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| Puerto Montt, Chile Puerto Montt is a port city and commune in southern Chile, located at the northern end of the Reloncaví Sound in the Llanquihue Province, Los Lagos Region. Puerto Montt, in the Los Lagos region of south central Chile, is one of the few good harbors in Chile. Most coastal cities rely at least in part on water transportation because of Chile's difficult terrain. |
| Puerto Montt from a hill overlooking the city |
| We had to be tendered into the shore to start on our trip to see Orsorno volcano and other local sights. |
| Puerto Montt looks pretty much like an American city. There are many recognisable places like the McDonald's at left. The buildings are all fairly modern and the downtown area looks like that of many cities. There are a few open markets, but generally it looks like a typical downtown area. The Catholic church at right is interesting because it is built from the Alerce tree. This is a type of redwood tree that can live longer than 3000 years. They are protected now and cannot be cut down. Many of the early residences used this tree to make shingles for the roof and sides of the house. You see this a lot in the older neighborhoods. |
| Our next stop on the tour was the town of Puerto Varas on the shore of lake Llanquihue (that's a mouth full!!). It was a nice little town the has the nickname "City of Roses" since there are so many roses on display throughout the city. We did a little shopping in the downtown area before proceeding on. |
| As we left Puerto Varas we had a good view of Mt. Osorno which is our next stop after lunch. |
| We stoped for lunch at the "Club Aleman" for lunch. It was a quaint little place with a German architecture since the German's settle this part of Chile in the 1800's. There influence is obvious in all areas - our guide was namned Ingrid and had a definite German heritage |
| Some local children put on a show of the local dances for us before lunch. They were very cute, especially the little boy who couldn't have been older than 5. The lunch was very good and included a serving of Pesco before lunch, wine with the lunch, and salmon for lunch. We had a blueberry dessert. |
| From our vantage point about 4000 feet up the side of Mt. Osorno we had a great view of Llanquihue Lake. This lake covers ov 350 sq. miles and was formed following an eruption of Mt. Osorna when it damed up a river and caused the level of the lake to rise more that 60 feet before the water could again flow out. We visit this area later in the tour. |
| Dan taking the pictures for the panoramic view of the lake |
| Mt. Osorno |
| Our last stop before returning to the ship was Petrohue Falls. This area is formed from volcanic materials from the Osorno volcano. We had to walk about a quarter of a mile to the falls through the woods. They had put signs by some of the trees to identify the type of tree. This was very useful since we had wondered what the many different trees were. There was one tree that had flowers all over it (unfortunately not one of those identified on the trail and I don't remember what it was called). |
| As we left the Puerto Montt harbor we got one final view of Volcano Osorno (on left) and Volcano Calbuco (on right). |
| We then found a spot in the lounge to enjoy the sunset before heading off to dinner. |