Valdivia - We have boats!

Brand spankin´new, we feel spoiled!

The next stage in the adventure was a critical one.  For months we scratched our heads about our boats.  Should we ship our own, use folding Feathercraft kayaks that we could fly with, or buy boats in Chile?  Thankfully, we learned of an outfitter in Valdivia who stocks P&H Kayaks from Great Britain and sells them at reasonable rates.  Becky and I prefer to paddle British style skeg kayaks and the P&H Skorpio will fit the bill nicely.

Hooray, the spray skirt fits!

Chile is a very modern country and we´d been using our cards for payment everywhere from cafes to hostels, but we did have a minor hiccup when we discovered that we were going to have to pay cold, hard, cash for the boats.  An important detail that I neglected to iron out ahead of time.   After two days gaining valuable financial spanish language skills in Valdivia´s banks we raced across town with pockets brimming with pesos.  Cheers to Jorge and Roberto at www.pueblitoexpediciones.cl  for hooking us up with kayaks and arranging the shipping to Puerto Montt!

Well fed and watered despite our poor spanish skills.

 I couldn´t resist sharing this cover shot of Pope Benedict, we saw it on every news stand we passed.

The Pope´s announcement caused a splash in this predominately Catholic nation.