We would typically call this a “Travel Day” because we are going from Villarrica to Lican Ray… but we won’t be in Lican Ray long enough to do a proper Lican Ray series. So, instead, you know the destination from the beginning. Fortunately for my travel partner, we will be returning to Villarrica later so he doesn’t have to carry all of our stuff, hehe. He can finally pack light! It’s only been over two months, hehe. But, as with seemingly all trips in southern Chile, we begin at a bus stop on the side of the highway.
You may recognize the stop from yesterday. We couldn’t sit down to wait for the bus to come because we didn’t want to disturb the dog… luckily we didn’t have to wait long! The busses that run from here to the centre of Villarrica are small micro busses, and this is what they look like inside.
Very small, but we never got on one that was packed. Teeeeeechnically you should be at a bus stop for it to stop… but… that’s not true, you can stop them along the route, and you can do the same to get off. Very, very convenient. We’re quickly in the middle of Villarrica ready to wait for our bus. We join the other people waiting at the bus station.
Unfortunately for us (and you, dear reader), my travel partner cannot stay still. So he got up to walk around and get some pictures, check out what type of food is available around here (mainly candy/chocolate and various drinks), and when the little bus was ready to leave he went back towards the bus to actually get on.
Unlike the big bus we took from Santiago to Villarrica, these busses don’t have assigned seating. So, the window seats were all taken… So sad. But that’s okay. We packed light but not small, so it’s better for us to be in the aisle so that we can place our bag on the ground. The bus actually has quite a few people on board, so our recommendation is to get on the bus when you can to make sure you don’t go standing. That would definitely not be fun, even if it is only a 30 minute-ish ride.
We ride the bus, get to the main square in Lican Ray, and start looking for somewhere to stay. We knew that there were places… but we didn’t pre-book anything. We know, we know… many people call us crazy for doing things like this… but it is what it is. We ask at the tourist information centre and they tell us which way some accommodations can be found. Alright, let’s go!
Pretty much right beside the main square is Lake Calafquén and that’s the way that everyone is going. There are lots of cars and people going towards the beach, it is definitely a happening place. Even though we packed “light,” the backpack is still heavy, so we don’t want to walk more than is strictly necessary. We can see the beach in the distance, but we will have to come back for it. We’re too busy looking at the map and trying to see where the closest accommodations could be to make time for the beach. We end up snaking through various tiny “neighbourhoods” in Lican Ray without a plan. The roads are dirt back here, but that’s fine. By just watching the map we take a wrong turn, and then another, and then another. Our app shows that the roads are connected… but in reality they are not, they just end in dead ends, ha. Remember how we said that we didn’t want to “walk more than in strictly necessary”? That went out the window… We eventually see a “shortcut” that will lead us right to somewhere where we could spend the night and walk that way… only to find out that it is also a dead end. By this point we quit and just walk back to the main road to walk along it, haha.
As we walked along the road a homeowner just came out of their house and offered us to stay there! Haha. As someone who is not from here, it seemed a little strange… but we were told that it is completely normal and not dangerous, haha. We tell them that we appreciate the offer and will consider it. We’re not 100% convinced because we’re not sure how the “shared spaces” would work (for example bathroom or kitchen). We keep walking a bit further and decide that if we don’t find anything soon we will go back to this random house. But just a bit further we find what we were looking for. We walk off of the main street and down a looooong drive way into the campground. We go to reception and ask them how much they charge for the night and what they offer. The price and amenities were good enough that we decided to stay. (Plus, we didn’t want to walk back up the long driveway and then keep aimlessly walking around). We pay and then go walk around to find a spot to spend the night. We think this will do nicely.
Not a bad spot, huh? A little private beach right on the edge of Lake Calafquén! And it only took us an hour to walk 3.7 kilometres, haha. (Please remember all of our things and taking wrong turns!) But this is a really nice spot. It seems like there are a few families around us, and there are lots of places for you to unwind and relax. Unfortunately for me, my travel partner does not really know how to do that, haha. (Just kidding, I can’t really relax either). So, we set up our accommodations for the night and move our things around to make sure we’re packed more efficiently. This is where we will spend the night tonight.
