Life carries on here in Valle Chacabuco, despite the uproar
from the protests. The senator
that came to visit us a few weeks ago was wildly impressed by the landscape
that surrounds us here; I remember hearing him say he had no idea it would be
so beautiful. Sounds like we
played our cards right in that regard.
Since then, a few more guests have come and gone, but in general things
are quiet here on that front.
We’ve had other visitors here for a while, like Jeremy, who’s soon to join
the ranks of pilots for Kris and Doug’s project at Iberá in Argentina, and
Annabelle, who’s working on a short promo video to show here and when Kris goes
on speaking tours. The Spanish
version, which will eventually go on the CP website and be shown at various
events in the local region, is her current project – but the catch is that she
doesn’t speak Spanish and therefore needs a translator. Guess who gets to take on the
task? Yours truly. It’s been a fun project, because I get
to listen to interviews of the various people who work here and translate their
message. Since this is meant to be
a promo video, everyone’s statements are all very optimistic and
inspiring…maybe not one hundred percent realistic, but it does remind me of
what attracted me to this internship and the ultimate reason that I’m here: we’re
creating an important national park in Chile that leaves behind it a legacy for
generations (of humans and other animals) to come.
Another reminder of why I’m here came a few weekends ago
with a quick backpacking trip into Cochrane through the Tamango National
Reserve. I went with a group of
interns and we had the most incredible time. On day one, we got a late start and slowly made our way up
part of the Lagunas Altas trail into the saddle between Cerro Tamango and Cerro
Tamanguito, from which we got some pretty awesome views of the Chacabuco Valley
behind us and the Tamango Reserve ahead.
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| Looking down at the recovering burn area and the Valle Chacabuco and Jeinimeni Reserve beyond. |
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| In the saddle between the two peaks, looking towards the Tamango Reserve. |
We decided to climb to the top of Cerro Tamango, which
measures just over a mile high, and left our packs in a field below the start
of our ascent. Tamango has quite a
few false summits, and we spent a couple hours scrambling up through continuous
scree fields and winding our way around small high alpine lakes. When we finally got to the
top…incredible. There was a low
and heavy blanket of clouds overhead which somewhat diminished our view, but we
could still see forever in all directions; from the Río Baker to Lago Cochrane,
from the Jeinimeni Reserve to Cochrane and beyond.
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| From partway up Cerro Tamango, looking down on Cerro Tamanguito (foreground), Valle Chacabuco (left) and the Tamango Reserve (right). |
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| From the summit of Cerro Tamango. |
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| From the summit, southeast over the Tamango Reserve, with Lago Cochrane the last lake in the background. |
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| The view south from the summit over Tamango Reserve and Cochrane, with Pete. |
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| Group shot with (clockwise) Josh, Eric, Pete, me, Diane, and Collin. This is why I love these people. |
We loitered briefly at the summit, but then began to pick our way down the rocks, to make it to our packs and get a ways further to find a campsite before dark. The afternoon light during our descent couldn’t have been better.
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| The Río Baker and a wee bit of the northern ice field. |
The next day we were tasked with finding an existing trail
in the Tamango Reserve that would take us downhill and into Cochrane, using
only an old and partially reliable map and our general sense of direction. We wandered and bushwhacked our way
through the southern beech forests for most of the day, a different experience
from the other terrain we’d covered thus far. The forests are beautiful, and have a contagious kind of
inherent peace to them that makes you feel like an explorer in a new wondrous
place. For us, that’s actually
what we were.
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| The rare sight of Cerro San Lorenzo (3706 m or 12,159 ft), the second highest peak in Patagonia, looms over the Tamango Reserve. |
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| Collin and Pete in the southern beech forest. |
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| Josh. |
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| Looking south-ish, with Cochrane barely visible on the left. |
We rolled into Cochrane in the late afternoon, and since it
was Sunday and everything was closed, we headed straight for the rodeo grounds
to catch the end of the Fiesta Costumbrista, a small cultural event with a
rodeo, food, and a live cumbia band.
