Pucon

After a 12 hour bus ride straight through from Castro in Chiloe, we arrived in Pucon yesterday, a small town on the shores of quite a large lake, with the even larger Volcano Villarrica just the other side of town. We'd been warned earlier that Pucon was pretty touristy (it's kinda a love-it or hate-it type of place), and it sure is. Coming from the very relaxed Chiloe it was a bit of a shock to the system, there's definitely more of a 'seperate the gringo from his money' vibe to the place. The whole town feels like one big resort, and while it's certainly nice to be able to get real coffee and do some shopping, it isn't really our scene.

We're staying at Donde German, which has actually moved from where their website (and LP) has them listed. We didn't find out they where a lot further out of town until we arrived, but really this didn't matter - the main bit of Pucon is very small (six streets square) and it was an easy walk in. The place is better for the move as well - they've got a lot more room than the old place, so the facilities are great - big kitchen, living room and garden.

Pucon itself seems to mainly consist of tour operators, with every type of outdoor activity you'd want on offer - the main ones are volcano climbing and white water rafting, but there's a fair bit else available - from paintball to fishing to flying foxes to something called 'HydroSpeed' - sort of like white water rafting, except just using a boogie board. Kat shudders every time I mention trying it!

The nearby Volcan Villarrica dominates the skyline in Pucon, and the town has a traffic light style 'Volcano Warning' system setup - green means all OK, yellow means evacuate and red means duck & cover. Thankfully it's solidly on green at the moment, but it's pretty interesting how many people live so close to a fairly clear & present danger. Villarrica isn't the worlds most active volcano (wrong on that point), but it is South America's. It spends most of the day smoking, and the top has an eerie red glow to it at night - quite impressive!