First few days in Pucón

I arrived in Pucón on Wednesday evening, which left me enough time to dump my stuff in my new accommodation and go out for a few drinks with my new boss.

My accommodation is a small room with two beds in a pretty rickety wooden shack-style thing, not the most luxurious accommodation I've stayed in but a bed is a bed and I'm not fussy. Thursday was my first day working in the shop, getting to know the staff, how the company works and what gear we've got. That evening I went out paddling with a friend to a local surf wave, it was great to be in a playboat again after a while. The might be pretty hot out here, but that river was absolutely freezing!

Team 2016

It's been far too long since I've been in a tiny boat!

Friday I spent a day shadowing one of the other two guides on an intro to whitewater day. I'll be running these things quite a lot this summer, spending the morning giving the clients some basic skills on the lake, then heading to an easy section of whitewater in the afternoon to give them a taste of the thrills that whitewater can offer. The river has some absolutely stunning sections, I'll be trying to get some decent photos of the work I do as the summer progresses.

View from the shop, 

Saturday was the best day so far. The head guide and I spent the morning reapairing gear at the shop and then we all headed off to my boss's house, who lives right next to the Palguin River. It's a classic Chilean waterfall run and we were told it's tradition to run it for the first time blind, after all you only get the chance to see a rapid for the first time once! The first run Daniel (the head guide) and I headed down with Ben (the boss) and I absolutely loved the river. There's a short hike in to start, a beautiful seal launch into the river followed by 3 waterfalls and quite a steep hike out. The best thing is that you can easily walk from the take-out to the put-in with your boat so me and Daniel did a total of three laps whilst the others BBQ'd the meat. We finished the trip with a delicious BBQ, beers in the sun and a bit of football.

If this is the start, just imagine how great the rest is...

What better way to do staff bonding?

I returned back to the centre where two friends from Concepción had arrived to spend the weekend. We grabbed some food together and then spent the evening chilling on the beach.

Today we went for a quick paddle on the lake, the cool thing about living here is even if I don't have transport to a river I can walk to the lake with my boat on my shoulder and let off some steam. The strong wind and heavy rain made it a bit more challenging on the lake. We then headed back to Loncoche to Roberto's house where we'll spend the night before I return to Pucón for work in the morning. It's been great to catch up with these guys who are taking a brief break from exam revision and I can't wait to start another week of paddling in the sun!