South America (Day 7)

March 25

In life it is not where you go, it is who you travel with. ~ Charles M. Schulz

December 26

You will never get any more out of life than you expect. ~ Bruce Lee

After multiple delays in processing this South America blog (medical (doing fine), Big Ten and high school basketball tournaments, and general gremlin attacks on our computers and their apps), I’m hoping to finally get rolling again. Said delays created long distance phone calls of concern. There were also so many photos I should have broken this into two posts. Anyway, this is our first adventure outside of South American urbanity to the Chilean Lake District. ~ Me

Think of how stupid the average person is, and realize half of them are stupider than that. ~ George Carlin

[Osorno Volcano is a 2,652-metre-tall (8,701 ft) conical stratovolcano lying between Osorno Province and Llanquihue Province in the Los Lagos Region of southern Chile. It stands on the southeastern shore of Llanquihue Lake, and also towers over Todo los Santos Lake. Osorno is considered a symbol of the local landscape and, as such, tends to be the referential element of the area in regards to tourism. By some definitions, it marks the northern boundary of Chilean Patagonia (Wikipedia).]

[We’re on a bus ride through central Chile to see volcanoes and lakes . . . ]

For every complex problem, there is a solution that is simple, neat, and wrong. ~ H. L. Mencken

[These are a few of the several (and more) photos I took of Orsono – a beautiful, conical, snow-capped volcano on a beautiful day . . . ]

You cannot explore the universe if you think that you are the center of it. ~ Joshua Suya Pelicano

So much of who we are is where we have been. ~ William Langewiesche

We wander for distraction, but we travel for fulfillment. ~ Hilaire Belloc

[El Galpón is an ecotourism park that has cabins to receive visitors, large green areas, children’s games, sports areas and an elegant room for social events. A space to spend a weekend in the company of the family, is located in Ayapango, State of Mexico (Wikipedia).]

We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time. ~ T.S. Eliot

[Calbuco is a stratovolcano in southern Chile, located southeast of Llanquihue Lake and northwest of Chapo Lake, in the Los Lagos Region, and close to the cities of Puerto Varas and Puerto Montt. With an elevation of 2,015 meters above sea level, the volcano and the surrounding area are protected within the Llanquihue National Reserve. The most recent eruption, a major VEI 4 event, happened with little warning on April 22–23, 2015, followed by a smaller eruption on April 30. This was Calbuco’s first activity since 1972 (Wikipedia).]

Travel makes one modest, you see what a tiny place you occupy in the world. ~ Gustave Flaubert

[Suspected to be a campground . . . ]

The most beautiful thing in the world is of course, the world itself. ~ Wallace Stevens

The world is a book and those who do not travel read only one page. ~ St Augustine

[Orsono and Calbuco in the same shot, with reflections from the bus window thrown in at no extra charge . . . ]

Once a year, go someplace you’ve never been before. ~ Dalai Lama

[Casablanca is a holocene stratovolcano in the Andes of Los Lagos Region. It is located about 90 km east of the city of Orsono and host on its slopes the Antillanca ski resort. The complex erupted lavas with composition between basalt and andesite and has no recorded historical eruptions. Several scoria cones formed after the last ice age (Wikipedia).]

The life you have led doesn’t need to be the only life you have. ~ Anna Quindlen

[The Chilean Lake District is a zone in Southern Chile defined by its many lakes in the Andean foothills. The term is primarily used in tourism literature and advertising, in Chile Zona Sur is preferred as a geographical concept. The Chilean Lake District includes the cities of Temuco, Villarrica, Pucon, Valdivia, Orsono, Entre Lagos (Puyehue),Puerto Octay, Frutillar, Puerto Varas, and Puerto Montt (Wikipedia).]

Seize the day (boys). Make your life extraordinary. ~ John Keating

[A boat ride on Lake Todos Los Santos in Vicente Pérez Rosales National Park . . . ]

In this spot, the photo at the top of this post (and all others throughout) . . .

