1. (1) Northern Chile with a desert

2. (2) Esperantists and a motorcycle mechanic in Chile

3. (3) Southern Chile with hot springs

(1) Northern Chile with a desert

It was raining on the 12th of January, 2004 as well. The Chilean border office was 15km away from the border of Bolivia. The frontier in Chile was surrounded with white mountains. I heard the elevation around there was as high as 4.800m. I had never crossed the high border like that. The latitude of the place is 18 degrees south. It is still in a tropical zone. And it was midsummer then. Even so it was cold. It rained and hailed. In addition, the road in Chilean side had lots of potholes. The asphalt was ripped off and the road turned to an earth road at the curves. I expected the roads in Chile would be better than in Bolivia, but the road near the border was terribly bad. Because of the rain clouds I couldn't see the view well, but without the clouds the area would have been beautiful as it is a national park in Chile. I was riding down the Andes, watching only the potholes. Meanwhile the road went into a thick cloud. I couldn't see the road ahead. I rode slowly, relying on the centerline at my feet. The Andes gradually lowered its elevation. As the elevation became lower, the rain became lighter and some patches of the blue sky came to be seen. The road became good after traveling 100km from the border and the blue sky extended. The town of Arica, my destination of the day, was only 90km away. The Andes slowly went down to the Pacific. At the end of the descent I saw the sea. There was a harbor. It was Arica, the northernmost town in Chile. And, the Atacama Desert was waiting. The town of Arica and the sky over it were vague in the sand-cloud. However, there was no cloud in the sky anymore. It was mostly rainy in Bolivia except in Uyuni. A blue sky is essential for a motorcycle trip.

After Arica the Pan-American Highway repeated descending into a valley and ascending to a mountain for a while. The rivers from the Andes form deep valleys and cross the road. Although there is no water in the rivers, the valleys are green. The desert in Peru was completely flat and because of this boring, but the view in this part of the Atacama is changeable. I was, however, frightened of riding above the deep valley of the bald mountains. Soon later those valleys disappeared and the Atacama turned to an interminable flat desert. While there were a series of oases is the desert of Peru, there was nothing in the Atacama. And so, there weren't many gas stations either. There were only two gas stations in the distance of 530km between Arica and the intersection for the hot spring in San Pedro de Atacama. Soon after passing the intersection, the warning light of the shortage of gasoline was lit. Not long before I had seen the road sign "87km to Calama", to the next town. My bike won't be able to reach there with the gasoline left in the tank. Fortunately the map shows the existence of another town 15km before Calama. However, it is highly possible that the bike will run out of gasoline during the trip of 70km. I lowered the speed down to 80km and shifted the gear to the top. I rode up the slopes, keeping the top gear. I wanted pissing, but I endured. When I saw the town of Chuquicamata at last, I stopped the bike and pissed by the roadside. Luckily there was a gas station at the entrance of Chuquicamata. That day I got up earlier than usual and left the hotel at 8:15, for I would ride 400km after a long interval. As I had heard there would be few gas stations on the way, I filled the tank after traveling 60km. I expected I would easily reach Calama with the gasoline. The wind is not strong in the morning in this desert as well as the desert in Peru. In addition the desert of the Atacama has solid earth while that of Peru has fine sands. So, there isn't any attack by the sandblast. There aren't oases as in Peru, and the well-paved Pan-American Highway, though the pavement is not as good as in Peru, cut the desert straight. As a result, you can ride fast. Moreover, the engine of the bike recovered thanks to the high-octane gasoline sold in Chile, while the condition of the bike was not good on account of the gasoline of poor quality in Bolivia. So I speeded up. I am afraid the bike ate more fuel than usual.

