Saltos del Petrohué

Let me return to writing about Chile. On one of the days we stayed in Puerto Montt, Machi’s wife was gracious enough to drive us around Lake Llanquihue to see the natural wonders there.

Our first stop was the Petrohué Falls.

Here’s a map of the area (a Google map with “terrain” set). You’ll want to click on it to get the full-size version.

The Area North of Puerto Montt

You can see Puerto Montt at the lower left. The lake north of it, with the towns of Puerto Varas and Puerto Octay, is Llanquihue. It’s about 20-25 miles across. To the east is Lago Todos Los Santos (All Saints Lake). The falls are on the river that connects the two lakes. That white squiggly line running down the right side is the border with Argentina.

Here’s the approach to Petrohué Falls.

Approaching Petrohué Falls

It cuts through basaltic rock. It actually rather reminds me of the Great Falls of the Potomac just a bit upstream from Washington, D.C.

Here’s what it looks like from above (via Google’s satellite view).

The Big Picture

Near the bottom you can see the bridge that was in the previous picture. And the parking lot is to the left.

If you look at that previous picture again, you’ll see a bit of slope heading up on the left. Well, there’s more to that.

Volcán Osorno

That is the Osorno Volcano, which was almost always visible wherever one is around Lake Llanquihue. You can look again at the first map to orient yourself.

The water was actually rather low—we were there during the “dry” season. If we’d come instead in June there would have been ridiculous amounts of water going over the falls.

But as it was, it was still spectacular.

The Base of the Falls

You can, if you wish, purchase a ride on a jet boat to take you to the base of the falls. (We didn’t.) Here’s one of the boats just starting its way up.

Jet Boat

Then it clears the first rapids.

Jet Boat Again

After that it rather wallows in the spray from the waterfall.

At the Base

(Photo Credit: Alan Bruens)

Of course we need some pictures of us with the volcano in the background. Here are Virginia (Machi’s wife) and Lucas (Machi’s son).

Virginia and Lucas

And here I am.

Yours Truly

The trail had been “improved” with gravel to even out the rough spots on the basaltic rocks. However, as you can see, there was still plenty of the rock exposed, and of course that was quite delicious for bare feet.

Let me end up with another photo taken by Alan.

Volcán Osorno

He really knows how to frame a shot—my corresponding picture of the Osorno Volcano was okay, but Alan’s picture just has that something extra because he made sure to get the tree in there.

From here, we drove up the side of Osorno (well, part of the way); I’ll leave that for another posting.