Valdivia

We spent a night in Puerto Montt after the Navimag. Our Hostel was like a ladies house and we didnt really feel comfortable relaxing in the lounge. Next morning the weather was awful, continuous rain and grey skys... so we decided not to go to the Chiloe Islands but get on a Coach to Valdivia.

We get to Valdivia and have no idea where we are staying. Its hammering down with rain, so we get in a taxi and make it stop at the first hostal. Unfortunately our spanish is not up to scratch and we misunderstand the fact that there is no room in the hostel but they have cabins - so we end up in this 2 bedroom apartment for double the price of a hostel...... not good for the budget....ooops.

So the next morning we check out of our luxery cabin and into a more affordale hostel - Airesbuenos. The hostel had a book with ideas for visiting so we basically followed this book for 4 days!!

First up the Fish Market.
Valdivia is most known for the fish market because it attracts male sealions who beg for scraps of fish.....

Its madness and its not just the sea lions wanting food .... lots of birds and storks too...

The sea lions were sooooo huge... and not frightened of humans at all - they just relaxed along the river bank and apparently sometimes they take a walk through the town!!

Sealions were not aggressive to people but quite aggressive towards each other...

The next day we went sight seeing and caught a bus to Niebla - a small town a and about a 30 minute bus ride away..

er a stroll around Niebla we took a ferry taxi to Corral....
Captain Becs... get you life jackets ready!!!

Was really strange as the locals obviously use the ferry taxi to get accross the sea to work and school!!

At Corral we walked around an old Fort... there was not too much else on this little island!

On the way back to Valdivia we stopped at Kunstmann Brewery for a self directed Beer Tasting session!

We couldnt see any signs for tours and the museum looked pretty boring. As our spanish is terrible we couldnt ask for the tasting platter so the only thing we could do is just try each different beer by ourselves!!

After lots of beer - food was in order...
CurryWurst..... yum yum

We ran out of money so we had to return the next day to make sure we had tasted all the different beers!!!

Our scoring system....

The Meil (Honey) beer was delicious.. and a favourite of both of us!!

Day 2 of testing we sampled some local cheesy empanadas...

And obviously we didnt care that we looked liked tourist wollys after a few beers..

Our last day in Valdivia we decided to visit a little nature reserve on the coast...

Punta Curiñanco is a natural reserve located 40 km from Valdivia and covers an area that includes different types of Valdivian temperate rain forest as well as coastal shrublands, wetlands and sea-side rocks.
The bus journey there was a bit sketchy - the bus didnt sound like it was made for steep hills and we also got stuck in a whole in the road!!
Once we got there a man let us through a gate into the nature reserve... and we followed a path that took us around the whole park....

The coast was a little chilly and the waves were really strong...

Waiting for the bus Terry learnt how to cartwheel..

Valdivia was a nice city with a few bits to do and see - but for me the Sea lions make it a worthwhile visit!!