Our Ratings: Overall: Beautiful scenery, good food, great people. Activities: Incredible panoramas of granite. Hiking is unbeatable. Challenge: Tough to get to, but worth it. A lovely hike (with a full backpack) pushes you but with so much to look at, it's well worth the trip. Food: Good and bad. The best salmon in the world in Puerto Natales. Worst sandwich in the world in the Santiago Airport café. Lodging: Mostly our tent, but a great hostal in Puerto Natales and a crazy red-satin-sheets place in Punta Arenas. Fun: Really fun. Great hiking, great people, great scenery…hard to get there, but absolutely worth it. The perfect 5 day hike. Current WX: N/A As of: N/A N/A°F Wind:N/A at N/A Visibility:N/A mi Sunrise:7:18 AM Sunset:6:20 PM Our Trips:

This is Amy sleeping. What a way to start a vacation... Actually, Amy sleeps a LOT! She says "It's genetic, Thanks DAD", I say she's got some sort of disorder or somethin'.

One word of advice, don't fly standby on Lan Chile!! (Not that you were going to...) We were bumped off the first Lan Chile flight out of Miami to Santiago, Chile, and just barely caught the one that left only 1 hour later.

They packed so many people on the airplane that these kids didn't have seats ('seats' 18F and 18LOOR)!! By the way, if you are a parent, and you let your kid sleep on the floor of an airplane, PLEASE keep them out of the aisle so that the flight attendants don't crush them with the beverage cart. A friendly public service reminder.

Like I said about the disorder... What could be better than a security tag blanket and some good ole' USA water (i.e. drinkable). It's not like there is a detector for the blanket anywhere, what's the deal?? The blankets aren't even that good (super shammy??).

A beautiful sunrise over the Andes as we make our descent into...

The Jorge Juan Valdez Maria Paco Ricardo airport in smoggy SANTIAGO CHILE!!

On our next flight from 'all the flights are full, full, full, you'll never get on' Santiago to Puerto Montt, Chile (get a map, you'll need it!) Bob 'enjoys' a 100% pure sugar "dessert" like substance.

I guess this was like a mountain that looked like Mt. Fuji or something, or at least that is what the book said, so I took a picture, and now I'm sharing it with you... you are welcome!

Here is the screen from the airplane. We are in Puerto Montt (you can see the little airplane thingy), and of note is the location named "Mount Pleasant" in the Faulkland Islands. It's also a small town north of where I grew up in Michigan... oh well, it's a small world I guess.

Arr, luck of the Irish! Look at me pot-o-gold! The arrival into Punta Arenas (no snickering kids!) lived up to the book description of "riding a bike down an escalator".

Another view of the Strait of Magellan... or maybe this was our trip last week at Lake Michigan... not too sure.

This is the handy shop where a guy sold me a liter of gas for our camp stove. We went in with a couple of Brits, one of whom starts walking around the store looking for the fuel, and then the store owner says, "Hey, This is not a supermarket! You tell me what you need, I will get it for you!" Personally, I don't think either of us confused this place for a "Super" market, but they had the gas.

Holy Punta Arenas!

As I'm telling Amy that she should receive medical help for her condition she blows the suggestion off as she is "too tired to talk about it now".

According to the book, this is one of the largest exposed coal reserves in the world. It's really in the middle of nowhere which I guess is why nobody has taken any. Got a match?

Other than big ass coal sticking out of the ground, this is pretty much all we saw.

The coffee was so hot... Actually, Amy, with her fair skin, burns easily.