2. It's just a hop, step and jump away.

19th Nov 2013     

 Patagonia

     Andrew and I were up at 2am so we could get a 5am flight to Sydney, I'm feeling a little nervous as all I have organised is our flights, bus tickets to Puerto Natales and 3 nights accommodation...3 nights out of 20. Life has been a little busy and during our 1st flight I gave the e-tickets a quick once over. Turns out Patagonia is just a hop, step, jump, leap, pirouette and bound from Queenslands Sunshine Coast, this involved stops Brisbane - Sydney - Auckland - Santiago - Puerto Montt ( this stop involved some people getting off, people getting on, people changing seats and much confusion - especially if you don't speak Spanish ) - Punta Arenas. We arrived at Punta Arenas airport on a cold and rainy evening and easily found the bus for the 3 hour journey to Puerto Natales, let me tell you now that this is a boring trip just miles of undulating grassland. 

Patagonia is highlighted in green

We had organised bus tickets via our hostel so were surprised when the conductor made us buy tickets. I should have been suspicious that he put the money in his pocket and didn't give me a receipt -  they are obsessive about receipts in Chile and this was the only time I didn't get a receipt and I ended up having to pay for the tickets again when we got to the hostel ( they had a receipt and tickets ) fortunately bus travel is very affordable in Chile and two tickets only cost $20. This was also about the time we realised that being able to speak Spanish would have been very useful, very little English is spoken in Patagonia, the only other place we have been where English is so infrequently spoken is South Korea. 

Hostel Alcalzar - Puerto Natales

Arriving in Puerto Natales at 10.30 pm we found a map at the bus terminal and shouldered our backpacks like a couple of uni students and blundered around dark back streets trying to find our Hostel. Now as any Adventure Racer knows it is always a little difficult to get your head around the map initially and mistakes are often made on the way to the 1st checkpoint and this was no exception, it took us 30 mins instead of 5 to make our way to the Hostel and we were within spitting distance of it more than once.

Hostel Alcalzar foyer with Spanish speaking laptop

Hostel Alcazar is a short walk from the bus terminal and the center of town, at $70 a night it is good value with clean rooms and showers with good pressure and plenty of hot water. Manuel who is part of the team at Hostel Alcalzar speaks reasonable English and did try to sell us a tour at 11pm when we arrived! 

The rooms are quirky and comfortable, just like my hubby

     

     The beds are hard but this was not a problem as we always travel with our Thermarest NeoAir mattresses so we just popped these under the sheets and were as comfy as can be. We didn't make use of our mattresses till the second night as after 34hrs in transit we just fell into bed and were asleep in no time.