I came all the way to San Pedro de Atacama in order to bathe in the hot spring which, I heard in the south end of Bolivia, would be on the other side of the mountain. If I had been able to cross the border that time, I would have visited the town by a short trip of 30km. It took 10 days instead to go there, making a long detour from the north. Although my guidebook writes nothing about the hot spring, I had been informed that the spring is 30km north of San Pedro de Atacama by the paved road. But I came to know the road is not paved when I arrived at the town and asked about it at the hotel. Hiring a taxi is expensive and in the desert the road doesn't get muddy by the rain. I decided to dare to go there by my motorcycle. The road was partly in the condition of a washboard, however, it was not a really bad road in most parts. But the last part of the road to go down to the hot spring on the bottom of the valley was bad. There were lots of stones and the bike jumped up. The bike landed on a large stone and the stone hit the bottom of the oil-leaking gearbox, making a big sound. But, I couldn't dare to stop the bike to check it. All I could do was to keep riding down to the valley, keeping the shiny part up. Fortunately I didn't find that leakage of the oil had worsened. The hot spring was surrounded by a plant like reeds. The hot springwater formed a pool and then flowed down the valley as a river. Some little birds were walking around and dragonflies were flying over the pool. The hot spring was in a beautiful place, being enclosed by rocky mountains, but the temperature of the water was 33 degrees and it was too low for me. The place was in the desert, however, the air was cool due to its high elevation. I felt cold when I got out of the thermal pool. Hot springs must be hot.As I finished bathing in the hot spring, I went down the mountains and went back to the Pan-American Highway. The Pan-American Highway meanders through the mountains in the south of the Atacama Desert. The Andes come closer to the sea and some port towns are constructed on the slopes. The Pan-American Highway comes to the sea to link these ports every several hundred kilometers and then goes inland for several ten kilometers. These ports were constructed for shipping out copper, which Chile produces the most in the world, and Chile niter. There was a museum of soda niter in a small village in the north of the desert. According to the local people, the production of fertilizer from soda niter has been completely stopped because of the advent of low-cost artificials. Besides these ports, there aren't any other towns in the Atacama. There is nothing between the towns, needless to say gas stations. I had always the fear that I would run out of the gasoline. These ports were really the oases for my BMW.

The ports were also oases for me. Good seafood is served in those ports of Chile. There was a cheap hotel with a restaurant along the Pan-American Highway in one of the small towns. The hotel room was never comfortable, but the charge of US$7.5 was much less than other hotels that usually charge more than ten dollars. In addition, as there was a parking next to the room, I stayed there. Soon after I arrived at the hotel at 2:30, I had fried fish. The fish had fresh white meat and was really delicious. Night came. I asked if they had something else. They answered me they had "erizo". I asked what it was. They took the food out of the refrigerator and showed it to me. Surprisingly it was sea urchin, that expensive seafood in Japan! I ordered it on the spot, supposing small portion of it would be served, but I was served with a plate with heap of sea urchin. I became full only with sea urchin for the first time in my life. It cost me only $7 including a small bottle of beer, although you are usually supposed to pay more than $10 for the supper in Chile. I was satisfied by the dinner.

After riding in the desert at the speed of 130km, I noticed that my helmet had a problem. I don't know if my head has shrunken or the helmet has swollen, but the helmet became to be moving backward by the wind. What is worse, the visor was often opened upward by the wind. I had to hold the visor by the left hand and was obliged to ride by one hand. I thought it would be more difficult to ride the windy Patagonia with this helmet. So I had an idea to buy a new helmet in Santiago. The rear tire would have to be replaced as well. In addition I wanted to change the engine oil and the oil filter. I had already found the address of the BMW shop in Santiago and its fax number by the Internet, but I didn't have the telephone number. I couldn't find the shop even in the telephone directory. The information of the Website of BMW is not always updated. It happened before that there wasn't such a shop when I went to the address given by the Internet. So I sent a fax to the shop. The fax didn't reach there. As a result I decided to go to the area with many motorcycle shops in Santiago to get some information about the shop. I parked the bike at the side of the street and went into one of the shops. I heard the rev sound of a motorcycle behind me. I looked back and saw the rider watching my BMW. I thought it would be better to ask him than the shop. His name is Alan Gordillo. He is a professional mechanic who repairs motorcycles at the police. All the police motorcycles in this city are BMW. He offered me the maintenance of my bike. I was accompanied by him and bought a helmet, a tire and engine oil. He changed the engine oil and the filter for me. A special tool is necessary to change oil of a BMW motorcycle. Needless to say, he had one. Thanks to him, my job about the bike was finished in a half day.

