IN CHILE: ROCKY ROADS, BIG 'FARM'
The train from Santiago to Temuco, where we were to meet our unknown host, is a three or four car diesel train. In English, it is "The Arrow." All seats are reserved and it is probably an extra fare train, all first class. The train left at 7:45 and arrived in Temuco, about 450 kilometers away, at 6:10 p.m.
Going south toward Temuco, we kept in the valley with fair sized mountains on each side, quite a distance away. Garden truck, fruit trees and wheat, cattle of European breeds, considerable dairy stuff, but nary a Hereford. Huasos (Chilean cowboys, corresponding to the Argentinean gauchos) in their mantas (cloth blankets with slits in the middle to put the head through) became common.
Temuco is the biggest city in south Chile, about 65,000. On the platform we met our host, a clean-cut, energetic young fellow about 32 years old, and another young fellow who turned out to be a schoolmate of our host in Paris. Our hostess was home with a slightly ailing four-month-old boy.
The two men were to take us southeast to Pucon in the lake and volcano country, 50 kilometers away. The road was a bit rough and we must hurry because we should see the scenery enroute and then spend the night in the fine resort hotel at Pucon. Then back next day to Temuco and thence due west another 80 kilometers or so to mine host's fundo (farm) near Nehuentue. It was all arranged.
We got in a 1947 Chevrolet that had taken a beating since it left the factory and started over the road described as "a bit rough" . . . Man of Samaria! Was that road rough! And did the loose round rock fly. . . Our car had a special network of steel bolted to the frame to keep flying rock from damaging the underside. And 7-ply tires—I never heard of them. And most of the time our speedometer ranged from 45 to 80 kilometers per hour, depending on how the road looked to our host. He mis-guessed many times.
We had three blowouts on that road to Pucon, and the first one tore the inner tube all to the devil. We never saw the valve stem. Our friends donned overalls, spread a piece of thick material and got under.
The blowouts caused us to change plans. We couldn't make Pucon and its splendid resort hotel that night, because we might run out of tires. We would have to stop short about 25 kilometers, at Villarrica, near a tremendous volcano of that name. Our host knew a French woman who ran a hotel there. Not much of a hotel for looks and all of the comforts, but the food would be exceptionally good. It was.
That late evening was the last time we were to see Villarrica. A mountain of a volcano, snowclad, it stood high above everything else, cold, white and still. It appeared shaped like one of the pyramids of Egypt, except that the top didn't come to so acute an apex. It erupted last year after a long period of dormancy. It awed me something like the Grand Canyon of Arizona does. Next day brought a big haze.