Just add Water ...

"My need for this strange landscape was profound. Travel, which is nearly always seen as an attempt to escape from the ego, is in my opinion the opposite. Nothing induces concentration or inspires memory like an alien landscape or a foreign culture. It is simply not possible (as romantics think) to lose yourself in an exotic place."

From: The happy Isles of Oceania, Paul Theroux

The movie "The Motorcycle Diaries" showed 2 things very impressively: First, the vastness and beauty of Patagonia, and the style Ernesto "Che" Guevara traveled through it. After watching the movie, the first thing which came to my mind was how nice it would be to kayak along the Pacific Coast of South America. All the way from, let's say from Peru, down to Cape Horn, in a similar relaxed and slow manner Ernesto traveled through Patagonia by motorbicycle. Paddling on some days, and volunteering at a hospital, a bar, or a construction site on other days. This dream is on hold for now, but why not going to Patagonia for 4 weeks or so to test the waters, an experience which might help to prepare for the long trip down the entire coast a year or two later? In February of 2006 I found myself in between jobs and stumbled over an online ad for a 3-piece Valley Nordkapp for sale. I bought the 3-piece Nordkapp, packed the rest of my kayak-camping kit, bought an EPIRB 4 hours before the departure of my flight, wrapped the kayak it in bubble wrap and called a cab in Brooklyn, NY, on February 7th. 2006 at 1.00 AM, for my flight to Puerto Montt, Chile over Panama City and Santiago de Chile.

My worries regarding the last minute wrapping of the kayak materialized sooner than imagined. Most of the bubble warp was already damaged when the kayak got out of the cab at JFK airport. I was still in Queens, and not even in the airport building yet, and was already exposed to my first problem of the trip. The fact that it was not even 2 AM in the morning yet did not really help, but little did I know at this moment in time that this problem would be my one and only problem or worry I would encounter in the next 4 weeks. Miranda, the friendly check-in manager at the Continental airlines counter at JFK airport seemed  even more excited about my trip than myself. He did not stop asking questions about the 3-piece kayak, the trip and about the travel plans. Miranda provided me the best seat in the economy in the house (Seat 14 A on a Boeing 727) with lots of leg room "to practice my paddling stroke", and charged only $100 to fly the 3-piece kayak all the way down to Chile. I was convinced that the luggage carousel in Santiago would act like a shredding machine to my kayak, dispensing a red pile of fiberglass trash, formerly my kayak, due to my flimsy packaging of the kayak. But to my pleasant surprise, the airport personnel in NYC, Panama (where I changed planes), Santiago de Chile and finally Puerto Montt must have carried the kayak with velvet gloves. The kayak did not have a single scratch when I received it at the airport in Puerto Montt. Fortunately, the cab drivers at Puerto Montt airport were incredibly flexible and approached the task of getting the kayak in a shoe box sized cab with Olympic ambitions. No, it is not very smart to go to Chile without speaking a single word of Spanish, but nonetheless, the cab driver understood where I wanted to go by looking at the 3 pieces of parcel and dropped me off right at the water's edge at the ferry terminal in Puerto Montt. Perfect! My plan was to paddle down South to Puerto Chacabuco, and take the ferry back up to Puerto Montt after having completed the trip. I would have 19 days to paddle the 270 miles down South along the coast of Patagonia, and then board the ferry to bring me back to Puerto Montt, from where I would return back home.

Unfortunately, I learned at the ferry terminal that the ferry from Puerto Chacabuco to Puerto Montt was not running in the week I needed it to. The timing was that I would have only 13 days to paddle the distance from Puerto Chacabuco to Puerto Montt. Right! I forgot to check ferry schedules and to reserve tickets, in short: I had missed to plan my trip beyond purchasing airplane tickets, and buying the 3-piece Nordkapp. I changed plans, and booked a ferry trip down to Puerto Chacabuco, since the ferry was leaving that very same evening. I would then simply paddle back North to Puerto Montt in - just as planned - in 19 days! Little did I know at this time, that the winds in Patagonia, come always from the North. Exactly the direction I would now paddle towards to. 

To kill the time until the ferry departure at midnight, I wandered around in Puerto Montt , which had a Wild West style "frontier" city vibe. Both tourists and and people from farms and remote islands come to Puerto Montt for their departures South. The houses around Puerto Montt on top of the hills were nothing more than shacks held together by cardboard, driftwood and corrugated steel. Later that day, I had my first of (and which later became a series) of "Crystal" beers in a bar favored by heavy drinking fishermen. The barkeeper was more than happy to match the conditions of his patrons (being hopelessly drunk), very much to the dsimay of the barkeeper's wife and mother, who seemed to have an excellent grip on the business, but not on Papa's drinking. Sitting in the bar sipping my Crystal, I now clearly felt the vacation-happiness setting in. The trip has finally began although I haven't touched any water yet.

The ferry left Puerto Montt at midnight. I woke up at 10.00 AM on a sunny day with beautiful views of the wide Pacific Ocean. The ship transformed slowly into a warm and friendly place of travellers of all sorts. There is Meike, a backpacker from Hamburg Germany, Marco and his family from Santiago, and John and Olly, a retired social worker couple from Great Britain, and hundreds more backpackers from all over the world, and of course as many truckers as the ship can carry trucks. All travellers were on the road for either days, weeks or months already, now heading temporarely for the same destination, and confined for 24 hours on this ferry. The ferry made its way down the coast of Patagonia, passing literally thousands of little island. During the 24 hours long trip I saw only one town and 2 single buildings from the ship.

After most of the trucks disembarked from the "Puerto Eden" at our destination in Puerto Chacabuco via a huge elevator inside the ship similar to the ones used on aircraft carriers, the 100 or so backpackers and myself were also put on this huge elevator and were lowered down to the dusty and dark little port of Porto Chacabuco. I assembled the 3 piece kayak, packed it, and was ready to start my 3 week, 250 miles, journey back to Puerto Montt by water. Launching the boat in to the dark harbor of Porto Chacabuco at midnight felt like cutting a huge birthday cake. Every paddling stroke felt like a liberation. After 3 days of carting the 3 pieces of fiberglass through undersized airport doors, stuffing it into too little cabs, and carrying it on and off a ferry, the boat and myself were finally in the water!