BIKING IN THE CHILEAN LAKE DISTRICT

Chile was our eleventh country, in a motorbike journey, which took us through 15 countries in 7 months; from Miami, through Mexico, Central America and South America.
We are three. Firstly, "Franky", our 1989 BMW R80GS, modified for overland adventure with an Ohlins rear shock, 9 gallon Acerbis gas tank, White Power front springs, Corbin seat, to name but a few. So named after Francisco Pizarro, the Spanish conqueror of much of South America, since the bike was going to have to do some conquering of its own! (It was only later we realised that Francisco was not generally a nice bloke - into robbing, killing, looting, pillaging and generally decimating the indigenous Indian population, but by then the name Franky had stuck!)
Secondly there is Kevin, a qualified motorcycle instructor and the rider of Franky. Finally there is me, Julia, who sits on the back, attempts to navigate, takes average photos, speaks a little Spanglish to get us through borders, loses guide books and is general "gopher".
We'd like to think that the team must be a great combination, since by hook or by crook we travelled 23,000 miles without too many hitches, have seen breath-taking sights, ridden in all conditions, from roads more like dry river beds to perfect tarmac laid only weeks before, from the ice cold rain and gusting winds of Patagonia, to the humidity and sweltering heat of Costa Rica, to the dry roasting sun of the Northern deserts in Chile.
It is hard to pick out one particular part of our journey for that special mention - there were so many experiences, they would need a series in the magazine, not just one slot! But Chile (despite the fact that the Pinochet affair was still the headline news when we arrived there!) holds a special place in our hearts. It was in this country that we experienced the most superb riding and also the most superb BMW hospitality - we had only contacted Francisco Campla, a Chilean member of the BMW of America, a few times over the internet, but when we met him at his country home just outside of Santiago, he and his family treated us like long lost friends . . . . . .
Our arrival in Chile was over the northern border from Tacna, Peru towards 
Arica. For us the ride in Chile has two very distinct halves. Firstly north of Santiago. Around 5 days of hard riding through desert, on long straight roads, with stifling heat and more desert, more straight roads, desert, desert, and heat. I think you get my drift. Although there can be said to be an inherent beauty just in its wilderness and isolation, the sameness of the terrain with the endless shimmering horizons and drying hot winds, made it hard going on us and Franky.
For us, the great part of Chile was the ride through the Southern Lake District. A vast oasis of deep blue lakes, tall green and brown mountains and snow capped volcanoes, with a rider's dream of twisty roads and challenging dirt riding. We started our journey through the Lake District from Puerto Montt, a large port in the south. We had recently completed the long distance motorcyclists dream of getting to Ushuaia and the famous sign "Bahia Lapataia - Finalisation de Ruta 3 - Alaska 17,848kms" (PHOTO TO FOLLOW) and then recovered from the emotional exhilaration of it all with a 4 day ferry ride that took us from Puerto Natales up to Puerto Montt, thus arriving there refreshed and ready to have a blast for the next few weeks.
Just as an aside, the ferry ride was a must. There is a section of Chile down South where roads do not exist; there is just national parks, huge mountains and not much else. Absolutely awesome but not viable for any form of transport!
For the first time on arriving in Puerto Montt, I felt that we were riding without a deadline. Previously, we had to get to Costa Rica for Millennium and then to Ushuaia by early March before the bad weather kicked in, but now we seem to have as much time as we want. After a big debate about whether to go to south again to the island of Chileo, we eventually decided to head North - the weather swayed us. Temptation of warm sunshine the further North (remember we are in the Southern Hemisphere!) we went versus the grey rainy days guaranteed in Chiloe. Or so we thought.
The first day went perfectly to plan. As we left Puerto Montt the dark clouds seemed to scatter and only an hour or so up the road we were enjoying bright blue sky. At Puerto Varas, we headed east to spend the day doing a circuit of Lago Llanquihue and up to Petrohue, most of it a perfect dirt road. 

