Posted 27 March 2007
Punta Arenas, unlike most Chilean towns showed fully its European colonial past. There were European style city buildings of some presence, many with plaques indicating their connection with the early antartic explorers like Scott, Shackleton and Amundsen. The old post office from which Scott posted 400 cards on his successful return from his first reconnaisance is now a centre for the administration of Chilean Antarctica (an area also claimed by Britain and Argentina).
You would however be forgiven for not knowing this was once one of the most strategic of ports, because of Antarctica and of the wealth arising from the world dominant Chilean wool trade in the late 1800s and early 1900s. That the town is even by the sea is a well hidden fact (no wonder given the grimy condition of the port and sea shore). In fact as we discovered later on our way to the airport they have now built a second port for their Armada, the tourist cruiser, and nearby a harbour for small fishing boats. Their commercial sea faring heritage is well and truly hidden.
The slump began with the end of sail, so that ships would no longer round Cape Horn in seek of shelter but go further north to Conception to pick up coal mined in its under sea pits. The second factor was of course the opening of the Panama Canal which eliminated the need to go round Cape Horn.
Nevertheless it was an interesting town with a pub with a thriving set lunch trade next door to El Coffee, which unusually for Chile actually produces real coffee and was rewarded with a good local trade, and a visually interesting local smartly suited business clientele.
Whilst wandering around the filthy old seaboard into the Barrio Croatia we made another chance discovery, a cafe called Los Immigrantes. It was packed with locals taking 'onces', and inside the walls were lined with a klaidoscope of photos recording the history of the Croatian community.
The cafe which Dinka had opened just a year ago was thriving and full of atmosphere. The first three pages of the menu recorded the history of the community from its earliest days in the late 1800s and in particular documented both of her parents' families. Showing how they had gone out to seek gold and a much better life only to find themselves in a cold, windy, wet, inhospitable place.
Initially they could only dream of returning to the beautiful climate of their native land. Gradually they mastered the conditions, even getting to pick one lettuce a day from their crop ravished by the wind was at the time a sign of success. Dinka´s father had run the same property as a grocery serving the area for over 50 years, then it closed for nearly ten before she, capitalising on her talent as a pastry cook, converted into an attractive cafe and meeting point.
There was a guest house called Dinka´s close to where we were staying. Ely House was run by a very cheerful and hardworking woman who charged 2 x 6K and, as Joan observed, reserved a big kiss for all her male guests. She met our bus touting for custom and since she offered free transfer by minibus at the dead of night she cleaned up on the available trade.
In a street nearby The Green House was still advertising its owners, a bagpipe playing psychologist and a anthropologist, one of three guest houses that I had highlighted in our guidebook as of particular interest, but sadly it was completely destroyed by fire. In our first days in Chile Joan had read in the paper that several lives had been lost in a guest house fire in Punta Arenas at the end of December, but we think that had a different name. It all goes to show the hazard of fire in a country of wooden house encapsulated with galvanised steel strip. They are quite simply death traps. We both began to assess the escape routes and concluded we needed to be lucky to get out. For the steel would ensure no easy way to break out and the wood an intense blaze. It goes to show how dependent you are on the good behaviour of your fellow guests.
Though I must say they were a very good but changing group. Two of the Maltese worked for Malta Air and so got free air tickets and had used them to travel widely, the other a postman and one time footballer often joined them. He was proud of the fact that there was a Maltese footballer now playing for Coventry City and made a TV subscription which enabled him to watch all their games.
We spoke with English Patrick who was on an 15 month trip around the world and his girlfriend who had joined him for Christmas in Bali and was now converted to the traveling life. He had recently been to the island Pulau Weh off Bandeh Aceh (Sumatara) of which we have such wonderful memories, and said it was up and running again, and the coral was still magnificent. Takes more than a tsunami to destroy such wonderful natural spots. We left with three handsome young Slovac men intent on trekking in Torres del Paine.
We left the big rucksack at Ely House and took the 9am bus to Puerto Natales, prominent as a tourist centre solely as the stepping off point for Torres del Paine. In contrast to Punta Arenas it was new and with little character. The number of guest houses was testament to the huge number of in transit tourists that they accommodated at the height of season.
