On Saturday we visited the Andes, on horse back, accompanied by a French lady who had lived for many years in Chile and worked defining people's auras in holistic therapy, the man who runs the hostal and his young and very smiley girlfriend. The man could gallop at ease on his horse over crazily rough terrain with cries of 'yeeeee haaaa', calling his horse 'caballito' ('little horse'). It was a perfectly normal sized horse. Finally, a largely silent ranch hand, who spoke only Spanish when he spoke at all, rolled easily from side to side on his horse and led a second horse, loaded with wine, food and water, casually with his other hand.
On Sunday we visited the coastal mountain range, in the national park set up purely for the conservation of Chilean palms, which have died out naturally, on foot, walking on clearly delineated and signposted paths, accompanied by other students at the Spanish school, who spoke to us largely in American English (the fluent Spanish contingent happened to be absent that day).
The Andes are rugged, rough textured and a dry grey. They are beautiful in their loose stones, their burning sun, the dust clouds that fly from the horses manes, and the vistas of jagged hillsides, casting shadows on the flat, and littered with dry and brittle trees and shrubs of a faded green that suggests they have been bleached by the sun. The ground is uneven and slippery, scree falling from the horses feet and scattering down the mountainside with every step. The horses gallantly carry us up steep mountain side tracks, which have me gulping and gritting my teeth, gathering my courage against the steep drops and the slippery, rocky terrain by concentrating on the awe inspiring vistas. Sweat drips from the horses, their coats soaked and matted under their rope bridles and sheep skin saddles, they change colour in the dust throughout the day.
The Andes are awe inspiring for their sheer inhospitality. I peer from under my wide brimmed sunhat (there are no riding helmets here) at scattered, sun bleached goat, cow and horse skeletons, picked dry by predators. The condors which we see wheeling high above take on a particular predatory nature as we realise it is this heat and dust inspired deathscape which feeds them. We stop for a rustic barbecue by a stream, incongruous in this landscape. The water is crystal clear and cold. We cool our feet and hands - instantly putting ourselves off ever drinking this water. I guess the animals don't mind. All the same, we encounter a near intact goat skeleton nearby. Our holistic therapist companion picks up the skull, which still, somehow retains its ears. For a moment I think she is going to read its aura or communicate in some way with its soul, putting it to rest or some similarly colourful action. To my relative disappointment it turns out that she simply thinks it is beautiful and is taking it home as decoration for her house. We relax against the warm rocks. It's more comfortable than any number of cushions and picnic blankets. I feel, leaning back, as though I am touching the world.
The coastal mountain national park has straight, clear paths, lined with huge green cactuses. I am amazed by the amount of green here, caused apparently, by the proximity of the sea, which means the ground is better irrigated. The rock face takes my breath away, it is geometrically patterned, carved out in shades of pale yellow of whitish grey, cactuses clinging to tiny ridges in the rock face. The Chilean palms, famous for their trunks which resemble an elephants leg, are dense enough to be considered, in the areas off the path, to be a forest. They make a chattery, clicking sound as the slight breeze rifles through their green fronds. Standing beneath them, looking up, creates a strobe like effect with the sun. This is not a parched and lonely landscape. This is a park full of walkers, with car parks full of cars (though only at the start and end of the tracks - this is not a Balinese motorbike shattered peace). There is a look out with benches. There are toilets at the car parks. The toilets have toilet roll and soap plus running water. In the Andes we simply ducked behind a dry tree or a rock and watered the dust.
In the Andes we talked in Spanish about our holistic friend's work and she told us her vision for us, read in our spiritual aura. She told us in Spanish and we understand about four words per sentence between us. Possibly the vision was that we were walking together in life, in perfect rhythm, taking exactly the same steps but, like students in school, individual people with individual personalities and aptitudes. Or she might have been saying there were gaps in our happiness. We are not sure, though M thinks the 'gaps' might have been in general, and were what she looked for in people and worked to heal. I am pleased with this explanation because I am rather tired of people assuming we have a collective 'gap' in the shape of children. Rubbish. We do not have a gap in our happiness because we do not yet have children. In fact quite frankly, we don't have any gaps. Our happiness, at least as far as I am concerned, is complete. We drink wine with the cork dug out of it with a hunting knife and blow ashes of the potatoes cooked directly in the fire, before eating them.
In the coastal mountains we talk in English about politics, immigration, environmental issues and have a rather giddy little fantasy about becoming 'wild tourists' living in the park when we get slightly lost. We cackle so loudly about this that obe if our number pointedly says that she will stay at the look out point a little longer while we go on ahead to 'enjoy the peace'. It is not motorbikes causing the noise pollution here, it is us. We eat empanadas from a small restaurant on the way home in the car.
I notice that the fantasy if living 'wild' is more prevelant and more inviting on the day we are living a much more civilised existence. I enjoy the horse trek, especially sitting in the rocks and the rustic barbecue, but am terrified of the horses slipping, plummeting with me down the arid rock strewn mountainside. That story, minus my fear, becomes perhaps more fun in the telling. Adventures are always more fun afterwards, when you know you survived.
Two very different worlds to touch, two very different mountain ranges. Equally beautiful. And, in their own way, equally deadly.
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