Punta Arenas, Chile: I had been to el fin de mundo, as far south as you can go save for Antarctica and it was time to start back. The bus ride that first day retraced the same miles I’d been on the down route. The girl at Los Cormoranes had preregistered me at a hosel in Punta Arenas, a different place than where I stayed before. This time the lady waiting for me had come by taxi. Her place was too far to walk and she didn’t have a car. I was easy to recognize, I knew that so when she waved from across the terminal lobby I knew that she knew. She called a taxi and it took about ten minutes to reach her house. The neighborhood was residential with few or no yards, no green space. Some streets had sidewalks, some not. On her website the photos showed only neat, cozy bedrooms. A photo of the house or neighborhood would have scared most tourists off. The house was a low, single story with yellow painted, metal siding. My host Teresa was fifty-ish, lived alone with two rooms to rent. She wanted me to know the cold, wet weather made everything look drab and rough but that it was a good neighborhood; being poor was not a crime. From the outside the house looked like a small compound with the side yard screened off by metal covered gates. She had space for a car to park inside the fence but visibility into the yard was guarded. Inside the house, warm, wood tones created a cozy setting from carpet to paneling and furniture. Unlike other hostels, this really was someone’s home. She had a son in Valparaiso who wanted her to sell the house and move north with them but she didn’t want to give up her independence.
I slept well, she was up early and my jellyroll, slice of cheese and coffee were waiting. They had snow that morning but it melted quickly, sky was low and gray and it felt colder than it was. I’d explored the downtown when I was there earlier and didn’t need to go there again. She pulled out a city map and we studied it for a while. We were only a few blocks from the water, the Straits of Magellan.
When you’re a kid growing up, learning about history and heroes, reading books, hearing stories, some characters capture your imagination while others are just vehicles to carry the story. For me, Christopher Columbus and Vasco De Gama were just dudes who drove boats. But Ferdinand Magellan was a bonafide, real deal, navigator-explorer. He was the first European to circumnavigate the globe. It took two different voyages combined; the first sailing east to the East Indies, then later to the same destination, sailing west. In 1520 he navigated the network of channels through Patagonia from Atlantic to Pacific, thereby avoiding the treacherous passage around Cape Horn. Before that there were stories and partial charts for some of the Strait but Magellan was the guy who charted the whole thing and put it on the map. So my fascination with the Straits of Magellan should be no surprise.
I wanted something special to take with me from that stretch of water. You can buy t-shirts and embossed leather wallets at the gift shops but I wanted a one of a kind something that I required something of me. What better than a sample of the water and a few pebbles from the Straits of Magellan? It would have to be something small, easy to transport on the rest of my journey. I decided on small, sample liquor bottles. Teresa suggested I go to the duty free store. Like her house, it was too far to walk. She called a taxi for me and gave me the address.
Like most duty free stores, the merchandise was limited to expensive jewelry, liquor and such. All over Patagonia with the exception of mercados, (grocery stores) you don’t touch the merchandise. A vendador asks what you want to look at, then pulls it from a shelf and puts it on the counter for you to examine, under their scrutiny. If you want it, they give it to an assistant to wrap, you pay at the check out and pick up your purchase. When I told the vendador what I wanted she didn’t understand. She spoke no English and I didn’t own some of the vocabulary I needed. I was a Gringo with limited language skills trying to buy tiny bottles of booze. What kind of booze didn’t matter, I just wanted screw top bottles with a label. The more I labored over the details the more confused she got. She was ready to throw in the towel and I wanted to tell her not to give up. But I didn’t have the words for ‘give up’. The best I could do was, “No pares ahora;” don’t stop now. Something to say for persistence, after what seemed like a brutal ordeal we connected. From a drawer under the counter she produced a tiny, green bottle of Napoleon Brandy. “Eso es” That’s it I said, pumping my fists. She laughed out loud, “Por que no lo dijiste?” Why didn’t you say so? “Cuantos” how many, she asked. “Tres,” three I answered. “Cuantos” how much? She laughed again, “De nada,” she wasn’t going to charge the Gringo anything. I got a taxi at the stand in front of the building and headed back to Teresa’s.
I had a bus to catch the next day, back to Puerto Natales. There I would catch the Navimag ferry to Puerto Montt, at the north end of the Chilean archipelago. Navimag is Chile’s equivalent to the Marine Highway in Alaska. A fleet of roll-on roll-off ferries, they supply goods and passenger service to and from Chilean cities in the south. Truckloads of live stock and materials drive into the hold and rear deck spaces while passengers are guided to the upper decks at the front. With short daylight hours I had no time to spare. I borrowed an empty jelly jar with a screw top lid to collect water and pebbles and walked the short distance to the Strait. Getting to a suitable collecting spot was a task. I needed very small pebbles and easy access. The bank was mostly mud and the tide was out. I wanted clean water so I did a lot of tip-toeing, rock hopping before I found a good spot and it was on private property. There was no current so I had to move some larger rocks to create a pool where I could dip the jelly jar. Then, picking pebbles proved a task, one at a time, small enough to pass through the narrow neck of the brandy bottle but big enough to be differentiated through the green glass, one from another.
On the way back I stopped at a small mercado. Shopping locally was the custom. Getting around was expensive, most people shopped for what they needed that day, walked to the grocery and carried food home in a bag. It puts everyone in walking distance to buy groceries, big stores in densely populated areas, little ones where it’s sparse. Half a dozen eggs, an onion and a green pepper, some cheddar cheese and a small piece of sausage; I had the makings for an omelette.
Teresa had a small decanter, for vinegar I would think, and we poured all the brandy in that, maybe two full shot glasses worth. I pushed it toward her and let her know it was for her. The smile was fun to watch. She was surprised and delighted, like Christmas. She watched as I loaded the bottles about a third of the way with pebbles and then water up to the top. Screw caps snugged down tight and I would carry them in my back pack. That done, we turned to the kitchen. I asked if she knew how to make American omelettes and she did not. So I taught a short course for her, had her do the hands on and we shared a big omelette for dinner. She cut veggies, crated cheese and saw just how much oil I put in the pan. We pre cooked the sausage, whipped and added eggs, I emphasized low heat, not to rush the eggs, when to add veggies and cheese. Flipping one side before the top was done was an adventure but it doesn’t have to look beautiful. You pull it off the fire before it’s done, let it finish on its own. In other circumstances, I would like her for a neighbor; can’t say that about everyone I meet. Early to sleep, off to Puerto Natales in the morning.
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