Another Ferry Ride
Here I sit on another ferry, this time to Chile Chico, thinking about what I wrote on the last ferry
ride to Chaiten. My view on rain is a bit different. I don't want anymore rain. None. No more. Boo
to rain. No more cold would be nice too, but I know that won't happen until I am actually heading
north, towards the heat. I am still heading south, towards the south pole, towards the austral winter,
towards more raised eyebrows in each town after we tell them we are headed south.
We arrived in Puerto Ingeniero Ibaņez (1) early this morning for the two hour ferry to Chile Chico.
We slept in the bushes just before town and skinned and cooked some roadkill. Unfortunately, I am not
kidding. A fresh, dead rabbit was found yesterday afternoon and boy scouts Sheldon and Orian thought
it would be good for dinner. They skinned it and then put it on a spit above the fire. I wanted nothing
to do with it although I was glad to have a warm fire. Since the rabbit took so long to cook, our
dinner consisted of pasta and veggies, Manjar (2) and cookies for dessert, and a piece of rabbit meat
as a palate cleanser. Yum. I didn't try it, Sheldon thought it was gross, Susie liked it, and Orian
had nothing to compare it to. We went to sleep warm and with bellies full.
Conversely, we awoke early to a strong cold wind that froze the just-about-freezing rain that lasted
through the night and packed up without breakfast to get to the ferry dock. We heard it leaves at 9
am each morning but our first hand experience was that it didn't dock until 10:30 and it left at 11:15.
This was fine because, after some coaxing and pamphlets, we enjoyed coffee, mate, and breakfast with
the Carabineros(3) inside the warmth of their kitchen area and
living space.
Now on to Chile Chico and Argentina where we are told there is less rain. I'll believe it when we
cross into the arid desert pampas (4) of Argentina. Before that, I will keep my
expectations wet.
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(1) Ibaņez was the man who helped delineate the border of Chile and Argentina. The Argentinian
who worked with him was Perito Moreno of which there is a town named after him over
in Argentina.
(2) Manjar is just like caramel and comes in a bag. We put it on everything. It is kind of like
peanut butter, we are always in search of a mechanism to get the manjar into our mouths, i.e. bread,
crackers, apples, fingers.
(3)Carabineros are the national policemen. I like them here much better than in Peru.
(4) Pampa means plain
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