The Volcan Osorno towered at the far side of the lake, with the top wrapped in a blanket of white fluffy cloud. (PHOTO ATTACHED) Our route took us past many little wooden churches, painted in bright reds, yellows and blues and as we got closer to the volcano, the cloud started to disappear as the sun burnt it away. There was no doubt that this was a perfect day for riding a bike in the most scenic of places and we were congratulating ourselves on a great decision to come North. We rested a while in Petrohue, a small village half way round our circuit, and wandered down to the lakeside there, watching the crystal waters lapping onto the black volcanic beach. As we headed back for the bike, a bloke in motorcycle gear approached us. It was another fellow traveler, from Brazil,travelling on a Yamaha TDM 850. We carried on riding with the Brazilian for a few hours before splitting up and we headed to Frutillar to spend the night. Frutillar is another very picturesque village and is nestled into the side of the lake, with a small beach and a spectacular view of 3 volcanoes on the opposite side of the water. At least that was the view in the evening. By morning the Chilean weather had presented us with lashings of cold rain and low murky fog. The view had become nothing more than like trying to peer through the side of a Tupperware box. So much for our warm drive North! We bundled ourselves up with fleeces and coated ourselves in our waterproof layer and then had to suffer a ride that took us north part of the way on Ruta 5.

Ruta 5 is a horrible road, yes, even worse than the A1, most of which is posted with signs declaring "EXCAVATION PROFUNDA" (major roadworks!) or "DESVIO" (diversion!). Where the road is not yet dual carriageway, they are upgrading. It is best to avoid Ruta 5, if at all possible, but sometimes to zigzag through the Lake District, you find yourself doing a few kilometres on it. Such times are low points in the ride, even more so when the weather resembles a typical late November in England.
Anyway, we were headed for Valdavia, a Pacific coastal town and an important port in Colonial times. We stayed there a couple of nights, drying everything out. My boots have long since forgotten that they were supposed to be waterproof and hold water now like a good sponge - it seems to take two days minimum for them to dry out, stiff and musty, but adequate to wear again with a modicum of comfort. We spent our full day here riding out to Niebla, the site of the old Spanish fortress. It contained an interesting little museum, informing us all about the wicked English pirate, Sir Francis Drake! It had been the same back at Ushuaia! And you know, I was certain I had been taught at school about those wicked Spanish pirates and the hero Sir Francis Drake! After, we scoffed fresh camarones at a small seafood restaurant fronting onto the beach, watching the local fisherman sort their catch, surrounded by a pack of excited scraggy cats.
When we left here we crossed back over Chile to the mountains and volcanoes. Chile is so narrow that to get from east to west can be pretty quick. Thankfully the day we left turned out to be perfect blue. Our ride took us to Panguipulli, around Lago Calafquen towards Conaripe. We got our first views of Volcan Villarica and, at last, a first sight of a live volcano, with a stream of smoke curling and twisting from the top. The ride around Lago Calafquen is one to be highly recommended. Again the dirt roads are in pretty good nick, they are quiet and they afford the most breath-taking views of Volcan Villarica.
From there, it was a section of the dreaded Ruta 5 again to Temuco. Temuco is just a big city really, with not much to recommend about it. We simply headed there because of Franky, who was in need of a bit of service work and whose problem with the steering head top nut has continued unabated since Nasca. We had been given a business card by some German bikers way up in Northern Chile, for a BMW mechanic, Peter Fischer, who has a workshop in Temuco.
Peter worked with us on the bike and listened to our problem with the steering. We explained that the forks were banging over the holes in the dirt roads and that the top nut kept undoing. Kev and I had always focused our attention on the top nut coming lose. In fact the problem turned out to be too much oil in the forks, which made the suspension too heavy, resulting in the banging, of which a symptom was the nut loosening. It was so infuriating to know that to resolve the problem was so simple, even more so because, Mick Barr, our UK BMW mechanic had already told us to check the oil levels and we (stupidly with hindsight) had trusted authorised BMW dealers (one Costa Rican and one Ecuadorian) to do this for us - I will leave it up to you to draw your own conclusions as to some standards of Latin American workmanship! Still it provided us with another salutary reminder that if you wanted something doing right, DO IT YOURSELF! However, since the work done with Peter, Franky seems to be back to his old self.
The next day we had arranged to ride out of Temuco with Peter, and a couple of German riders, Andrea and Beoni, who were riding Yamaha Super Teneres. They were off to a few days through Argentina and we were riding to Parque Nacionale Conguillio. It took us all a little time to get going that morning after some Happy Hour beer drinking had taken place the previous night! But by noon, we were racing out of the city and luckily with another excellent day. After reviving our bodies with a much-needed coffee a few hours down the road, our little group split up just after Melipueco.