Not too bad, huh? Hopefully it is comfortable. From hotels with Great Pyramid views to tents with Lake Calafquén views. Not too bad! But, as we said, we’re packing up so we leave the tent behind and head off back towards Lican Ray, haha. We now have to walk the looooong driveway back towards the main road and then walk back towards Lican Ray. We head off! We make it to the main gate and there’s a car approaching it from behind us. The friend that we are with said “let’s hurry to open the gate for them!” So that is exactly what we do, we speed up a tiny bit to make it to the gate so that we open it for the car. The two girls that were in the car roll down the window to thank us and drive through. We close the gate behind us and keep on walking, but then the car stops. They roll down the window and yell at us “hey guys! Where are you going?!” We say we’re headed to Lican Ray and they are as well and tell us to hop in! Amazing! Saves us the walk there, hehe.
We get in and thank them a million times. They ask where we’re from and tell us that they are from Santiago. They’ve been here a few days but are leaving soon. They point out what we should know in Lican Ray and drop us off in front of a grocery store so that we can get some snacks for our outing. We appreciate the 5 minute ride as it avoided a 25 minute-ish walk, which means we can now use that energy on another walk, hehe.
After the grocery store we immediately go back towards the main square in town, where we of course see a sculpture of a Mapuche woman. If you read some of our older posts you may be able to pick out all of the traditional Mapuche items that she is depicted using and wearing. If not, you can take it as homework to find out!
The reason we decided to come back to the square first is because it was buuuuusy. We know, we know, the picture above really shows that we are lying, but we’re not. All along the edge of the square are all kinds of stalls with all kinds of different vendors selling all kinds of things. Of course, we walk around to take a look. There are handicrafts, souvenirs, plants, food, jewelry, pretty much whatever you’d like to get. We’re noticing that this is pretty common in southern Chile.
And there is our proof that we weren’t lying about the number of people! We think that the majority of the 7,200 people that live in Lican Ray must be here, hehe (joking!). But, after a few minutes here and a snack or two, we decided to start actually exploring Lican Ray. And what better way to do that than walking down to the beach?
It is absolutely packed! Crazy. And, as we showed you in Pucon and Villarrica, the sand is still black because we have not gone far enough to leave the nearby Villarrica Volcano. As we walk along the waterfront people approach us to ask if we want a beach chair, inflatables (see above), a boat tour, food, or anything else our heart could desire. We say no to everything because we are just walking around.
Along the beach you can start seeing some more Mapuche monuments, showing that this region was and is in the middle of their traditional and historic territory of Wallmapu. These statues let us show you a bit more if the history of the Mapuche in Chile.
As we previously learned, the Mapuche are well known for their wood carving skills, which are shown off with the above work. We will try to explain what each is as best as we can in sequential order. First we have Leftraru Lautaro Toqui who killed the Governor of Chile Pedro de Valdivia (died in 1553) during the Mapuche’s resistance. Second we have “The Warrior’s Battle Cry” representing the Mapuche leaders that led the people’s resistance to the Spanish conquistadors. Third we have Chemamull, which are the spiritual guardians and protectors of the Mapuche people. (Some say that these were placed to mark graves while others say they may have denoted territorial borders). And the last picture is the description of the Chemamull… And this is where we can talk a bit about the “tension” between the Mapuche and non-Mapuche in the region…
As we mentioned in Villarrica, you can see lots of artwork depicting the Mapuche around southern Chile, but that does not mean that everyone likes the Mapuche. We can’t be certain, but we imagine that that is why someone destroyed the above sign. We think that the sign may say “Marichiweu” on it, which translates to “we will win ten times” in Mapudungun (the Mapuche language), which may be another reason why someone decided to try to destroy the sign… But, we can’t be sure. All we can report is that there are tensions in southern Chile between the Mapuche and a small sector of the Chilean population here, and the best way to show it is through this destroyed sign. (We’re also careful to not so broadly characterize everything in southern Chile in this way. We are not saying that this “tension” is everywhere, or else these artworks and things would not exist. We just had to make sure that that was left clear).