There is Mt. Aconcagua, the highest peak in the Americas, 100km northeast of Santiago. Its elevation is 6,960m, close to 7,000m. The elevation of Mt. Mackinley in Alaska, the highest peak of North America, is 6,194m and Mont Blanc, the highest in Europe, is 4,807m. To see higher mountains than Aconcagua, you have to go to the Himalayas, the Hindu Kush or the Tian Shan in Asia. According to my old map of South America edited in 1980, the sole paved road to link Chile and Argentina runs in the south of this mountain. I was thinking about taking this route to enter Argentina. At the same time I felt like visiting another face of Chile in the south of the desert. When I bought a map of north part of South America in California, I didn't buy the south part. It was my mistake and I had been looking for that map since Mexico. I couldn't find on the way and I have come to Chile in the end. The map that I finally obtained shows the road from the southern Chile to Patagonia in Argentina has already been paved. I want to see Aconcagua, but I will go to the south of Chile that has hot spring resorts.

(2) Esperantists and a motorcycle mechanic in Chile

On the third day after I entered Chile, I received an e-mail from an unknown person. It was from Daniel Carrasco, an Esperantist who lives in Rengo, a small town 130km south of Santiago. He wrote in his e-mail that he knew my arrival in Chile in my Website and that he would really want to see me, giving me his phone number. Later I came to know that Roberto Sartor, the Esperantist in Argentina, with whom I had been corresponding by e-mail for more a year, had let him know about me. In those days I was faced with the necessity of finding some Esperantist who live somewhere in the south of Santiago. For, two of the new ATM cards of those I lost in Colombia three months before were already sent to my brother's place in Osaka, Japan and I wanted to receive the cards that would be sent to Santiago by an air courier. The air couriers in Japan told my brother that they wouldn't send ATM cards. So I asked my brother to buy some books such as a Spanish grammar book and a history book about South America and to send the cards hidden in those books. I had an idea to receive the books at an office of one of the air couriers. My brother sent me a message the day before I received the e-mail from Daniel. He was waiting for good timing to send the cards to Santiago and finally he went to the courier. They told him that they wouldn't send the parcel to the office in Santiago, but to an individual residence. I didn't have enough time to receive the parcel in Santiago. So I was thinking about looking for some Esperantist in the south of Santiago then. I fully trust in Esperantists. It was the best timing. I immediately called Daniel by the Internet telephone. The calling system that I introduced in Cuzco is really useful not only for international calls, but also for the occasion like this. He willingly accepted my request and sent his address to me by e-mail on the spot. I received the address five minutes later in the same cybercafe and sent it to my brother. I wanted to receive these two cards as soon as possible, because the Visa card, which was the only means that I could draw my money, would expire in the next March. I received the e-mail from Daniel exactly when I needed it.

I received an e-mail from my brother that he had shipped the parcel on January 19. I was tracking the parcel by the Internet while I traveled in the north of the desert. I arrived in Santiago on January 21. I went to an Internet cafe immediately after I arrived at a hotel. First of all I checked the web site of the air courier and found the parcel had already delivered to Santiago. I was relieved to some extent and expected that I would be able to receive it in Rengo, even if it would take time for the parcel to get through the customs. After feeling happy, I saw the list of emails newly sent. One of them was an e-mail written in Esperanto again by an unknown person. It was from Ricardo Bravo, an Esperantist who lives in Santiago. He wrote in his e-mail that had been informed about my arrival at Santiago from a certain Esperantist and that he would let me stay in his place in Santiago. He also wrote he had never talked to a foreign Esperantist. However, I had already checked in a hotel and unloaded the heavy luggage from the bike. In addition, I had an idea to leave Santiago in three days when I finished the replacement of the tire and engine oil. So I didn't think I would accept his invitation, but I called him at once. He came to see me at the hotel before ten at night on the same day. We talked for about an hour. I came to know that Daniel let him know about me.

