You could have teleported me to Pluto and I don’t think the feeling would be any weirder.
Last night I fell asleep on an Air Canada flight somewhere over Canada. This morning I woke up on that same Air Canada flight somewhere over South America. It was summer when I went to sleep, winter when I woke up. I had shorts on when I left and a ski jacket when I arrived. The world’s a weird place… so big yet kind of small.
My husband and I flew Toronto direct to Santiago, Chile… why? What else… to go skiing in Portillo, Chile. The South American seasons are upside down–it’s summer in Canada when it’s winter in Chile. Something quite novel for a diehard skier like me, who’s always looking for new journeys to snow. This one did not disappoint.
Our driver’s name was Mario. An apt name, considering his Italian driving style. He spent more time in the oncoming traffic lane than he did in his own. My nails dug divots into Peter’s arm every time we went around a corner on the wrong side of the road. “Do you think he knows there’s a car coming the other way?” I’d hiss. Peter would just smile. “Sure. Mario’s a good driver.”
Mario spoke no English, and neither of us speak Spanish beyond “Hola” and “Gracias.” Yet somehow he engaged us in a full conversation. As we snaked up into the Andes from Santiago–a three-hour drive if there’s no snow falling or worse (avalanches) we learned about the seemingly vibrant trucking trade between Chile and neighbouring Argentina, Chile’s vineyards that are all lined up at the side of the road, the role of the Gaucho (cowboy) which is actually an Argentinian word but is used here, too, and the wonders of Patagonia in the southern section of Chile to which, suddenly, I am yearning to visit.
The road to Portillo runs upward like a black ribbon through brown ranchland as it makes its way into the Andes. Santiago itself is all lowrise and sprawling. It’s a massive city with more than 6 million inhabitants–more than the rest of the country–yet it’s not filled with skyscrapers like New York, Chicago or even my home, Toronto. Somehow it’s more low key.
Once out of the city you’re immediately into ranch land. Gauchos (I promise I will find the local name for them soon) ride horses along the roadway. I don’t know what they’re doing, but they appear to be working. They wear large, round straw hats and colourful ponchos. Most have huge, swooping mustaches (the gauchos, not the horses). I’m not kidding.
Mario kept warning us we would encounter a lot of truckers on the way to Portillo. I wondered why he’d warn us of such a thing, yet sure enough, there they were… an absolute ton of truckers. We likely encountered 4- or 500 in a single three-hour trip. Apparently the ski road to Portillo is also an international highway linking Chile with Argentina, Brazil etc. It’s they only way there, which seems incredible. The road is only a two-laner and is as steep as any I’ve encountered in the alps, with loads and loads of switchbacks. At one point we counted 29 switchback turns in a space of about two kilometres. Let me show you a picture: 
Once we reached the snowline we came across at least three transport accidents, most in the ditch with front wheels hanging precariously close to a cliff’s edge. The trucks’ general ascent, as a result, moves at a snail’s pace. Hence Mario’s favour of the ‘other lane, not our own.’ We must have passed 100 transport trucks along the route… many of them happy to honk at us.
The best part was spotting the dozens and dozens of cars pulled off to the side of the road, their occupants tumbling out to run toward the snow adjacent to the highway. Mostly Chileans, perhaps from Santiago, they’d pull on rain pants or whatever waterproof garb they could find. They’d grab sleds (that looked, by the way, suspiciously like flutter boards), then hurl themselves down the pistes–mom, dad, three kids all piled on the same board.
About 2/3 of the way up the steep part of the access road (a.k.a. international highway!), Mario pointed to the sky and told us to look at the ski lift. I forget which word he used for ski lift, but it was nothing I’d heard before. We pressed our noses to the window and sure enough, there was a triple chair moving rapidly above us, right over the swtichbacks and the hundreds of truckers. It was moving much faster than us. “We should ride the lift,” I told Peter. “It would be faster than us, even with Mario!”
But it wasn’t long before Hotel Portillo was looming in front of us, a massive, all-yellow rectangle of a thing that lords itself over acres and acres of wide open, treeless slope. Mario reeled in, we threw open the van doors and let our sneakers touch the cold ground–a long way from the summer lake we’d just left. We shivered and said thanks, handed over a tip, then entered the all-yellow hotel.
About to start: our skiing adventure.
Lori Knowles is the ski columnist for the Toronto Sun.
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