During the night, well beginning about 1am this morning, we were introduced to the Chileans idea of camping: Pull you car up, open all the doors, turn up the music until the ground around you vibrates and drink until you fall asleep – in this case not until around 8am. The half a dozen or so Chilean men, whose girlfriends on the other side of the campground had obviously told them to piss off, pulled said car up to about 1.5 metres from our tent. Several other campers throughout the night had asked them to turn down the music with no result. At about 5.30am, I had had enough too and decided to stick my head out of the tent and yell at them. I heard them say something about “Gringa Loco” (crazy foreign lady) and close the doors on the car, but it didn’t really help with the sleep situation!
We instead waited until they passed out at about 8am and skipped the first few festival “events” in favour of some sleep. At about 12 noon we got up, as did the Chileans, I endured the eyeballing, wolf whistles and general commentary as I crossed the campground to freshen up at the toilet block and then we headed over to the ‘other side of town’ (about a 20 minute walk) to watch some horse racing.
The impromptu track had been set up on a straight bit of road leading up to the rodeo arena. Two by two, men raced up the 500m road, whilst the crowd whistled and yelled, the tote being a guy in a hat standing near the finish line. The description on the program said the event was called “Carreras a la Chilena” which Matt had translated to mean “Race to the Chilean woman”. I didn’t see any Chilean women, but we had fun watching the men race, most in traditional dress and a lot of them even bareback!
Cerro Castillo, the town’s namesake.
Guess it’s the equivalent of driving your granddad’s ute down the farm when you were 6!
Street racing!
The mounting yard.
The finish line.
Later that afternoon we walked back into town and had a wander around the couple of craft stalls set up and the various food options. Following some meat and vegetable skewers, two tone traditional cookies and Matt ending his meal with a ‘completo’ (hot dog with the lot), we bought some beer and pulled up a possi on the hill in time for the afternoon parade. Unfortunately there were no floats or sequined costumes, but the were “Tropa de Vacunos” (troupe of bovines) and “Desfile de Cabalgaduras” (parade of cavalrymen) and a presentation of the men who had been riding earlier in the races. All this was set to traditional accordion and guitar music and many of the locals were getting up to dance in front of the platform where the band played. We chatted to the two Belgians camping opposite us, who also weren’t so pleased with the introduction to camping in Chile, and drank until the parade was over about an hour or so later. Then it was off to the supermarket to get some dinner ingredients, given I didn’t fancy eating two tone biscuits for both lunch and dinner (all other offerings at the festival being meat!)
The band plays as we wait for the parade.
Matt took this one – not me!
Security prepares for the rowdy crowds at the parade.
Some big boys in the parade.
When we got back to our camp, two Chilean guys from nearby Coihaique had set up one tent each (*ehem* and Matt had to ask why!) practically on top of ours, so it was at about that point we decided that we wouldn’t be beating them so we better join them! We quickly made friends with Matt’s Spanish and my miming and took turns in practicing drinking out of their “Bota” (tear drop shaped grog holder made of furry-side-in deer skin, which you squeeze and shoot grog into your mouth) – a skill that we never managed without at least spilling some down the front of us! Later that evening, once it was dark, we went off to watch a film about a cycling trip that some young Americans had done through Patagonia, mostly because it showed some of the scenery we had missed by not taking the Villa O’Higgins option out of El Chalten. Meanwhile, the boys had gone off to the gymnasium for the Fiesta Campera and to select the lucky Chilena’s who would be sharing their cozy dome tents later the next morning.
When we got back to the tent around midnight, all was quiet, so we got in a couple of hours sleep before the party in the campground started up again at around 4am when everyone had obviously been kicked out of the gym.
Back at the camp ground.
Day 75 - Yeeeeehhhaaaaaa!
Today started at about 5.30am when our neighbours (and their new lady friends) took great delight in calling out our names and offering us breakfast bota. We chatted through the tent for a bit and managed a few more hours sleep when they zonked at around 7am before the first of today’s events: lassoing, castrating and then branding bulls and horses – my favourite! We had a great position sitting up on fence of the main arena, however it ended up being a bit too close for my comfort once it was established what the next event would be encompassing! I was thankful when the less gruesome sheepdog trials and examples of sheep sheering started, but soon got bored and went in search of food. We found 20 asado’s cooking in a big ring and a long, long queue for chips, so decided to walk back to town to pack up the tent in time for the 4pm bus to Coihaique.
Asados cooking over hot coals.
Some locals entertain us with some traditional dance to the accordion music between events.
Lassoing…
Catching…
Preparing…
Branding…
And…. oh poor horsey…. (yes, those are testicles in his hand)
Despite us checking with the tourist information place twice about buses and where to get them, the 4pm bus came and went without us. We walked up to the main road to see about hitching or other buses but it seemed neither was going to happen. Just as we had all but given up and were contemplating setting the tent back up to wait for tomorrow, a guy in a yellow mini bus drove past. He happened to be drumming up business for a bus load to Coihaique when the festival finished at 6pm. In luck!
We ended up being able to go back to the festival for the main event – “Doma de Potros” – the breaking in of the colts. This essentially turned out to be a “rodeo” as we non farm type people would think of it. This drew by far the biggest crowd and from the number of cars, many of locals from nearby towns were here for the afternoon’s spectacle. Dozens of guys tried their best to hang on as the colts bucked violently all over the place and half the fun was watching the two other guys on horses bolt to catch the colt again after he had successfully tipped off his rider. At one stage it seemed randoms from the crowd were giving it a go! But as the saying goes…. it’s all fun until someone gets hurt! But I guess that’s part of what the crowd was waiting for. A random, who appeared to be dared by his friends was on, then he was off, and then he copped a hoof in the guts. Out came the 20 year old ambulance and his mates began to ball like babies. The announcer came over and advised that all action was off until the ambulance got back, as there was only one in the town!
Tying the horse to the pole so the rider can get on.
On (barely!)
And off again!
Check the Converse shoes! Very professional.
The professionals stayed on a lot longer and rode a lot more stylishly!
It was already 6pm and many people started to leave. We figured our bus driver, who was also at the event, would keep his word to the other people waiting back in town for him and so we headed to where the minibus was parked. Our driver was there, beer in hand, but it turns out he was only grabbing his jacket because he was cold! He wanted to see the end of the event! We didn’t leave until around 7.30pm and didn’t get to Coihaique until 10pm. We hadn’t booked anything and like the result of any good festival, we were sunburnt and tired, so ended up taking the second place we went to, which was way overpriced but quiet.
Dumping our bags we headed out to get something to eat. Fortunately/unfortunately the only restaurant open in town at 11pm on a Sunday was one of the pricier ones. I had some really nice salmon and Matt enjoyed his potatoes, but we were falling asleep at the table and just wanted bed!
1 comment:
Sounds like camping in a busy campground in Canada. :-) The rodeo seems to have a few familiar bits as well, including the not so wise young bravados who try their hand only to be taken away by ambulance. Looks an amazing trip so far with very interesting blog posts, even with the dogs ;-).
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