Puerto Montt, Chile

We dropped anchor off the shore of Puerto Montt early this morning.   Richard went down one floor to the Exploration café and brought back two espressos to get us going!  After breakfast we made our way to the tender for our quick trip ashore.  The port had wifi so we stopped for a few minutes to check our email before walking 5 minutes to the bus station to catch the local bus to Puerto Varas.  We paid the driver $800 pesos each (about $2.80 US) for the 20 minute ride to this scenic little town overlooking Lake Llanquihue, the Osorno Volcano, and the surrounding mountains. 

After a quick lunch, we again boarded the bus and returned to Puerto Montt and made our way to the Artesenal Angelmo shopping area which consisted of a fish market and small stalls with mostly women vendors selling their homemade knitted items. One lady was knitting with bright blue yarn and had apparently just begun her project. However, when we stopped back by about an hour later, she showed us the sweater that was almost complete. Beautiful workmanship! I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to own one of her ponchos!

 

We made our way back to the port and boarded our tender back to the ship. We had an early dinner and walked several laps around the promenade deck before dark….which isn’t until after 9 pm.  

 

Holland America’s clientele is mostly much older than we are….or at least older than we feel! The continual attempts at upselling and their overt attempts at increasing their bottom line are becoming quite annoying. Many of the activities on the agenda are for this sole purpose, not to enhance your ship experience.