We left around 10:00am to do a short hike today as we need to pack our things as we fly to Uruguay tomorrow. We drove on Route 7 in the direction of Caleta La Arena. As soon as we headed out of town we took a side road to a place where there were petrified trees. We stopped at the Bosque fosil de Punta Pelluco.
The trees didn’t look pertrified because when you touch them, they are spongy. It was quite interesting though to see the rock that had formed around the trees.
We also witnessed a lady on a horse drawn cart with a dog on this same beach. She stopped periodically to fork some moss onto her cart. This was pretty cool to watch.
We drove to the end of route 7 where you take a ferry over to an island. This was our turning point and we headed back towards Puerto Montt for approximately 8km and turned onto a side gravel road that goes to Parque Nacional Alerce Andino.
After driving approximately 7km you come to the end of the road and the entrance to the Park. It costs 4,000.00CPS each (Approx. $8.00CDN) and was a lovely hike through a forest.
We hiked in to Saltos Rio Chaicas, a very nice waterfall.
A few metres up from this waterfall, there is a little side path that takes you to another waterfall in a lagoon area. Both waterfalls were within a few metres of each other, but you cannot see the second one unless you take that short path.
About 0.5km further up the path is Alerce Milenario, a tall tree over 3,000 years old.
We then continued our journey up to Laguna Chaiquenes which was an okay view of this lake. The view was not the best, but it was worth the 13km hike return.
On the way back, we had to cross a large stream and noticed how clear the water was. A group of small waterfalls were spotted just a slight way above this pool of water.
This was a great hike to end our stay in Puerto Montt.