At past twelve on Saturday I met Daniel and Ricardo at the apartment of Ricardo. Ricardo is 29 and teaches linguistics. Daniel wears whiskers and looks older than his age. I imagined he was around 25, but surprisingly 17. He told me he would learn linguistics at a university. He spoke fluent English although he was still a high-school student. First of all I was surprised by his English, remembering almost no one of the university graduates in Japan can speak English. Besides, he spoke Esperanto as fluently as English. It is not surprising that 29-year-old Ricardo speaks fluent Esperanto, however, Daniel is only a high-school student. I have been learning Esperanto since he was a baby who couldn't speak even Spanish. Even so I still speak poor Esperanto. I joined their conversation, feeling some inferiority complex. Meanwhile, Daniel made an access to the Internet by Ricardo's PC and began chatting with seven Esperantists of the world. I believed computer chatting is based on letters, but they began to talk each other in Esperanto by microphone. After the chatting, Daniel opened the pages of Web sites on other international languages than Esperanto. Ricardo told me that about 700 international languages are invented, but that Esperanto is the only functioning language among them. I always learn a lot from Esperantists. I said goodbye to them that night, as I had already finished having the bike maintained and would be leaving Santiago the following day. In the Sunday morning I got up at 5:50 to go to Chillan, 400km south of Santiago. I left the hotel at 8:30. After the ride of several kilometers, the bike stopped, making a strange sound somewhere from its gearbox. Fortunately I saw a gas station 20m away. It was Sunday and most motorcycle shops were closed. I wanted to make a contact with Alan Gordillo, the professional mechanic on BMW who helped me a lot such as changing engine oil several days before. I had his e-mail address, but not his phone number. His name was not found in the telephone directory. In the mean time, the attendants of the gas station got the information that there was only one shop open in Santiago. When I tried to catch a taxi to go there, one of the attendants asked one of their clients to take me to the shop by his car. When we arrived there, one of the workers of the shop went somewhere and found a mechanic. I explained my trouble and the mechanic went somewhere and came back with a length of rope that never looked tough in his hand. We went back to the gas station and tried to tow the BMW by the same car. The rope was cut at once. I remembered one of the gas-station attendants had shown me the business card of a tow truck. I asked him to call the place. The man of the tow truck told me to give him 30 minutes, but he came two hours later. The truck was, however, the one for towing a car. So we had to tow the bike by rope again. I had the same experience in Mexico about ten years before. I remembered I frightened myself by riding on a bike towed by a car that time. So I rejected to be on the bike. The mechanic rode on the bike. When we safely returned to the shop, the mechanic carried my bike through a narrow corridor, which had several steps on the way, to his apartment at the end of the corridor. I felt a little nervous. I asked him to show me his work from the beginning, but he rejected my request. He asked me $60 before he did nothing. I felt uneasy. I asked him what time he would finish the repair. He answered me to come back the following day. I felt great anxiety and told him that I would be back on the same day. About my question of what time I would have to be back, he answered me it would be at eight of the night. I told him it would be too late and he changed it at six. I got really worried. The driver of the tow truck felt the same way and asked me, after leaving the apartment, if I had any friend in Santiago. I felt a worry that the mechanic might sell my bike without repairing it. The driver called Ricardo, the Esperantist, by his cellular phone. Ricardo soon came by taxi. We went back to the apartment of the mechanic by the tow truck. Ricardo talked with the mechanic and got the bike back for me. The mechanic had took out the seat of the bike, but hadn't done any more job. Nonetheless, he asked $19. Thanks to Ricardo's help, I paid $11. Ricardo told me he had found a public parking for my bike near his apartment and offered me to stay in his apartment so that I could save the money for the expensive hotel. So we carried the bike to the parking by the tow truck. But, the parking was a little far from Ricardo's apartment. I examined the situation more closely. I would have to go to the far parking in the early morning before Ricardo's leaving home for work and have to give my bike to the same tow truck. And, when the repair was finished, I would have to carry down all the luggage from the fifth floor, leaving the bike on the street. I didn't like the idea and I decided to return to the same hotel.

