After our experience crossing the famous Strait of Magellan, nobody was hurt or broke down on the barge and we finally arrived in Punta Arenas in Chile. I would describe our visit to this city as fleeting, as we only visited some shopping malls to check if everything was cheaper than in Argentina, as I had been told (answer: yes it is), but we didn't buy anything, we just had dinner and went to sleep. The most relevant thing that happened to us in Punta Arenas was that a wheel part was stolen from our car while it was parked in the street, but we wouldn't notice it until a week later. In the meantime, we continued on our way to Puerto Natales, where another barge was waiting for us to sail 😃.
Our original idea was to arrive in Punta Arenas from Porvenir before noon, but as the barge was delayed by strong winds, we ended up arriving at almost 5pm. As usual, we had no accommodation and had to look for one while we wandered around the shopping mall and had dinner. All this took time away from our time to walk around the outside of the city, but we didn't regret it too much because there was still a long trip ahead of us. The next day, we left the hostel we had booked for $30 a night for both of us and set off on our four hour drive to Puerto Natales.
While I was in Ushuaia, I listened to all the travellers going from there to Puerto Natales. What I didn't know was that some time later I would also have the opportunity to visit this Chilean city. M and I had to go to this city to take a boat that would take us to almost the beginning of the Carretera Austral, which was our main travel plan. It was the third day of our journey and we were not even close yet, because that little boat trip had a duration of three more nights.
We were both excited because we had never spent so much time on a ship before, but we still had to board at 8 PM and it was only 5 PM. This gave us enough time to get around the city a bit, plus the day was beautiful despite the cold. Puerto Natales has a long and beautiful waterfront to walk along, with several photo spots, such as the two people who seem to be floating on the waters of the Señoret Channel.
This city also reminded me a bit of Ushuaia because of its aesthetics. Well, I haven't visited many other countries, so I can only compare it to Argentina. But somehow everything felt different at the same time. This part of the city preserves historical buildings but there are also many modern ones that can be seen during the walk.
Another interesting point on the waterfront, apart from those giant fingers that seem to stick out of the ground, is the mylodon sculpture. One of the reasons why this place is famous is because this is where the large cavern where this prehistoric mammal, 3 metres high and weighing 3 tons, lived was found. You can also visit this exact place as it is made park style, but we didn't have enough time to go, so we had to settle for seeing the sculpture in real size.
In addition to the waterfront, we also walked around the inner streets and what would a city be without its square and its church. This was the busiest place in the city because there were many businesses around, but we went a little closer to see the church to see what it looked like. Its construction was simple, but it was still neat and open to the public.
We were so busy walking back and forth that I almost forgot to leave one of my new stickers in this city. I like to have them and stick them everywhere as a token of my time there. On this occasion, we headed back towards the port area because it was getting close to boarding time and I found that the canal viewpoint would be a good place to leave it. There was a fixed binoculars and that's where it stayed. What do you think 😃?
The first few days of my trip had me very excited to be in another country, and luckily this feeling lasted until the very last moment. My past self did not know that at some point I would visit this place, the destination of almost all backpackers who arrive in Ushuaia and decide to go by land to travel the Carretera Austral. After that, we had a long sailing trip ahead of us, so we took the opportunity to walk on dry land as much as we could: we knew it would take us a while to get back on it 😅.
With lots of love. / Con mucho amor.
Lau 💕.
