On our last trip to Patagonia we had to wait one month in Buenos Aires for our motorcycles to be delivered. This time…. one day! Oh, yea. Of course, we were not waiting for OUR bikes all we had to do was take a cab to the offices of Ride Adventures in Pucon where they had our bikes shined up and waiting.

But first….. the trip down. Wow, it is a Looooooonnnnnggg Waaaaaay Doooooown. Deby and I arrived at the Seattle airport at 10:00 AM on Wednesday January 16 for a flight to Houston. We arrived in Houston with just enough time to meet Michael and Dee Dee who flew from Idaho, drink a beer and jump on the all night plane to Santiago, Chile. From there we negotiated the organized chaos of retrieving our luggage (a lot of it) and getting through customs in time to make a local flight to Temuco, Chile. We landed in Temuco about 3:00 PM where we jumped on a shuttle van for an hour and a half ride to our Airbnb in Pucon. We arrived there about 5:00 PM on Thursday. So, how many hours was that travelling? How many hours sitting on planes? What ever that adds up to it was many many more hours than the number of sleep hours I had during that time. I could hardly sleep at all. In Pucon we managed to stay awake enough to get a couple of beers and some food at a corner restaurant and crash at 10:00 PM local time. We made it.

Friday was a day off. We spend the day being tourists walking around town and hanging out at the beach.

Michael’s first order of business was to find the beer. He’s a professional.

We walked around town and took touristy pictures. Here is Deby and I with Volcan Villarrica in the background. This volcano is always steaming and is the most active volcano in South America. We were told at night you can sometimes see a red glow at the top. We went to check out the black sand beach along lago villarrica.

Deby went for a quick dip… it was really cold.

Here’s a good picture of Michael with Dee Dee and Deby

It was an amazing day, the weather was perfect, about 90 degrees and lots of sun. It’s the peak of the summer season here so the city was crowded with vacationers. It seems like everyone was from Chile, we didn’t hear any English spoken at all.

At 4:00 we took a cab to pick up the bikes about 20Km east of town. Here is where we first saw the motorcycles we would be on for the rest of the trip.

Two Honda Africa Twins for me and Michael and a Honda 500x for Deby.

We couldn’t believe the beautiful location Ride Adventures has for their shop, wow, look at this view from the parking lot.

It took a couple of hours to inspect the bikes, complete the paperwork and make some small adjustments. We then reviewed the route and Ulli, from Ride Adventures had some great alternate route suggestions. Thanks Ulli.

Here we are, almost ready to ride!

We managed to ride the 20Km back to Pucon with no incidents. Strange, bikes, strange city, lots of weekend traffic. Yes, we were on high alert but arrived safely by about 7:00 PM and tucked the bikes away safely in the secure underground parking of the Airbnb (muchas gracias Monica!). We poked around with some re-packing on the bikes but eventually needed to get out for a walk in the warm evening. We ended up at a rather nice restaurant very close to the Airbnb and sat down for dinner at 10:00 PM which is definitely the appropriate time to arrive at a restaurant in Pucon. It was packed and we got one of the last tables right next to the road.

Here is a page from the menus, I circled what I thought was interesting. For sure, you want to order off of this page if you want to Maintain Your Figure.

But if you want real adventure in dining you want to order the “Tabla de Carnes.” There is a translation in English.

If your wondering about the prices, they use a period instead of a comma to delineate thousands. Tabla de carnes is $15,900. That’s pesos…. so around $20 USD.

Here’s Deby’s plate, brazed brisket… she said it was really good.

We had an outstanding night. The outdoor section was loud and boisterous. We were as loud and rowdy as the best of them. To add to the fun these drummers entertained the crowd from the street.

Finally, at midnight the restaurant started thinning out. I had one last bit of business to take care of inside but needed to find the correct door for “men.” Let’s see…. oh yea, this must be it…..

With that we carefully walked the block to the Airbnb and called it a night.

Saturday January 19.

Hmmm, I didn’t take too many pictures. I was busy navigating (since I’m the one with the GPS) and getting used to the bike. We took off bright and early to beat the heat at 10:30 am. Oh, well, with the late night and packing the bikes I thought that was pretty good. Here was our route.

A total of 176 miles to Valdivia. We took the long route recommended by Ulli which took us along the coast. The temperatures that were in the 90’s in Pucon dropped into the 60’s with fog as we neared the Pacific Ocean. I felt like we were descending into the fog of the Oregon coast which would make sense since we are at about the same latitude south as Oregon is north.

Here is Deby with her Honda 500X, so far she really likes it. Below is my Honda Africa Twin, Michael and Dee Dee are two up on a bike just like it.

We had a nice lunch stop at the Mobydick restaurant in the small port town of Queule Mehuin.

We ended up at the Hotel Entre Tilos in Valdivia. A real nice place, Deby and I stayed there last time we were here in 2017. It was a great wrap to a perfect first day of riding.

So far so good. The bikes are working perfectly, the weather is ideal and the roads and scenery are beautiful. Ahhhh….

So here we go. I hope to post as often as possible. Remember you can click the “follow us” tab at the top to see our real time location. Thanks for all the comments, we love them. I want to answer them all but if I start I’ll be spending my evenings on my computer instead of out exploring this great part of the world.

Hasta Pronto amigos!

Donn and Deby