The only restaurant in town with any trade, English speaking El Living, was packed with travelers, a place with a lovely informal atmosphere with many people eating on their knees whilst sitting in settees. We had lunch with another English lady of our age who had been in Coyhaique several years ago on an Operation Raleigh project. (They had built a large suspension bridge linking a village in Borneo with the pasture on the other side of a major river.) She had a berth on the Navemag ferry which was to depart that evening on the 4 day trip north to Puerto Montt - something we had originally planned to do.
Our landlady had suggested we take a taxi and visit the Frigorifico museum at Puerto Borries.
Not knowing what to expect we arrived at a desolate factory which was now being converted to a museum to remind us that in the early 1900s this had been the export centre for what was the largest shep trade in the world. In those days there were 60 million sheep in Patagonia, but now with the changes in trade pattern that had fallen to 3 million. In its heyday it had a compound for 250,000 live sheep. It carried out the shearing, washed and dried the wool before packing in bales. The sheep were slaughtered and the fat and skins were separated off. The fat was processed ready for use in the candle and soap industries and put in barrels. The skins were tanned and packed. The mutton was frozen ready for export. All the products were loaded on ships bound for Europe from the associated jetty.
The train that pulled the wagons to the ships was also used morning and night to transfer workers from Puerto Natales, was displayed in the that town. Four hundred people worked in the plant rising to 800 at the peak season. They lost trade due to the opening up of the Panama canal, the rise of the New Zealand industry and the transition from frozen to chilled meat exporting. The teeth of sheep, which had been originally introduced from the Falklands, were not adapted to the tough yellow grass of Patagonia, so they wore down causing the sheep to pull up the grass rather than bite it, thus destroying their own habitat.
The machinery rooms were still fully equipped with their original 1913 British machinery. The huge steam driven Haslam of Derby ammonia compressors with their immense flywheels were in as good a condition as when they were first installed. In deed I wondered if the firm had been back recently to clean and renovate. The 100 volt DC generators had been built by Bellis and Morecombe, the coal and wood fired boilers were by made by Babcock and the refrigeration controls by a firm from London. It's easy to wonder at the extent of British world trade, with the prestige of our manufacturing of the day and the need to import of wool and lamb.
Back in the El Living we got talking to Heink and his wife who was nicknamed Will, who were a similar age to us. They were Dutch and had just completed a three week sail in a yacht from Ushuaia, five paying crew who got on really well. The middle-aged Dutch woman who was skipper and her husband came in later.
Heink and Will were retired and had traveled longer than us. They had stated in 1986, we too had been in Nepal in 1989 at the height of the kerosene dispute with India and we all had been in China last Sept/October. Before leaving they gave us their contact details and a heart felt invitation to call them if we were ever near Rotterdam, refusing my offer to reciprocate with a 'you come first'.
Punta Arenas, unlike most Chilean towns showed fully its European colonial past. There were European style city buildings of some presence, many with plaques indicating their connection with the early antartic explorers like Scott, Shackleton and Amundsen. The old post office from which Scott posted 400 cards on his successful return from his first reconnaisance is now a centre for the administration of Chilean Antarctica (an area also claimed by Britain and Argentina).
 |
| PUNTA ARENAS (Sandy Point) |
You would however be forgiven for not knowing this was once one of the most strategic of ports, because of Antarctica and of the wealth arising from the world dominant Chilean wool trade in the late 1800s and early 1900s. That the town is even by the sea is a well hidden fact (no wonder given the grimy condition of the port and sea shore). In fact as we discovered later on our way to the airport they have now built a second port for their Armada, the tourist cruiser, and nearby a harbour for small fishing boats. Their commercial sea faring heritage is well and truly hidden.
The slump began with the end of sail, so that ships would no longer round Cape Horn in seek of shelter but go further north to Conception to pick up coal mined in its under sea pits. The second factor was of course the opening of the Panama Canal which eliminated the need to go round Cape Horn.
Nevertheless it was an interesting town with a pub with a thriving set lunch trade next door to El Coffee, which unusually for Chile actually produces real coffee and was rewarded with a good local trade, and a visually interesting local smartly suited business clientele.
Whilst wandering around the filthy old seaboard into the Barrio Croatia we made another chance discovery, a cafe called Los Immigrantes. It was packed with locals taking 'onces', and inside the walls were lined with a klaidoscope of photos recording the history of the Croatian community.
 |
| LOS IMMIGRANTES CROATION |
The cafe which Dinka had opened just a year ago was thriving and full of atmosphere. The first three pages of the menu recorded the history of the community from its earliest days in the late 1800s and in particular documented both of her parents' families. Showing how they had gone out to seek gold and a much better life only to find themselves in a cold, windy, wet, inhospitable place.
