Debbie in Chile: Puerto Varas

Me and C have been in Puerto Varas since last Thursday. We got engaged last Saturday! So this was a great trip to rest and celebrate.

I wanted to write this post really bad because the trip has been amazing and very surprising. The views are insane, and we have seen a crazy amount of animals! The air is so clean here (comparted to Santiago) and also we had some really beautiful sunny days.

Day 1: Puerto Varas

Landed at 9 AM in Puerto Montt, rented a car
Drove 30 min to Puerto Varas
Walked all around the town center (it's pretty small)
Saw views of the Llanquihue Lake, and 2 volcanoes: Osorno (wide but really symmetrical and with a rounded point) and Calbuco (wide and with a flattened top with spiky edges).
Had a 2nd (actually third counting what they gave on the plane) breakfast at Mawen, a traditional café in the town center. That was around 11:30 AM
Kept walking around and went to the hotel to have a small break
Went out again to the beach, supermarket and dinner at Mesa Tropera (the cool restorant built on stilts over the lake, hard to get a table). I have decidedly written off beer. It is made here and everything and I can't get myself to like it

Day 2: Saltos de Petrohue

Drove to Saltos del Petrohue, a park surrounding the Ptrohue river in a part where there are a bunch of rapids and waterfalls. The water's color is amazing and super translucent.
In the park we bought tickets for rafting on the river for the afternoon
We drove to the Lago de Todos los Santos, a smaller (still huge) lake 5 minutes away where we could've (we didn't because of the rafting) taken a boat to a small town right on the border with Argentina.
We had a quick lunch in La Base in Ensenada (like a town build along a part of the highway with lots of restorants).
Went to rafting and it was amazing. The water was not that cold and the views of the river, woods and volcanoes in the back was unforgettable. Also we caught huge waves! This is as adventurous as I get haha.

We finished around 6 and went towards the Osorno Volvano.
We stopped at Laguna Verde on the way and did a 15 min. trail to see the mini mossy part of the Llanquihue lake.
We went up the Osorno Volcano. It was about a 45 min drive with curves up to the ski center at the middle of the volcano. We parked there to look at the views from the top and watch the sun start to set and touch some snow.

At the end of the day, we had pizza at Quintal, on the way to our hotel.

Day 3: Termas del Sol

We drove down towards Caleta La Arena to take the long route to Termas del Sol, a place with thermal water hot pools to spend the day relaxing. It was raining a little which made it perfect for this.
We grabbed a 30 min ferry (the car rode on the boat!) to cross a part of the lake and continue on to the Termas del Sol. It was 1 hour of a rocky road until we arrived.
The pools started from 36 degrees and there was one that was 45 degrees °C. We only dipped our toes in that one. The best was 39 and 40.
We shared a pizza in the cafeteria before having another short round of the pools.
We drove back vía the short route (north), stopping by Cochamó and reaching Ensenada from this new side.
The 50 min way from Cochamó to Ensenada was absolutely amazing. A road with barely any construction, constant views of the lake, meadow, dipping in and out of tunnels of trees with the sunlight (that came out in the afternoon) peeking in through the leaves and the volcanoes in the background).

On the way from Ensenada to the hotel, we stopped in the Water Mill german club for some Polka in an Oktoberfest.
Finally, we had dinner at a restoraunt called Los Volcanes that had a 50% discount and was very good! I had tomato soup.

Day 4: Frutillar & Puerto Octay

We had a relaxed breakfast in the hotel in the morning and drove to Puerto Octay. It was a really small town. We saw the mini beach, the main square and some bridges and docks.
Afterwards we drove 20 min through the forest and along the lake to Frutillar. This was a beautiful and much more touristy town.
The whole town is basically 2 paralell streets: 1 along the waterfront. On the far right, the "Teatro del Lago". A round wooden thrater on the lake. At the middle, a huge lookout spot over the lake, a wooden bridge with a mini gazeebo at the end. It doubled as a dock where we boarded a "bandurria" boat for a 45 min ride around the Frutillar bay of the lake.
We had lunch at A restorant Colono something, right in front of the iconic piano sculpture in front of the beach. Later we had some ice cream at Pim and ate it on the beach to end the day.
Back in Puerto Varas, we had dinner at Bargual, the "Bar" version of Bagual, a famous burger place that turned out to be right next to our hotel!

Day 5: Chill hotel breakfast, walk around town, lunch & go home. Day in progress!

I want to highlight the animals we saw. Some we got to photograph, others not in time.