26/10/2019 – Thermal springs, Pucon, Chile

We had a coffee and cereal in bed before getting up and ready for todays’ excursion. Josh and I both have the day off together. We got picked up at 12:30 by a minibus. It was grey and raining so there was a whole bus load of us heading to the thermal springs, a great activity for this weather! It took about an hour and a half until we pulled into the car park of thermal Geometricas. The springs are within a national park - it was so green and steamy, very atmospheric! A bit Jurassic Park esque. (BTW definitely Google to have a look as we didn’t take any pictures and they really were very cool!) First we went into the main building that had some open fires. Josh and I were very hungry so had some lovely wood fired pizzas before getting into our swimming stuff on in the outdoor huts. The whole complex was designed by a German architect who used only natural materials, it was very beautifully done. It felt very luxurious, and we had got it at almost half price because we are volunteers, which was an extra bonus. There were about 30 different pools, ranging from 6°C to 44°C. There were freezing cold waterfalls that you could stand under too (we didn’t do that, it was too far away from the next hot pool!) It was all very relaxing! Josh loves the sulphur smell! After a good few hours (the time flew by!) we got changed again and downed some water before getting into the minivan to go back to the hostel. Both Josh and I dozed off for most of the journey. We got back to the hostel and had a gnocchi dinner before showering and getting ready for our first Saturday night out in Pucon! We sat in the bar with David (the volunteer behind the bar) and played a few games. We drank some pisco with a Chilean guest – it is strong stuff! The hostel was closed up as usual by about 23:30 and then a group of about 8 of us both guests and volunteers headed out to Mamas and Tapas – the nightclub in Pucon. Ori managed to get us all in for free as he is a regular thankfully. The dance floor didn’t open until 0100 so we sat on the heated terrace and had some pisco drinks. They didn’t measure the alcohol and they were very generous with it! I think we only bought a couple of drinks each and that was more than enough! When it opened we hit the dance floor with a bang and were being a bit silly, which the local crowd seemed to enjoy! One of the bouncers has a dog that just wanders around the whole bar, which was quite funny! Josh and I escaped when we had had enough and were ready for bed, but were chatting away to each other until we realised we were on a beach, and had gone the wrong way. I mean, the bar is literally three blocks down the main road to the hostel, but somehow we must have just gone completely the wrong way. We ended up knocking on a security office to ask the way, the 10 minute walk took us a whole hour!! We eventually got home and were in bed by about 05:15.