It was another spectacular volcano day! This time Volcan Llaima, the most active in South America and we had the pleasure of riding Franky through some narrow dirt roads carved out of the old lava flows, with the volcano coughing bellows of smoke behind us. It felt like we were on the moon. (PHOTO ATTACHED) This was no doubt our favourite ride in Southern Chile.Our next day's ride took us to yet another Parque. This time, a dirt road round to the Termas Tolguaca (hot springs for you and me!) and then to the Parque Nacionale Tolguaca.

Whilst the road to the hot springs was a fairly average quality dirt road, thereafter, we had real doubts. The road disintegrated into a steep downward mudslide and ended in a river. Convinced we had gone wrong, Kev stopped the bike before the river crossing (PHOTO ATTACHED) and scouted ahead. Within 2 minutes he had found a Park Ranger who confirmed that yes this was the right road to Victoria, but he warned, it gets very bad later on. Unfortunately he was right. The road was as bad as the Parque Nacionale was beautiful.

 And it was very very beautiful! The way started to remind us of a similar experience in the Northern Andes en route to Kuelap, except that this current road was normally closed in the rainy season because it was a river. Within 2 minutes of leaving the Ranger Station we found the next 200 yards of road was a small lake. I got off Franky - the chances of the bike going over through this with me on the back were pretty high and I did not want to be covered in the brown muddy water. In any event, it was in vain. My efforts at trying to see how deep the water was resulted in me losing my footing and slipping down the muddy bank and straight into the water. I would have rather been on Franky. Feeling rather foolish I lifted myself out of the water to Kevin's obvious amusement and then had to face 2 car loads of four wheel drives and a park ranger on a small bike, which had just turned up behind us. My humiliation was complete!
We slowly winded our way downwards through the forest, picking our way through the huge boulders, which littered the road, and spraying the sides of the forest as Kevin hurtled through all the water. Just when we finally thought the road was getting a little better (comprising two narrow mud tracks through a field), we come across that wonderful sign again - "excavation profunda". What could there be to excavate? Well it seems that in an effort to provide easier access to the Parque, another road building programme was in progress, the first stage on which seemed to comprise sending a heavy machine down the existing track, ploughing it up like a field and dumping a load of heavy gravel and mud in the middle of it. We could not get the bike through this two up. I was off Franky again, walking, whilst Kev slowly pulled ahead on the equivalent of a trials riding 
course, now heading steeply upwards. What we did not realise that there was 20 kms of this ahead. . . . .
After half an hour of me trudging behind getting increasingly hot and sweaty, with Kev now out of sight, a huge works machine pulled up alongside me and honked its horn. With no hesitation, I leapt up inside to sit next to Tomas. He could not speak English and my Spanish was apparently incomprehensible to him. Great! So we smiled and nodded to each other as this great monster machine churned on up the hill after Kevin. When we caught him up, we decided that I should stay with Tomas and Kev would be free to practice his motocross! My lift really saved the day; otherwise we could not have made it back to the tarmac that day. As it was we had enough light to get to Los Angeles and treated ourselves to a hotel with hot shower and cable TV!
Before the final leg to Santiago, we decided that we wanted one more volcano, so the next morning fully refreshed (we even got our breakfast brought to our hotel room - a very rare thing indeed given the type of accommodation we normally have stayed in!), we followed the road taking us through Antuco and onwards to the Parque Nacionale Laguna del Laja and Volcan Antuco. This volcano was very different to the others we had admired. We were far enough North now for the top of it not to be crowned with a circle of snow, and it stood there bare, deep brown and rocky, reaching far over the valley below. On the way to the Laguna, the road took us right past the old lava flows, huge tracks of sponge looking black rocks, now sprouting vague roots of green grass and new life. It then climbed up 