It is a big beautiful world. Most of us live and die in the same corner where we were born and never get to see any of it. I don’t want to be most of us. ~ Oberyn Martell

[A now, the views from the boat . . . ]

Whenever I miss traveling (which is pretty much all the time), I find myself googling quotes to cheer me up. ~ Anna Faustino

[Little Ole really gets around . . . ]

I have worn the dust of many foreign streets, but to brush it off would surely be a crime. I have the memories of many foreign adventures, but to forget them would surely be a sin. So, breath in the dust and keep the memories in. ~ Rowland Waring-Flood

[Casablanca . . . ]

If you’re not moving, you’re standing still. ~ Stephen Trafton

Fear of the unknown will always be overpowered by human desire toward exploration. Curiosity is the risk, whose gifts often pays off. ~ Mladen Đorđević

[Well, I told you I took a lot of shots of Osorno . . . ]

Exploring the world is one the best ways of exploring the mind, and walking travels both terrains. ~ Rebecca Solnit

[That’s our new travel friend Rich in the middle background . . . ]

People have always looked to the horizon and feared that which they did not understand. ~ Matt Kaplan

[And our new travel friend Liz as photographer . . . ]

I’ve been to almost as many places as my luggage. ~ Bob Hope

Oh the places you’ll go. ~ Dr. Seuss

[Fellow travelers we met on the trip, Liz and Rich (in above photos solo) from Stanford, and with whom we became friends . . . ]

Once the travel bug bites, there is no known antidote, and I know that I shall be happily infected until the end of my life.  ~  Michael Palin

The world’s mine oyster… ~ William Shakespeare

A person does not grow from the ground like a vine or a tree, one is not part of a plot of land. Mankind has legs so it can wander. ~ Roman Payne

[Even more American tourists . . . ]

We can never have enough of nature. ~ Henry David Thoreau

[And no, the guy in the background with the hat is not William Kent Krueger . . . ]

Love is a game that two can play and both win. ~ Eva Gabor

The gladdest moment in human life is a departure into unknown lands. ~ Sir Richard Burton

[Lakeshore views . . . ]

This I believe: that the free, exploring mind of the individual human is the most valuable thing in the world. ~ John Steinbeck

It is in our nature to explore, to reach out into the unknown. The only true failure would be not to explore at all. ~ Ernest Shackleton

Every man can transform the world from one of monotony and drabness to one of excitement and adventure. ~ Irving Wallace

I will go anywhere, as long as it is forward. ~ David Livingstone

[Petrohué Waterfalls is a chute-type waterfall in the upper reach of Petrohué River in Chile, a short distance downstream of the source of this river in Todos los Santos Lake. This waterfall is inside the Vicente Pérez Rosales National Park, close to the road leading to the Petrohue locality on Lake Todos los Santos (Wikipedia).]

[Back ashore, hiking Saltos del Rio Petrohue . . .

All journeys have secret destinations of which the traveler is unaware. ~ Martin Buber

The first condition of understanding a foreign country is to smell it. ~ Rudyard Kipling

Adventure, yeah, I guess that’s what you call it when everybody comes back alive. ~ Mercedes Lackey

People protect what they love. ~ Jacques Cousteau

[Trying to keep up with the Supervisor . . . ]

Traveling – it leaves you speechless, then turns you into a storyteller. ~ Ibn Battuta

[From here Orsono and Casablanca are both in view . . . ]

We need the tonic of wildness…We can never have enough of nature. ~ Henry David Thoreau

I will come again and conquer you because as a mountain you can’t grow… but as a human, I can. ~ Edmund Hillary

[The crowd at the falls overlook . . . ]

To travel is to discover that everyone is wrong about other countries. ~ Aldous Huxley

In wisdom gathered over time I have found that every experience is a form of exploration. ~ Ansel Adams

[The crowds, the crowds . . . ]

Equipped with his five senses, man explores the universe around him and calls the adventure Science. ~ Edwin Hubble

[Rich, Liz, Ruthie, some people, and Orsono . . . ]

Drink heavily with locals when possible. ~ Anthony Bourdain

We only know a tiny proportion about the complexity of the natural world. There are always new things to find out if you go looking for them. ~ David Attenborough

We forget that the water cycle and the life cycle are one. ~ Jacques Cousteau

Once you get to earth orbit, you’re halfway to anywhere in the solar system. ~ Robert A. Heinlein

