maneuvered themselves around jockeying for position, trying their best to have their respective Group arrive at the destinations first (assuring themselves of good tips!) We were highly successful in this endeavor as Francisco (our driver) managed to squeeze through impossible opportunities on the highway and we only needed to knock two of the other buses off the road. One ended up in a ravine but thankfully all passengers escaped with only minor injuries. On the plus side, we were able to snag their desserts from lunch since they were all at the hospital.
Our first stop was the Osorno Volcano which resembles either Mt. Fuji or Mt Kilimanjaro depending on whether you favor Japan or Tanzania. It has that classical conical volcano shape to it, see photo!
Osorno has an elevation of 8,701 feet and because of its location in the Lake Region, the surrounding area is rather flat assuring those around it with a 360-degree view. It is still considered one of the more active volcanoes in the Southern Andes with the last eruption happening in 1869. But the previous 300 years had it erupting eleven times helping it attain that ranking. Today Mt. Osorno is a popular skiing mountain as there is snow on its higher levels twelve months out of the year. Hiking and regular sightseeing round out the reasons for the rest of us to come here. The views are spectacular as to the south you can see right into the backbone of the southern Andes.
On the other side of it however, you can see Mt. Calbuco which last erupted in 2015. No one was hurt, but it was quite spectacular as Chloe (our guide) was present and snapped a photo of it that she shared with all of us. This event was totally by surprise and illustrates the unpredictability of our ever-changing tectonic activity. I was lucky and found this one on the internet and it resembles Chloe’s almost exactly.
Our next stop was to get us even closer to Mt. Calbuco as the Petrohue River winds its way around its base and is quite spectacular in its color, clarity, and nature. Waterfalls abound and this entire area is accessible to most folks as it is now one the regions favorite Parks.
Back in the mid/late 1800’s the Chilean government passed a curious law entitled the Law of Selective Immigration and its goal was to encourage immigrants of a medium social/high class cultural development to colonize areas of Chile, one of which was this local Lake Region. The results were that they had small towns and the like resembling areas such as Bavaria and the Black Forest in all aspects, including traditions, architecture, and industries. Today there are about 20,000 folks in Chile that still speak German and there are German schools and publications in these regions.
Puerto Varas is one of the towns in the Lake Region sitting on the shores of a huge (215,000 acres) lake, Lake Llanquihue (pronounced yzan-kew-ee according to the Magic Translate Person inside Google). I suspect that it, and the town, would have more German-sounding names if the immigration had preceded the already established town and area!
Our lunch was at the Buena Vista Hotel which lived up to its name as it was directly on the shore of the lake with Mt. Osorno sitting firmly on the horizon. The entire town had a European feel to it, particularly the buildings which resembled chalets and the like.
Baby Doggie will need to move in a few days when Baby Jesus comes along!
We were informed before we left the ship in the morning that the last Tender would depart the Town Dock at 4:00pm as the ship was to sail shortly thereafter. When we were on the bus Chloe asked when the last boat back to the ship was and she was told 4:00 pm to which she replied, “Good, we will leave Puerto Varas at 3:30, it takes a half hour to make that distance.”
That would be fine if everything else was equal but (here it comes!) all of the other Excursions did exactly the same thing!
Oops! this is not good!
When we arrived at the dock there were probably close to 2000 passengers in line waiting for the Tenders.
It was 3:59 pm.
Oops – Oops!!
There is no way to transport 2000 people, 150 at a time, across a half-mile of water in less than one minute! It would take the Starship Enterprise and a very quick-thinking Mr. Scott longer than that to beam everyone aboard in time!
Oops-Oops -Oops!!!
…. ah… forget about it! They can’t leave with that many of us still on shore…. Very, very bad press would be someone’s legacy!
So, gradually we all made it back to the ship and as the last tender was being hoisted up and into its berth, the Captain put the petal to the metal (so to speak) gunned the throttles and burned rubber all the way out of the harbor.
The townsfolks thought that the volcano had erupted once more as the smoke from our getaway is still hanging there.