to its base before circling around to the Laguna. The colour of the lake was in direct contrast to the black brown landscape. It was a violent deep turquoise. We turned off the main dirt road, onto a vague two-wheeled track, which went right down to the waters edge. At this point we were only 20 miles or so from the border with Argentina. As you would suspect, this way is not a busy border crossing. In fact we saw more men on horses herding their cows along the road than we did vehicles!
From our campsite, we left the next morning back tracking for a little while until we hit the road that took us out to Cobquecura. This was a first class twisty road. After that though we were back to dirt road (or in the case of the coast, sand road), but this ran directly along the sea, running either along the beach or higher on the cliff edge. We stopped for a picnic on the sands, encountered the usual mad hungry dog that insisted on sharing the ham sandwiches, and watched a crazy bodysurfer alone out on some huge waves. Apart from the four of us, there was not a soul in sight and we could relax listening to the crashing of the water and watching the sun bounce off the waves. At last our quest for sun and warmth has been realised.
We dragged ourselves from the beach in the afternoon and headed off to find a campsite. I guess sooner or later the sand road would finally claim its price. Turning a corner the road climbed steeply upwards and looming ominously ahead was a huge farm truck that slowly ground to a halt on the steepest section. As we drew close it was obvious that we could not get round and although the truck was trying to get going again, it was not happening fast enough. Within a few feet of the truck with us creeping at a snail pace, Franky finally stalled. Kev gripped the brakes as he started a slow slither backwards which despite best efforts, accelerated at an alarming speed towards the edge of the hill. There was no choice but to put the bike over and us with it. We hit the dust road with a thump and huge clouds of grit bellowed outwards. Neither being hurt, we raced to put Franky upright, with the only real injury being our dinner for that night, which had been dangling in a plastic bag on the wrong side of Franky.
We found an excellent campsite a few miles further on, within a pine forest right on the beach. As seems to happen many times in the past couple of weeks, the campsite was deserted except for us. This one did not even have the obligatory dog sniffing around. We quickly set up camp, poured a generous helping of Gato Negro red wine into our plastic camp mugs and strolled down to the beach for another sunset. Again, deserted, huge foaming waves pounding and grinding the beach, with the cries of seagulls and a slowly sinking orange fireball. We never tire of the sunsets (or sunrises) - they seem so much significant, serene and moving than when at home. It is always a very special time of day and when we can reflect on our travels in perfect harmony.
We arrived in Santiago 2 days later via Curico. We were welcomed once again by Francisco Campla and his family. We had stayed with Francisco for a few days some weeks earlier when we prepared for our push to Ushuaia. Now we were back and we stayed with him for a week refreshing ourselves for the next part of the trip. Kev and Francisco talked motorbikes and the trip at length over a bottle (or two) of whisky! There is no doubt that his and his family's hospitality have been one of the highlights of our tour around Chile and have made it very special for us.
It was a day of mixed feelings when we loaded up to leave the Campla's - sad to leave such a marvellous family, but excited at what adventures lay in store for us on the next leg of the trip, through Northern Argentina, Bolivia and Brazil.

****************************

Kevin Sanders runs a DSA approved motorcycle training school in Cambridge, 
called BikeSafe Motorcycle Training. As well as having the unofficial "qualification" of defensive riding skills extraordinaire (by getting round South America without being killed on the roads!), he is IAM and RoSPA Gold. 
Now back from South America, Kevin offers courses to suit every motorcycling ability. Interested potential pupils can contact him on 01223-369963.

Kevin is now the official world record-holder for the fastest circumnavigation of the planet! Over 19,000 miles in under 20 days - with a pillion! Find out more at www.globebusters.com

****************************

Balderston Home Page