We’re walking along the beach, but we’re not interested in swimming here since we have our own waterfront accommodations (so fancy, hehe). But, we were told that there may be something that we will enjoy just beyond the beach, so of course we have to go and check it out! What do we find? Mapuche Ziwilwe Natural Park!
And this is why we had to try to clarify that the “tension” we talked about above is not everywhere, and the Mapuche also play a role within the tourism sector in the region. And just beyond this entryway we find some more public art, which you know that we absolutely love. And this shows more of the traditional wear of the Mapuche.
But just as we say that the “tension” is not everywhere, we also see that the sign on the right says “for the defense of Lake Kalafken”. Now, you can take that as you wish, but this is where we tell you about some other “tensions” in southern Chile…. (We swear that southern Chile is lovely and you probably won’t feel or notice any of these things, but, we also can’t leave it out of our travels, haha).
In recent years people have begun to oppose different “uses” of the waterways in southern Chile. The “uses” of the waterways varies by region, but those with the largest opposition are hydroelectric dams in rivers and fish farms that pollute the waterways. Obviously there are many others, but these are probably two of the largest. Many people throughout Chile oppose this on ecological/environmental grounds, and the Mapuche many times do as well, but they also include their territorial claim to their ancestral lands in the mix, which likely explains the sign, haha. But, that’s enough explanation, let’s keep walking!
This is the entrance to the park and a little information about it. The park is on “reclaimed Mapuche territory” and costs 2,000 pesos to enter (~$2). The sign shows you some words in Mapudungun to illustrate what you will find as you walk around this small park. We’re ready to go!
It immediately looks harder than what we expected, haha. But this will obviously not deter us! The start of the path is a small, steep hill, but is manageable. You’re immediately surrounded by HUGE trees on all sides, and it feels and looks amazing. We’re doing the trail that goes around the entirety of the park and borders the lake itself.
Of course you can imagine that that means that the views are pretty nice. Throughout the walk the lake peeks out from behind the trees. It is actually gorgeous. And you can see that it is nice and sunny out, which explains why there were so many people on the beach (which you can kind of see from the below picture).
The views get even better from dedicated lookout points (azkintuwe in Mapudungun). There are many of these lookout points along the trail and it was pretty much the only place that we crossed paths with people while walking back here because everyone was trying to capture the beauty of Lake Calafquén.
We keep walking. As we explained, there are so many trees around and it is so, so green. The amount of greenery in southern Chile is something we just didn’t see while in the Middle East, so it is pretty noticeable for us while walking around.
And then we make it to the next lookout point which let’s you look out over the islands of Lake Calafquén. And while we were up here we saw a little boat pass by that was out giving a tour. So, now we know that the little boats that were trying to get us back at the beach at least come around the natural park, haha. It must be a nice tour, at least the lake looks amazing from our vantage point.
Now, as you can imagine, we keep walking, haha. The rest of the path is pretty much the same thing, so we won’t explain anything else. Instead we will just show you. As you can see we made it to a few more look offs, went down to touch the water, and looked out over some rocks. It was all very pretty, but we’re not convinced that the beauty is properly captured in these pictures.
The final lookout spot where we stopped was by far the most popular. Here there were quite a few people hanging out, and this is where many people climbed down in order to get closer to the water. We know that the pictures aren’t of the highest quality when they get put here… but believe us when we say that there are quite a few people hanging out on the rock island that you can see. We’re sure that at least some of them must have gone down to it from our look off point.
