Second time lucky! This time it should work out. Finally we will set sail and say farewell to the mainland of Chile. After we had almost been ready to leave at new years day, including everything one needs when planning to be on the ocean for 3 or more month – loads of food, petrol, drinking water, cooking gas … – today at the end of March we are still moored in Valdivia. What got in our way? We were forced to totally reorganize our business in Berlin. All but not funny. More about this later on.
After all this hassle in Berlin Kalibu has been in Chile for one year and one month, a long time. Needless to mention, we had a good time here. We like Chile very much. Dear Chilenos you have a great country!
The range of very varied, but always spectacular scenery, flora and fauna is truly unique. This is, of course, due to the extreme length of the country. As you know Chile extends from Antarctica to the Atacama Desert and from the ice-covered summits of the Andes to the tropical Easter Island in the Pacific. This alone is impressive.
And then there are the lovely people. We will surely miss the composed, unagitated, lovable and almost always helpful manner of the Chileans.
Is there something we did not like? Yes, I remember, the children miss mozzarella (if anyone here should contradict, sorry, what is sold in the Chilean supermarkets as Mozarella, is a joke and every real Italian will cry bitterly when he sees it). Mascarpone would also be nice to have, for a delicious Tiramisu. But surely there will soon be a resourceful business man or woman among the Italian immigrants who will be tackling this.
Something else? Yes, there are the Salmoneras and the consequent pollution of the Pacific. Anything but nice, but compared to the amounts of plastics that are washed in the oceans in Asia every day, it is barely worth mentioning. And a change of attitudes is visible, at least in Valdivia.
Finally there is the language. Lo siento mucho, dear Chilenos, we have not managed to learn Spanish properly. Ashes on our head! For too long we were traveling on the lonely canales where we have not encountered any human soul. Then in Puerto Montt the international sailing community spoke mainly English. Reading Spanish turned out to be not so difficult, but speaking the language is just another thing.
Te vamos a extrañar. We say good-bye with a few more impressions from this beautiful country.
See also Best of 2016
Ein Gedanke zu „Farewell to mainland Chile“