The following morning I found the shop of Motorrad in the telephone directory and called them. As "Motorrad" is the name of the Web site of the BMW, I believed that they had a pickup truck, but they didn't. So I called the man of the tow truck of the previous day and I asked him to tow the bike again from the hotel. After all I had to pay $110 for the towing for about 10km during two days. The Motorrad where we went was not a shop of the BMW and the service of the attendants was bad. They told me they couldn't start repairing the bike on the same day. At the moment a local motorcycle rider who visited the shop told me there was another better shop and gave me the business card of the shop. The shop also had a nameboard of Motorrad, however, the name of the shop was "Cross Team" in fact. The attendants of the shop were well-trained and immediately introduced their chief mechanic to me. The mechanic was 40-year-old Ricardo Arevena. I trusted him at once by his mild face and his serious attitude of listening my problem. He owned the shop. He was married to an English woman. I had heard from another shop that there were only three mechanics who can repair BMW motorcycles in Santiago. One of them is Alan, who works for the police as a motorcycle mechanic and who exchanged the engine oil for me. However, I believed Ricardo would do it. I asked him, "Can you repair?" His immediate answer was "Yes". He explained to me, in a moment, which part of the bike was broken. He was thinking about the process of the repair, gazing at the bike during 30 seconds. By this I became confident that he would surely make it. He asked me if I could understand Spanish and I answered, "not much". Then he tried to call a person who speaks English. He wanted to tell me the expense to repair the bike. I can understand this kind of simple Spanish. He told me it would cost $450. I asked him if he would also be able to stop the leakage of the engine oil. He answered me he would completely stop it. To tell the truth, he is a motocross racer. Masahide Kuraya, my motorcycle friend and at the same time my teacher of motorcycle maintenance, was also a motocross racer. He repaired and remodeled my several bikes after work every week, often five days a week, during ten years after I got a motorcycle license. The passion and the precision of their repairing and maintaining a motorcycle are extraordinary. For the repair of the oil leakage I had visited five different workshops in vain. But this time I was sure Ricardo would fix it. Ricardo stripped most parts of the bike, only leaving the engines. I was watching his work all the time. It required lots of labor. The reason of my bike's breakdown was that the revolution from the engines was not transmitted to the driveshaft on account of the wear-out of the gear of the socket in the center of the clutch disk. He soon phoned to order the disk. But he got the answer that it would take one week to receive it. I told him I wouldn't able to wait that long because it would get cold soon in Patagonia. So Ricardo and I visit several shops, trying to find a similar disk used for a car. But we couldn't. Then we went to a factory where clutch disks are produced. We found a similar Japanese disk and asked them to replace the broken socket. As we visited there just before closing time, they told us it would be finished around noon of the following day. However, it would be much faster than when ordering the new disk. In addition, they charged only $19 while the original disk costs $280. My motorcycle revived after two-day work. From the evening of the second day Ricardo ripped off the material used by the previous repairs to make preparations for welding till nine at night. On the third day welding was finished and the leakage of the oil was completely stopped. He offered me to put an iron plate to the bottom of the gearbox for protection. We went to an iron workshop, bought a piece of iron plate and had it cut. It cost only $2.8. Ricardo welded a cylinder-type metal to the plate to allow a space to let the wind pass and lastly painted the plate. He did all of these jobs as a real professional. He repaired my bike with a passion as if he was repairing his own racing bike. We were together for only three days, but I felt sorrow at parting.

The bike fully recovered at six in the evening of the third day. In the morning of that day I moved from the hotel to the apartment of the Esperantist Ricardo, as he was on holiday and he would help me carry the luggage. I was supposed to meet him at night in the night and spend the last night of Santiago at the Japanese restaurant that Ricardo and I went together before. I offered the mechanic Ricardo to join us. He accepted my invitation. At the restaurant he exceptionally drank beer that he doesn't usually drink. I was happy because the leakage of oil, which had been annoying me for a long time, was also solved. In Ricardo's eyes I also found a sense of satisfaction that he fulfilled his work. I was lucky. I would have had the hardest time if the bike had broken down in the desert of the North Chile. What is more, luckily the bike stopped in the center of Santiago. And, I think it was a sort of fate that I finally took the bike to Ricardo's place. There might not be any motorcycle mechanic like him in Santiago, or even in the world.

Years ago I attended a Spanish class in Japan for 12 years. For some of those years I was taught by a teacher from Chile. I believed Chileans would be as kind as her. Nevertheless, the people whom I met in this country were opposite to her. To tell the truth, I was getting to dislike Chileans. In both the hotels and restaurants, most Chileans were as cold as Ecuadorians. Particularly, the hotel "Los Arcos" close to Plaza Brazil in Santiago where I stayed was an extreme case. I had been having a bad impression about the hotel attendants who were too rude to, and negligent about their guests, although they charged as much as $25 a night. Probably due to this kind of poor management, someone stole money from one of the hotel rooms and three policemen came for investigation. I would have left the hotel if I hadn't had a problem about a parking. One day, I banged the reception counter and complained for the first time at my 31st trip abroad. Further, on the last day when I was leaving the hotel, the woman, good-looking but so rude that I had banged the counter, told me, "You didn't pay for the last day". "What!!!" I wanted to say such a mistake could happen because she was chitchatting, ignoring the guest, and as a result she neither gave me a receipt nor made notes of it, but I couldn't on account of my shock and the poor ability of my Spanish. In addition, I didn't have any proof and the driver of the taxi, in which I had put my luggage, was waiting, and the Esperantist Ricardo was also waiting for me outside his apartment. I paid the $25 in anger and despair. If I had not met the two Esperantists, Ricardo and Daniel, and the mechanic Ricardo, Chile would have been the country of the worst impression. I wish to learn even a bit of Buddha's world if possible, but instead, I almost suffered misanthropy in Chile.