You should be excited to meet new people and try new things—to assume the best about them, in the absence of evidence to the contrary. ~ Brian Christian

I am just a child who has never grown up. I still keep asking these ‘how’ and ‘why’ questions. Occasionally, I find an answer. ~ Stephen Hawking

We want to explore; we want to understand. We want to believe. ~ Robert C. Jacobson

[A short bus ride to a beach on Llanquihue Lake, Chile’s 2nd largest lake . . . ]

Space is only 100 kilometers above sea level. That’s incredibly close—about an hour’s drive on most United States highways (at speed limit, of course). ~ Robert C. Jacobson

An explorer cannot stay at home reading maps other men have made. ~ Susanna Clarke

My true ecstasy is to hunt, seek, and find new things in life. ~ Helen Edwards

J. Robert Oppenheimer once remarked, “live always at the ‘edge of mystery’—the boundary of the unknown. ~ Rebecca Solnit

[The drive along Llanquihue Lake to Puerto Varas . . . ]

Perhaps there is no thrill so great as that which comes with a walk in the freshness of morning air. ~ Hellen Keller

[The Puerto Varas “boardwalk” . . . ]

As a child, a library card takes you to exotic, faraway places. When you’re grown up, a credit card does it. ~ Sam Ewing

[Lunch at Hotel Cumbres Puerto Varas on the waterfront . . . ]

Among the trees, I have come to find that there is no age limit to exploration. There is no end to learning. ~ Jessica Marie Baumgartner

[This was our view coming out of the restaurant after lunch . . . ]

To think, she could have lived and died and never seen the sea. ~ V. E. Schwab

[Our volcanoes on the far side . . . ]

There is a reason the remote Pacific was the last place on Earth to be settled by humans: it was the most difficult, more daunting even than the deserts or the ice. ~ Christina Thompson

[Really too bad we didn’t have a nice day . . . ]

Where ever humans can’t go, the earth is in peace. Not much left, though. That is why we reach out to the universe. ~ Lenfantvivant

[When telephoto lenses come in handy . . . ]

‘No Trespassing’ actually means ‘Best views this way’. ~ Rip Pereida

If ever it’s necessary to ride the bandwagon, it’s done with one leg swinging out and eyes scoping the fields. ~ Criss Jami

[International tourists?]

Emergencies have always been necessary to progress.  ~ Victor Hugo

[Note to Puerto Varas Chamber of Commerce: Please permit street art on this forsaken wall . . . ]

Is it fair to say that traveling is life itself? ~ Louis Yako

[Left side center, where we had lunch . . . ]

We tend to think things are new because we’ve just discovered them. ~ Madeline L’Engle

There’s no blank spots on the map anymore, anywhere on earth. If you want a blank spot on the map, you gotta leave the map behind. ~ Jon Krakauer

[Why yes, I am a tourist from the United States. How did you guess?]

Travel is broadening. It’s time to hit the road again. ~ Carl Sagan

Once upon a time, we soared into the Solar System. For a few years. Then we hurried back. Why? What happened? What was ‘Apollo’ really about? ~ Carl Sagan

[Why yes, I too am a tourist from the United States . . . ]

Whether women are better than men I cannot say – but I can say they are certainly no worse. ~ Golda Meir

Through a strange kind of geographic arrogance, Europeans like to think that the world was a silent, dark, unknown place until they trooped out and discovered it. ~ Tahir Shah

It is often said that there are very few places left on earth that have yet to be discovered. But those who say this are usually referring to places that exist at the human scale. ~ Mark Miodownik

Inquiring minds want to know: What’s the difference between sea salt . . . and salt? ~ Me

[A big boat . . . ]

He who is outside his door has the hardest part of his journey behind him.  ~   Dutch Proverb

[We are tendering back to our ship . . . ]

Traveling is a brutality. It forces you to trust strangers and to lose sight of all that familiar comfort of home and friends. You are constantly off balance. Nothing is yours except the essential things – air, sleep, dreams, the sea, the sky – all things tending towards eternal or we imagine of it. ~ Cesare Pavese

The country remained the same, and was extremely uninteresting. The complete similarity of the productions throughout Patagonia is one of its most striking characters. ~ Charles Darwin

Up Next: Day 8 . . .