Chilean Mothership Trip

June-July 2004

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by Beth Geiger

Altue's 55 foot support boat.

Start with a stunning coastline, where lavishly forested mountainsides plunge into mirror-calm fjords. Add sea lions and dolphins, decorate with silvery strands of waterfalls, and toss in splendid natural hot springs. Finally, flip the seasons so you can enjoy all this when the snow flies in North America.

Welcome to northern Patagonia, where Chile’s long coastline breaks into a watery riddle of islands, fjords, rainforest and glaciers. There are no roads and few settlements, and compared to the famous Lake District to the north, or the rocky spires of Torres del Paine National Park to the south, this magnificent coastline is essentially tourist-free.

The southern coast of Chile is also home to Pumalin Park, created by American millionaire Douglas Tompkins. Everyone who reports on Pumalin Park agrees: it’s beautiful, pristine, and for the most part, nearly impossible to penetrate by land. In other words, perfect for sea kayaking. And with the best fjords widely spaced along the coast, fjord-hopping by mothership is the way to go.

One of the few kayak guides serving the region, Altue Sea Kayaking, uses a homey, converted fishing boat to support its guided kayak tours. Francisco de Valle, Altue’s owner, escorted us from Puerto Montt, two hours by air south of Santiago, for a six-day trip in early March. We started with a four-hour drive south along the Pan American highway—a pot-holed road winding past colorfully shingled houses and small farms. At the mist-shrouded town of Hornipiren we met the rest of the guides and hopped onto Altue’s brightly painted 55 foot support boat.

As we motored south, the forest shore seemed to rise vertically from the water.Snowy peaks appeared above the forests, waterfalls reflected in the calm water, and a family of dolphins came to play in the bow wake.

After a few hours, we pulled up to an uninhabited island, where the kayaks were lowered off the deck and we dipped our paddles into the Gulf of Ancud for the first time. The mist that had encircled Hornipiren had cleared (in fact, the clear weather stuck around for the whole week, something we didn’t take for granted in this temperate coastal climate).

The next morning, we continued south in the support boat to the mouth of the first fjord, called Quintupeu. Quintupeu Fjord is so secluded and protected from view that back in World War I, a German battleship damaged in combat hid here from British pursuers for a month. These days the fjord is peaceful, its glassy water reflecting lush mountains and a rocky ‘bathtub ring’—the dramatic sign of a twenty-plus foot tidal exchange. We climbed into the sea kayaks and paddled towards Quintupeu’s narrow entrance.

Just inside the fjord, a series of salmon pens were an incongruous visual break in Chile’s otherwise wild coast—a part of the world that doesn’t have salmon in its natural ecosystem. Salmon farming is one of Tompkins’ ongoing conflicts here. Tompkins and other critics of salmon farming point to impacts on the environment, compromising the region’s delicate ecology.

But, as if to soften the blow of the salmon farm, five more minutes brought us to a lovely waterfall cascading into the green water. Beyond it, snow-capped Andean peaks rose so steeply from the sea that they seemed like an artist’s exaggeration.

As the trip progressed, we settled into a relaxed and quintessentially South American schedule. Though we traveled and ate on the mothership, we slept on shore in tents, surrounded by flowering fuchsia bushes and the improbably big greenery of the primeval rain forest. Each morning at about 9, the crew collected us in a small launch and took us to the boat for breakfast, featuring good coffee (a rarity in much of South America) and the extraordinary fruit Chile is famous for. Meals were relaxed affairs, with guests and crew at one long table . Then we’d climb into the sea kayaks (a mix of singles and doubles), do an easy paddle up a fjord for a few hours, and then meet the boat for a 2’clock lunch and, of course, afternoon siesta. Another paddle or hot springs soak, and dinner—chicken or fresh mussels over fettuccine, prepared in the tiny galley—at about 8 or 9. The simple accommodations in tents and remote setting gave this adventure a distinctly rustic edge.

On the third day, the boat took us to Cahuelmo Fjord. A colony of sea lions (lobos del mar, or sea wolves) barked and snorted as our strange little herd of bright kayaks approached. We continued to the fjord’s eastern end, where a small river flows out of a misty valley. Here, tubs and channels filled with crystal clear hot water have been meticulously carved (nobody seems to know how long ago or by whom) into a terrace of limestone. There are no roads or trails to this remote place. These termas fall within the boundaries of Pumalin Park, and a new wooden sign had been posted, asking visitors not to disturb the solitude with radios or mar the environment with shampoo or soap. We had Cahuelmo hot springs to ourselves, soaking blissfully and taking in the scenery.

That evening our guides joined us on shore for a campfire. The dark waters of Cahuelmo Fjord were now hundreds of yards from camp thanks to the 21-foot tidal exchange. Altue’s gregarious owner, Francisco del Valle, produced a bottle of pisco—the clear-as-a-mountain creek Chilean liquor—and a guitar appeared. The first song came as a surprise: Bob Dylan’s ‘How Many Roads’ in a pretty good imitation of Dylan’s raspy voice, but after that the songs took on a more South American flavor.

Before snuggling into my sleeping bag I took a walk out onto the tide flats. Above me, glittering like a diamond brooch, was the Southern Cross—which I’d never seen until this trip. Orion was there, too, but he was standing on his head. Along with the magnificent temperate rainforest, the scenery, and the campfire songs, the stars here in northern Patagonia were an enchanting mix of familiar and exotic.

Cahuelmo hotsprings may have had the best view, but for me, the termas at Porcelana, which we visited a few days later, were pure magic. We camped at the end of Comau Fjord, where a scattering of fishermen’s cabins sit in small meadows dotted with sheep. Past the sheep, through a wooden gate and up a narrow forest path, we came to Porcelana hotsprings.

I’d never seen anything like this place. For at least two hundred meters, a steamy hot brook fell delicately over tiny waterfalls and into rock-bounded pools fringed with emerald moss. The water was so clear that it was hard to tell where the pools ended and the fern-scented air began. In the largest and hottest of the pools I swam a few strokes then floated on my back and watched the rainforest drift silently above me.

To experience a more cultural side of Chilean sea kayaking, I continued with Altue for a few days at their base on the big island of Chiloe, southwest of Puerto Montt. Chiloe has several small towns (the biggest is Castro), a tapestry of colorful fishing villages, and reportedly, a mystical population of fairies and trolls. We headed for Altue’s simple but inviting waterside base lodge, just south of the wood-shingled fishing village of Dalcahue. Launching the sea kayaks from here requires waiting for the impressive tide to come in; at low tides the Altue dock is stranded high and dry. From the lodge, Francisco leads day long kayak excursions into the picturesque maze of islands and fishing villages along the protected east coast of Chiloe. There are lunch stops for freshly made seafood empanadas at Dalcahue’s waterfront, quiet paddles alongside the island’s brightly painted working fishing fleet, and as a highlight, a dinner of curanto, the layered seafood bake that is the Chilean equivalent of a New England clam bake, and Chiloe’s trademark dish. At the end of the day, it was wonderful to settle into the wood-fired hot-tub on the lodge’s deck and watch dusk give way to the quiet twinkle of lights from Dalcahue’s shingled houses. There I reflected on my trip: a balance of sea kayaking, fantastic scenery, picturesque towns, and of course, those hot soaks at the end of the day. It was hard to leave.

© Beth Geiger lives in Seattle, Washington and is a contributing editor for Canoe & Kayak Magazine.

For more information on Chile, contact Altue Sea Kayaking: www.seakayakchile.com.Encomenderos 83, 2nd floor, Las Condes, Santiago CP 6760254, CHILE