We (or at least I) had a good time watching the end of the jineteada (a
contest riding a bucking horse) and dancing to the live music. We camped close to the rodeo grounds
and hitched a ride back to the cruce the next day, from where we hoofed it back
to the estancia, arriving tired and happy and refreshed.
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| The start of a jineteada round. |
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| The food bus where we bought some french fries. |
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| The live cumbia band with lots of dancers up front. |
The next couple weeks passed by in a blur of few visitors, a
couple journeys up the Aviles river valley, numerous sunny afternoons of
frisbee, and an intern camping excursion by the Río Chacabuco. In this case, I’ll let some pictures do
the talking:
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| The Río Aviles. |
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| Cerro Pintura above the Río Aviles. |
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| The runout of the Río Aviles where it winds its way towards the Río Chacabuco. |
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| Sarah in the reeds on the shore of Laguna Cisnes. |
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| Incredible late afternoon on the way to our camping spot at the Río Chac. |
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| Collin. |
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| The view of the Río Chacabuco from the beach where we camped. |
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| Sunset. |
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| Eric, Diane, Jeremy, Nadine, and Collin 'round the campfire. Sarah's trout, which she caught in the river, is roasting in tin foil in the flames. |
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| Newly discovered cliff jumping spot. Jeremy takes a leap. |
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| Jeremy and Nadine. |
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| Josh, super excited about the rainbow trout he caught. |
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| Annabelle, Jeremy, and Sarah. |
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| Josh and Collin. See Collin's line? |
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| Jeremy and Josh. |
In the past few days, we’ve had some employees from Kris and
Doug’s projects in Argentina (the
future Esteros del Iberá National Park and the Laguna
Blanca farm) here as part of a “global” team meeting, the first of its
kind. The idea was to have all the
staff from three of Kris and Doug’s foundations meet here in Val Chac and spend
the week getting to know each other and learning about everyone’s work. Unfortunately, none of the crew from
Pumalín joined us for fear of transportation issues, but the week still turned
out to be fun and interesting. The
first two days were filled with presentations about the various projects and
what we’re all hoping to accomplish in the next couple years, interspersed with
some afternoon hikes and horseback rides.
Yes, I finally got out on a horse!
No, I didn’t take my camera, but considering that I got launched off my
horse at one point (when we were galloping along and he tripped), it’s probably
a good thing I didn’t have anything important with me. I was fine, just a little sore, and the event didn’t put much of a damper on the ride in general. I’m addicted and want to go back out again as soon as I
can. Who knows when that will be.
This coming week we’re supposed to host a group of people
from
Ecotrust, a Portland-based organization that aims for “reliable
prosperity,” helping found and fund projects that protect the natural
environment in politically and economically viable and profitable ways so that
they can be self-sustaining for long periods of time. They’re coming in the capacity of potential donors to our
efforts, so fingers crossed that they can actually make it here. The group is slated to spend a week at
the estancia, surely being entertained by Kris and exploring many aspects of
the project, hopefully walking away with the idea that our work is worth
supporting. They are really the
last important group of people to come this season, besides a few tourists and
a German TV crew that come later in the month. By the eighteenth of March, it seems like our traffic will
drop off almost completely, so I’m starting to compile ideas of what to do with
the rest of my time in Chile. I
want to spend as much time as I can getting to know new places, be it here in
the park or elsewhere in Patagonia.
Time to break out that backpack again!
In the meantime, I’ve found a few interesting articles in
the past few weeks when there’s enough internet to peruse the news. Here are a couple of them:
And finally, this New York Times article just came out
today, about the general paradox we’ve put ourselves in the middle of here
around Cochrane. Although the
article doesn’t paint the most flattering picture of CP, it is pretty accurate;
however, during and after talking to the reporter, we were and are working with
a local sociologist to figure out what the barriers are to our acceptance in
Cochrane and she’s proposed some initiatives to put into action to see if we
can’t start to win people over.
That’s part of what the promo video I translated is for as well. But without further ado, read up:
