(Peulla, Chile)
The plan was clearly laid out: using 4 different buses and 3 different boats, we would travel from Puerto Varas, Chile to Bariloche, Argentina. The various modes of transportation are required for a good reason: in addition to crossing various lakes, we would also be crossing the Andes.
There was one small problem, however. If you are travelling on a Canadian passport, you must pay a “reciprocity fee” to enter Argentina because Canada charges Argentinians a visa fee to enter Canada. My wife duly paid the fee online in advance, as required, and obtained an invoice proving payment. However, the border officials also apparently required all of this in a bar code format, which my wife did not have. In addition, her e-mail account was locked because her e-mail provider was apparently not used to her accessing the account from South America.
To make a long story short, we could not progress beyond the Chilean border town of Peulla until she had that magic bar code. We reluctantly said goodbye to our tour group and booked a room at the Hotel Natura Patagonia in Peulla. It was situated nicely (I took the photo at the top of this post from our room), near the shore of Lago dos Todos Santos and in the shadow of the Andes. However, there was nothing else in the “town” and it was very definitely out of season. How long would it take until this was straightened out? Would it *ever* be straightened out?
We did not know the answers to our questions. Our group had moved on to Bariloche, Argentina and would then be flying on to Buenos Aires. The rain was pouring in Peulla and, to be honest, we were getting quite frustrated with our situation. We wouldn’t know anything else until the next morning, when the Argentinian immigration office in Buenos Aires opened again.
I went for a hike to the only accessible local attraction: a huge waterfall hidden in the rainforest. I got soaked, even with an umbrella, but it was awe-inspiring to see the waterfall suddenly appear at the end of an overgrown trail. The picture above shows part of it; the waterfall went on and on.
Near the dock in Peulla, I saw a signs with information about condors, pumas and pudús. The pudú is the world’s smallest deer and I thought I might see one while we were in the area. I held out no hope for the others.
Darkness arrived early. We had a very quiet dinner in the oversized hotel dining room. There were perhaps 6 other occupied rooms in the hotel; there would ordinarily be hundreds of guests. Being in immigration limbo in a nearly deserted hamlet in the middle of the dark, cold and wet Andean winter…it doesn’t get much more desolate than that!