(3) Southern Chile with hot springs

The desert ends and a green field extends in the south of Santiago. The four-lane Pan-American Highway runs through the field far to the south. I overtook the cars at the speed of 130 km/h as the Highway was paved well and as I wanted to reach Patagonia before it would get cold. I rode 400 to 500 km a day and gained one degree of latitude.

The Andes run parallel in the east of the Pan-American Highway and the international border between Chile and Argentina is in the Andes. In the south of Santiago there are hot springs on the western foot of the Andes. I ride 300 to 400km on the Pan-American Highway and ride another 100km or so to the east toward a hot spring on the foot of the Andes.

First, I visited Termas de Chillan in the southeast of Chillan. I had the idea of staying in a budget hotel in Chillan and of visiting the hot spring on the following day because the hotels in the hot spring resort would be expensive according to my guidebook. The second map edited in 2003 that I bought in Chile showed that the road was all paved to the hot spring. To make sure, I asked several people about this. They answered the road was paved. Nevertheless, the paved road ended after the trip of 74km from Chillan. I saw the road sign “6km to the hot spring”. I was shocked because I absolutely believed the road was all paved. But I didn’t want to go back as I came all the way. The unpaved road might have been easy for an enduro bike, but was hard for my BMW. Everything was expensive in Chile and the admission fee for the hot spring was also as expensive as US$6.5. That was almost the same fee as in Japan. Thanks to the expensive fee, changing rooms and showers were equipped. Four thermal pools were on the slope of the mountain like a terrace field. I heard the second pool from the highest was the hottest with the temperature of 40 degrees, and I bathed in it. However, it was not hot enough. I moved to a spring spout. The water around the spout was indeed so hot that I had to stay away. A middle-aged man talked to me. He told me he was also a motorcycle rider. I asked him about the hot springs that I would visit farther in the south. He answered me that the roads were all paved and that there would be budget hotels. It was a valuable piece of information to me. The sky began to be clouded. As I really hate to ride on an unpaved road in the rain, I left the hot spring earlier than I expected. I had kept all of my things, including the helmet and the boots, by the side of the thermal pool, because there weren’t lockers in the changing room. So I was looking for some place to change clothes, but I couldn’t find the place to hide myself. At the moment, the man whom I talked before gestured me from the thermal pool that he would watch my things. Riders are kind after all.

Second, I was heading to a hot spring in Pucon in the southeast of Temuco. The BMW became out of control at the place 50km before Pucon. I closed the accelerator, but the bike didn’t slow down. I couldn’t shift gears either. I kept riding, looking for a good place to park the bike. But I couldn’t. I saw a by-road ahead. I stopped the engine by the emergency switch and parked the bike there. I found that the accelerating cable for the left engine had worn out and it stayed in the position for high revolutions. Two young men walked up to me. I asked them if there was any nearby motorcycle shop. They answered me there was one in Villarrica, 30km away. I took the cable off from the left engine and rode the bike only with the right engine. As soon as I arrived in Villarrica, I rode to a motorcycle workshop. The mechanic successfully changed the worn-out cable with a new one. He charged me $18. He also adjusted the amount of gasoline supply from the injector. It was six in the evening. The mechanic told me the hotels in Pucon are expensive and busy on Saturdays. So I decided to stay in Villarrica. This was good for me. I heard that besides Pucon there are also some hot springs near Villarrica. However, all the roads to go to the hot springs in this district are not paved. Then I don’t have to go to Pucon. It’s the same thing. Elizabeth, who was running the hotel, was a kind and friendly woman. She called several places to make a reservation of a bus tour to a hot spring for me. I went to the hot spring at Conaripe, 60km southeast of Villarrica. When I came back to the hotel at around ten on that night after having supper, Elizabeth told me that some guests wanted to talk with me. They were four men from Santiago. Claudio, the oldest of them, was 43 years old. He told me he had several Japanese motorcycles including a Yamaha V-max. All of us drank together in the hotel kitchen and then in a bar of the town. It was half past four in the morning when I went to bed.

