This day started out very dark and gray, and we started by walking for a while along country roads
through a logged-over area. This is where we saw some truly amazing-sized tree-stumps,
evidently alerce trees that had been cut down very long ago. Later, but before lunch,
we walked again in the forest (left thumbnail: big image,
small), along a stream bordered by loads of Gunnera
tinctoria, a moisture-loving plant with immense leaves. You can see them
in the right thumbnail, at the right of the picture
(big image, small).
We had lunch on the trail, and continued onward:
We saw Gunnera plants everywhere, not just along streams,
and Ingrid Schönherr, our guide,
told us that people in Chile eat the stalks raw, with salt. We had the opportunity
to taste the stalks later, in Castro, on Chiloé. Pleasant, I thought, but not
delicious, though maybe with time and repetition you could get to crave them. In the
left thumbnail (big image, small)
you can see the plants growing along the stream, and in the right
(big image, small),
you can see the spiky nature of the stalks. If we can grow these at home,
or the corresponding Brazilian plant G. manicata,
I’d love to try. We could name it Audrey III.
After an incredibly steep and tricky climb, terminated by a steep and rustic stairway
punctuated by small platforms, we came out onto a view of a falls. The thumbnail
here is a picture I took of a sign at one of the platforms, saying “Don’t
Lean Over”, a rather unnecessary warning, we all thought.
(Small image.)
When we did finally get up to the top, there was the falls, less spectacular than
the Saltos de Petrohue from the day before, but I think more picturesque. If the weather
had been hot, I think a lot of us would have stripped and gone into the water, which
seemed unusually pure. The left thumbnail (big image,
small) shows the falls, the right
(big image, small)
is a view downstream from the viewing platform.
Sandy (big, small)
and Mark (big, small)
in two pictures of the final viewing platform, with the falls in the background.
We retraced our steps, nervously going back down those steep stairs and trails,
and returned to Puerto Varas fairly early, in time to do some shopping or more
sightseeing in Puerto Montt. The next day we would pile onto our bus and take
a ferry to Chiloé.
Previous day’s pictures; next day’s pictures
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