Nevados de Chillán Days 2-4: Shangri-La and the Markets of Chillán

Following the incredible powder day that introduced me to the magic that is Nevados de Chillán, I slept great and woke up early ready to rock another snow day. However, as we rolled out in the truck caravan we noticed strong winds on the mountain, wind that turned out to be so strong that the resort shut down, wind that blew all that great snow right off the mountain, turning it into an icecake. Booo.

Puelche wind blowing the snow off of the mountain

Apparently this particular type of wind has a name: Puelche. They are warm winds that blow over from Argentina and have the nasty effect of blowing any fresh snow off of the Chilean mountains and then melting a layer (that later freezes) as a final kick to the nuts of skiiers in the Chilean Andes before retreating a few days later. Argentina, I know you are jealous of Chile’s superior snowfall, but do you really have to be such a jerk?

But the BackChillan guys had other adventures up their sleeves and we reversed direction and headed deep into Shangri-La for a mellow tour in the sunshine. We climbed through forest, past gorgeous mountains, through a volcanic landscape that Panchi (one of the BackChillan guides, also unofficial Grillmaster) pointed out looked like an Oreo Blizzard (I don’t remember what he said since I’m pretty sure there are no Dairy Queens and therefore no Oreo Blizzards in Chile, but I immediately knew what he meant) because of the snow on the black volcanic rocks, and out to the recently collapsed Refugio Shangri-La. Where we stopped and ate lunch and drank beer. Which was glorious.

Suiting up for the Shangri-La tour

Photo shoot with Manu in Shangri-La

Collapsed Refugio Shangri-La

On our return, Spanish Amazon Maria, a friend of the BackChillan guys and ski patroller by profession who spends her European summers snowbirding in Chillán, made Spanish Tortilla, which despite the egg allergy I tried a bite of and enjoyed thoroughly (Benadryl chasers have been my survival tool here in Chile), and Xavier, another friend of the group, made “barber’s spaghetti” (apparently his nickname is “the barber” although I never found out why).

Since the strong winds put a kink in any touring plans, we spent the next day in the city of Chillán, a 2 hour drive away, a place known primarily for its sausages (Longaniza). The guys took me through the Chillán market, a huge multi-block partially open-air market that sells everything, especially meat (like, there’s a whole block dedicated to meat, meat, and more meat). I of course loved it. And bought a lot of meat. They also got me to try Cazuela (a sort of hearty soup/stew involving a broth with vegetables, a boiled potato, and a large chunk of meat) and I had my second "mote con huesillos" (the first having been sprung on me with glee by Ignacio in Santiago), which is like a liter of supersaturated sugar with rehydrated peaches and grains inside. It looks as vile as it sounds and tastes delicious. The guys somehow gulped theirs down in all of 10 seconds, and it took me the better part of half an hour to finish mine, after which I had that “oh god, what have I done?” sugar overdose feeling (but oh, was it good).

Cazuela de Pavo (turkey)

Mote con huesillos

The primary purpose of the Chillán trip was to pick up a shipment of five brand-spanking-new mountain bikes that the guys had purchased on government start-up grant money in order to help make BackChillan a year-round venture (and therefore support their mountain hut-living lifestyle year-round, something I both completely understand and fully support). Five beautiful shiny mountain bikes, which we loaded into the back of their truck to cart back to Shangri-La.

Panchi and Pipe with their truck full o' bikes

And of course once we returned to Shangri-La, the first order of business was to assemble and test out the brand-spanking-new mountain bikes on a few mellow trails around Shangri-La and Las Trancas. The bikes came back nice and dirty, officially deflowered and ready to be rented to future visitors. That evening dinner was a giant rack of mutton ribs that the guys had pilfered off of an Asado at the local bar the previous night. Like, they literally brought a very large sheep’s rib cage home, intact, and plopped it down in the middle of the dinner table. A massive, dry heap of mostly bone and broiled fat. It was ridiculously tasty. And fat makes excellent touring fuel.