Initially they could only dream of returning to the beautiful climate of their native land. Gradually they mastered the conditions, even getting to pick one lettuce a day from their crop ravished by the wind was at the time a sign of success. Dinka´s father had run the same property as a grocery serving the area for over 50 years, then it closed for nearly ten before she, capitalising on her talent as a pastry cook, converted into an attractive cafe and meeting point.
There was a guest house called Dinka´s close to where we were staying. Ely House was run by a very cheerful and hardworking woman who charged 2 x 6K and, as Joan observed, reserved a big kiss for all her male guests. She met our bus touting for custom and since she offered free transfer by minibus at the dead of night she cleaned up on the available trade.
In a street nearby The Green House was still advertising its owners, a bagpipe playing psychologist and a anthropologist, one of three guest houses that I had highlighted in our guidebook as of particular interest, but sadly it was completely destroyed by fire. In our first days in Chile Joan had read in the paper that several lives had been lost in a guest house fire in Punta Arenas at the end of December, but we think that had a different name. It all goes to show the hazard of fire in a country of wooden house encapsulated with galvanised steel strip. They are quite simply death traps. We both began to assess the escape routes and concluded we needed to be lucky to get out. For the steel would ensure no easy way to break out and the wood an intense blaze. It goes to show how dependent you are on the good behaviour of your fellow guests.
Though I must say they were a very good but changing group. Two of the Maltese worked for Malta Air and so got free air tickets and had used them to travel widely, the other a postman and one time footballer often joined them. He was proud of the fact that there was a Maltese footballer now playing for Coventry City and made a TV subscription which enabled him to watch all their games.
We spoke with English Patrick who was on an 15 month trip around the world and his girlfriend who had joined him for Christmas in Bali and was now converted to the traveling life. He had recently been to the island Pulau Weh off Bandeh Aceh (Sumatara) of which we have such wonderful memories, and said it was up and running again, and the coral was still magnificent. Takes more than a tsunami to destroy such wonderful natural spots. We left with three handsome young Slovac men intent on trekking in Torres del Paine.
We left the big rucksack at Ely House and took the 9am bus to Puerto Natales, prominent as a tourist centre solely as the stepping off point for Torres del Paine. In contrast to Punta Arenas it was new and with little character. The number of guest houses was testament to the huge number of in transit tourists that they accommodated at the height of season.
The only restaurant in town with any trade, English speaking El Living, was packed with travelers, a place with a lovely informal atmosphere with many people eating on their knees whilst sitting in settees. We had lunch with another English lady of our age who had been in Coyhaique several years ago on an Operation Raleigh project. (They had built a large suspension bridge linking a village in Borneo with the pasture on the other side of a major river.) She had a berth on the Navemag ferry which was to depart that evening on the 4 day trip north to Puerto Montt - something we had originally planned to do.
Our landlady had suggested we take a taxi and visit the Frigorifico museum at Puerto Borries.
 |
| PUERTO BORRIES |
The train that pulled the wagons to the ships was also used morning and night to transfer workers from Puerto Natales, was displayed in the that town. Four hundred people worked in the plant rising to 800 at the peak season. They lost trade due to the opening up of the Panama canal, the rise of the New Zealand industry and the transition from frozen to chilled meat exporting. The teeth of sheep, which had been originally introduced from the Falklands, were not adapted to the tough yellow grass of Patagonia, so they wore down causing the sheep to pull up the grass rather than bite it, thus destroying their own habitat.
 |
| HASLAM of DERBY AMMONIA COMPRESSOR |
Back in the El Living we got talking to Heink and his wife who was nicknamed Will, who were a similar age to us. They were Dutch and had just completed a three week sail in a yacht from Ushuaia, five paying crew who got on really well. The middle-aged Dutch woman who was skipper and her husband came in later.
Heink and Will were retired and had traveled longer than us. They had stated in 1986, we too had been in Nepal in 1989 at the height of the kerosene dispute with India and we all had been in China last Sept/October. Before leaving they gave us their contact details and a heart felt invitation to call them if we were ever near Rotterdam, refusing my offer to reciprocate with a 'you come first'.
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