And that finishes off our loop around the outside of the park! But, that does not finish our time at the park. Now we go towards the middle of the park following the signs. Again, it is actually packed with trees, which makes it a very nice walk. The trees also help keep the temperature down because it blocks out the sun, which is nice when you’ve been hiking up and down hills since you entered the park, hehe. But the reason we are going towards the centre of the park is because we want to show you this.
This is the Mapuche cultural centre in the middle of the natural park. It is relatively small, but it has some handicrafts and jewelry you can buy, plus small explanations about the Mapuche. We have already explained everything that was captured within this cultural centre, but it is a nice stop nonetheless. And, just beyond it, is the Mapuche gastronomical fair. We didn’t take pictures of it, but there are a few little stands in the middle of the park that sell food. We imagine that it must be Mapuche food, but we didn’t see any activity at any of the stalls so we didn’t investigate further. Maybe it’s because of the time of day that we visited? Next time!
And with that, we are done the nature park. It was not very long, but because we went back and forth and stopped for so many pictures and videos we were here longer than the estimated 45 minutes, haha. But, worth it. If you’re in the region, definitely add it as a nice walk.
Now it is time to start walking back towards our campsite. By this point it has only been 5 kilometres of walking, so we’re fine. We continue, and immediately find some more street art that we had not previously noticed. We just had to take a picture because it shows the kultrung with the cosmic symbols of the Mapuche. And the flower that you can see is the copihue, Chile’s national flower. The flower is native to the Valdivian temperate rainforests of this region of Chile (Valdivia is a city that is about 2 hours away by car).
So we don’t do too much else. We just go back to the main square to again look at the different things that are for sale, then walk to the grocery store to get the things that we will need tonight, and then start walking through town back towards the campground. This time we don’t go in the middle of random neighbourhoods, but instead walk along the main road. As we were walking my travel partner would look at the map and see where we were. Unluckily for him, he noticed that the map highlighted “something of interest” in a different direction than we needed to go… But it was “only a little further” and curiosity got the better of him. He ran off to take a look at what it might be, haha. It was this monument at the entrance to Lican Ray.
Was it worth walking that little bit more after we had already been walking for so long? We will never know for sure… but we also got this picture of a bus stop as we were walking. These birds are all over the place in southern Chile, and they are quite loud! Very typical, so luckily we were able to capture them here.
And then it was straight walking back towards our campground. We were just calmly walking along the main road when all of a sudden my travel partner had the brilliant idea to turn around for some reason. Luckily he did, because poking out just over the forest was Villarrica Volcano. You can see that either the volcano is huge or we haven’t gone very far from Villarrica and Pucón (in reality, both are true). It’s so beautiful to just see snow covered volcanoes off in the distance.
And as we keep on walking along this road we see a real copihue! We just took a picture of a mural that depicted them, and here they are. Although they are the national flower of Chile, that doesn’t mean that they are absolutely everywhere. I obviously had to get a picture with the real flower, how could I not?
As we return to the campsite the sun is just starting to go down, so we just drop our stuff off and head down to our beach. It was so pretty to watch the sunset over Lake Calafquén. Surprisingly, there weren’t many people down here taking in the sunset.
You can kind of see the beach where we were today in the second last picture, and the big forest on the right of that is the Ziwilwe Mapuche Natural Park that we visited today. What a nice way to end the day just chilling by the lake. For the record though, we did want to swim… but the temperature drops a lot at night, so there was no way my travel partner would get into that water, haha. Plus, we weren’t done with our day just yet! We had to make supper. And you know what that means while camping!
Luckily for us the person that we were traveling with absolutely loves cooking over an open fire, so we ate some good food as we waited for the night to go to sleep. Once the sun went down it was absolutely dark here, and we enjoyed our time by looking at the stars with the help of an app on our phone that allows us to easily identify everything in the night sky. We saw many stars, constellations, and a lot of satellites. It was a lot of fun! Good night from Lican Ray!
