Volcanic Delight
Día 16: A chance meeting, and a rogue plan comes good
Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Instagram | Komoot
Chapter 3 Fjordlands (2/6)
Theme: Friendship Komoot GPX (16km - Summiting El Volcán Hornopirén)
This story starts the night before.
----
Two weary travellers cobble together their last coins for a roadside snack. The cash machine is stubborn. In contrast to its nation’s neoliberal leaders, it denies cash to gringos. The cyclists are jaded and in need of paper notes.
One heads off to find an Alan key from a nearby garage. The other sits sleepily on the curb, searching for the final Chilean pesos in a dusty bike bag. There’s enough to buy a couple of pastries from the street vendor.
He sits down to wait for the other, but can’t wait to eat.
——
A third and fourth man approach. One sees the bikes and gestures.
“You see this is the set up I was talking about.” He says to a friend.
To me: “Where are you heading?”
“We hope to arrive in Colombia eventually.”
“¡Que buena! How long will it take you?”
“5 months.” At this point, people are usually amazed, confused or somewhat disgusted by the thought of such a distance.
Not Alejandro.
“I once rode a bike for 1.5 years. From White Horse in Canada to Osorno in Chile, my home town.”
“Are you joking? That’s incredible.”
Jake returns to hear the story of another mad tourer. The sense of affinity is real.
Alejandro: “Are you hungry? I’m inviting you both to dinner. I know what it’s like to be travelling and hungry. Let’s go.”
He doesnt take no for an answer.
——
Alejandro to us: “Have whatever you want.’
To the waiter: “Bring them some marisco (seafood) soup. And you should try the Salmon steak. Here’s some Chilean white wine to go with it.”
A feast ensues.
Recieving food from anyone is a joy, but when you’re benefiting from the hospitality of people in their own country, the feeling of warmth is especially heartening.
Plus, we were god damn hungry.
——
Alejandro answers all our questions about his trip.
-“We used to sneak into hotels for breakfast in America, you have to look confident and have your best clothes on for that though.”
-“I stayed in churches and schools in El Salvador because it was so dangerous back then.”
- “¡Peru! You won’t believe the mountains there. But I was so so cold. I had to wear all my clothes and therefore had no pillow. I had to come back down to the coast because it was too much. The coldest of my life.”
- “Mexico es lo mejor de todo (the best of them all). Everyone invited me to dinner, to their house, to meet their family. They are so generous in the campo - countryside - there.”
We’re left with an insatiable desire to continue up through Central America. Not a realistic ambition for Jake this time, but maybe one day.
——
Shortly afterwards.
“We’re in town to climb a volcano. We start tomorrow at 5am. Are you coming?” says Juan.
“One of my friends is a guide here. He was out kayaking today but he’s taking us up in the morning.”
Juan is the bike traveller newbie. He’s recently purchased a ton of camping and climbing equipment and is starting to eye up a long cycle.
As yet, he has not launched a trip of his own. But Alejando’s tales are getting him excited too.
——
The mountain guide, Nico, arrives to dinner, fresh from kayak instruction out in the fjords.
“Come with us, I’m inviting you, it’s free. It will be a great experience.”
Thumbs up, beaming smile.
The two travellers consider the offer but then their thoughts turn to tent sleeping so close to town. Maybe not.
Juan: “It’s fine, you can stay at my in-laws. I haven’t been there for like a year, but I’m sure he’ll let you stay.”
Juan spends the next 15 minutes on the phone reintroducing himself to the in-laws he has quite clearly neglected in recent times.
And now he offers to bring them the present of two lanky gringos to sleep in their shed.
Well that’s settled then.
——
Jake’s up for the challenge but slightly sad about the missed sleep. When an incessant dog barks right outside our open doorway I briefly awaken and see a side to him I’ve never seen before.
“I’m going to kill that fucking dog.”
Luckily, for the sake of our free accommodation, he decides to shoo it away instead.
—
Well before dawn.
Two travellers and three Chileans share eggs, bread and maté - an Argentine, Chilean, Uruguayan and Paraguayan national drink, a sort of herbal tea - at Nico’s house.
“We drink maté to make us strong!” exclaims the ever positive Nico with a wholesome grin.
Then we pile into Alberto’s (Nico’s father) car and ease up a road bumpier than a midge bitten ankle in the Scottish highlands.
The sky turns lilac then faintly red - shepherds warning?
“SSHHHH, stop. Hear that? Puma. Keep the group together. They are terrified of humans. The won’t come close if we’re together.”
—
Nico drives us on up through thick forest along a path hewn into shoulder high rock. Sometimes we shimmy under fallen trees, other times limber over them, splaying limbs like amateur skaters at an ice rink.
Nico is all about the tactical ascent.
“We attack, we always attack. Then a quick rest. 5 minutes. Then attack.”
The dawn seeps between branches. We’re already far higher than the clouds.
—
Nico is full of facts. Truly a mountain boy at heart and reveling in his career. A smile wider than a fjording ferry.
“That one is an Alerce tree, 1,500 years old. That’s a baby one, only 900 years old. The Chiloé brought them down to make churches on their islands fifty years ago.”
Every time we stop, Alejandro hands out maté, bananas, biscuits, salami (politely refused).
“¡Compartimos todo!”
We share everything!
It’s going to be hard to repay this boundless generosity.
——
Soon we reach the treeline. The volcano rises high above still. The clouds a distant carpet, hundreds of meters below.
“That’s a fake summit, we have one more section to go.”
Flashes of neon tshirts wrapped around rocks mark the way up. This path is not often trodden. A 4th hour of climbing passes.
—
A final ‘attack’ and we make it. Views for absolute days. Panoramic doesn’t do it justice. Not a quiver of wind. Our laughter is magnified absurdly.
Nico, with characteristic vigor,
“That’s where the American logging company came in and caused a landslide” and
“the glacier used to reach all the way to there. When I was 10, it used to snow for 3 months straight. Now, 1 month is all.”
My sandwiches go down well. At last, a trade in hospitality is accepted.
—
Alberto, the chuckling father, tries to break a world record for hitchhikers on the way back down. Picking up as many as he can and insulting jovially as he does so.
In town, we buy beers and veggies and Jake does what Jake does best and creates the kind of meal you’d gladly share with your entire extended family.
So that’s what we do.
——
The two travellers marvel at their luck. Now they have the blueprint to pay it forward.
El espíritu de bikepacking siempre gana.
The bikepacking spirit always wins.
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