The hot spring at Conaripe was in an expensive hotel. There were three thermal pools and one cold pool. The temperature of the hottest pool was 41 degrees. It was hotter than the pool of the previous day only by one degree, but hot enough to enjoy bathing. I spent a good time for four and a half hours in the hot spring, bathing and eating, on the poolside, smoked meat of a vicuna with Chilean wine that I had bought at a supermarket. However, I threw up before leaving the hot spring. It was before nine in the night when I went back to the hotel. I had been invited to a dinner in the kitchen by Claudio. We had three of new guests. Elizabeth joined us as she did on the previous night. The time was twelve at midnight soon after we started the party. One of the men stood up to hug Claudio and said, “We celebrate your 44th birthday.” The rest of the men followed him. I also wanted to follow them, but I couldn’t. Japanese don’t have the custom of hugging. The party seemed to continue limitlessly. I left the kitchen to go to bed at two in the morning. Last, I went to a hot spring at Puyehoe, which is located in the east of Osorno and 20km before the border of Argentina. I imagined Puyehoe would be also a small town like the previous two towns close to those hot spring resorts. But the hot spring of Puyehoe was in a sole hotel in the mountain. At the reception of the evidently expensive hotel I asked, “This hotel must be for someone else, but how much do you charge?” I hesitated over the charge of $55. They told me that there was another hotel of the same owner, which charges $35, 3 km away beside the same road I had taken, and that the guests can bathe in their hot spring for free. I couldn’t easily judge which hotel I should take. The condition of my bike was not good. Dusk was falling soon. It began to rain a little. In addition, I didn’t like the idea of coming to the hotel again and going back with leather jacket, pants and boots on. I thought about what to do, smoking a cigarette at the reception. “Everything is expensive in Chile. And this is the last day in Chile. I have money. This might be the last hot spring in my journey. Today I will bathe in the hot spring and stay in this comfortable hotel after a long interval.” Although I could have paid in dollars, I paid in Chilean pesos as I still had some. As it was a high-class hotel, I paid the charge they asked me without any doubt. In the room I came to know that I had paid more than $80. I had paid $25 more. I went back to the reception to pay in dollars. The woman at the reception insisted that she couldn’t do it as she had already put the pesos in the safe. I couldn’t believe why she wouldn’t be able to do such a simple thing. So I told her that I would talk to the manager of the hotel. Her boss easily accepted my request. I asked the reason to a male receptionist. He answered me 19 percent of tax is imposed for the payment in pesos while no tax for the payment by a foreigner in dollars. On the whole, Chileans are not friendly and cold. And, most of the attendants in the hotels or restaurants are women. In Chile I am getting to hate women.

The hotel had indoor thermal pools unusually in Central and South America. It looked like a “jungle bath” in Japan. There were three pools and one of them had cold water. The temperature of the hotter pool was the same 41 degrees as that of the previous day. Probably because it was an indoor pool, I felt hotter. I felt like getting out of the pool after bathing in the hot enough spring for five minutes. I moved to another pool of 37 degrees. I could stay there for a longer time, but in the mean time I missed the hotter one. I repeated this for three and a half hours. The hotel charged $55 a night, however, it was well-equipped to meet the charge. The hotel also supplied bath towels and even bathrobes. I felt as if I were staying in a hot spring resort in Japan. The expense of $55 was great for me, but the hot spring satisfied me. The following day I stopped the bike and threw up time after time. I remembered I had a problem with my stomach and threw up each time I bathed in a hot spring for hours. The hot spring resorts in Japan often write, “Please refrain from taking a bath for more than 10 minutes. It is bad for your health.” I haven’t had any stress after I left Japan. Nevertheless, I have thrown up on account of stomach trouble at times. A hot spring might be the cause of it. Even so, I will keep visiting hot springs.