The next morning we were back on the mountain for the tour I had been most looking forward to: Aguas Calientes.

Nevados de Chillán Day 1: !&%*$#@ POWDER!

I knew I had found the right bus when I saw international freeskiing champion Drew Tabke waiting next to it. Tall, handsome, carrying a ski bag, from Seattle, friendly and mellow, pretty much like every other PNW mountain enthusiast I ever met before the hipsters and skittle kids started to infiltrate the niche. It was definitely a good sign.

Beyond "tall Seattlite skier" I didn’t know who he was until after he had helped me figure out how to get a ride to where I was going when we were informed that the bus we were on wouldn’t be able to make it all the way up the hill because of the snow (snow!) on the roads. After we had waited half an hour on the side of a dark road in a snowstorm together. After his local friend, a badass in his own right, sandwiched the two of us into the cab of his tiny truck for a bumpy ride out to where I was headed in Shangri-La. After they helped me carry my gear into the cabin, lit only by the headlamps of the still-strangers at that point of the people I’d be staying with, and hugged me goodbye with a “good luck and see you up there”. After they shut the door and one of the guys at the cabin asked me if I knew who that was. “Yeah, he’s kind of famous. Like, really famous.”

And that is how I arrived in Shangri-La at the mountain home of the BackChillan crew.

The BackChillan cabin in Shangri-La, the Nevados de Chillán volcanoes in the background. HDR.

Ending up in Shangri-La was the result of a long chain of serendipity that began when MIT geobiologist Julio Sepúlveda came to give a seminar in the geology department where I was finishing my Ph.D. As I gave him a mini-tour of campus, our conversation quickly turned from science to Chile when I told him my dream of ski touring in Patagonia after graduating. He told me to get in touch with his brother, Felipe, who was starting BackChillan--a Chilean-run guiding company based in Chillán. Get in touch I did and Felipe (Pipe) is ultimately to blame for my still, over a month into the trip, not having been to Patagonia, spending time instead in the central Andes and land of beautiful volcanoes of which Chillán is one of the powdery epicenters.

The original plan was to start the trip with him and his crew in Chillán and then head directly south to Bariloche, then Patagonia. Instead when I arrived in Santiago to a rainy Chillán forecast, I went to Las Leñas, got stuck there, and finally made it to Chillán in the middle of Week 3.

Getting myself dumped off at a dark cabin deep in the woods full of guys I’d never met before (my only contact being a few emails with Pipe) was a definite leap of faith, especially following the deeply uncomfortable experience I had just escaped from. But with my fingers crossed, faith in my mountain people, a good snow report ahead, and a “conditions are great, get over here” email from Pipe, I jumped on that bus from Malargue with my fingers crossed and faith in my experience that mountain people are good people.

My faith was rewarded.

Powder day at Nevados de Chillán

Pipe and the BackChillan guys set me up with a headlamp, bed, and beer (important) and got me pumped for the morning by showing me the weather forecast (powder) and photos from their recent tours. I woke up the next morning to the smell of toast in a house full of skis and nice people with a fresh layer of snow coating the mountains which wrapped around the cabin porch like a giant snowporn poster.

Asado. Along with snow, mountains,
wine, and the people, one of the reasons
Chile is amazing.

Loaded up with breakfast and coffee we loaded our gear and bundled-up selves into a truck caravan and headed to Nevados de Chillán, the local ski area, arguably Chile’s best for powder.

Then we rode without pause for 7 straight hours, hitting every stash of untracked snow we could find, stopping only briefly at the end to rest our legs and enjoy some live entertainment before making one last run before the lifts shut down.

And then my first Chilean Asado. Asado is Chilean for BBQ. Like Chilean wine, which is called wine but is actually distilled straight from the blood of angels and spiced with hellfire and tastes nothing like “mere” wine, Asado is like BBQ only at least twice as awesome.

Amazing.Fing.Day.

Continued:

Nevados de Chillán Days 2-3: Shangri-La and the Markets of Chillán

Nevados de Chillán Day 5: Aguas Calientes