Petufquén to Cunco
A great ride to Cunco. The last 10km was very hot. We now know why there is siesta time in Chile from 1pm till 3pm. The Sun is very hot. So hot in fact that Bob had circular shaped Sun burn patches on his head from the sun beating down thru his bike helmet.
So hot it looks as though I may have gotten a Sun burn thru my cotton shirt-if that's possible.
So hot that we ride for 30 minutes then hid in the shade to prevent us from over heating.
So hot that we drank 3 litres of water each and then some when we arrived .
I checked my on board computer which gave us a temperature of 39 degrees Celsius. (Sorry to friends and family who are braving the -30C winter weather in Ottawa!)
Our "hotel" in cunco was new.
Claxon Hostetleria. Right across from the park. The front desk guy showed us where to put our bikes and lead us up the back stairs to our room.
Our bikes were safely put in the utility room that housed the water pressure tank, water heater and storage for the things you don't know what to do with. Card board boxes, old broken tables and other junk lined the walls.
The door was Heavy but there was no lock. Instead of a lock there was a string coming out of the middle of the door to unlock the door from the out side. You pulled the string, which unlocked the door then you pushed the door open. The front desk guy said it was safe because there were cameras. Hmm. Anyway, we locked our bikes together then dragged our bags upstairs following the manager to our room.
The room and fixtures were new. Lovely beds, sheets, pillows and bathroom. Bob did a quick check and after some of the places we've stayed in this one looked great. No bare wires or black mold anywhere!
After a borderline tepid to cold shower (not a hot shower) we thought about heading out to the "supermarcado" for some fixin's for supper.
We went down the stairs to find the front doors locked and our keys not fitting into the door. How were we supposed to get out? Bob said that the front desk guy said something about using the back entrance if you are comfortable.
Hmm.
The front desk was vacant and we could see people thru the front windows having their restaurant dinners on the streetside patio not 6 feet away. We thought about tapping on the window and calling out. But what to say? We're Canadian tourists trapped in our hotel? We didn't know the Spanish word for trapped and we also weren't prepared for that embarrassment. We had enough water and air to get us through the night. Back to the investigation.
We did come in thru the back staircase but there didn't seem to be any back stairs!
We weren't paying attention to how we got to our room because we were being lead thru the warren by the front desk guy (no English). There was three floors of doors, each of which had a very conventional hotel room number on it.
We felt like lobsters in a trap. We remember coming in but can't remember what the door looked like. We opened a few doors to see if any revealed a hidden stair case.
Bob reached out to open room number 1 - " don't", I whispered sharply, "I checked and there's people sleeping in there!" ( FYI I'll always lock my door from now on)
I think it was like an escape room.
There were no hidden stair cases.
There was an unfinished suite. Kitchen not complete.
A couple of rooms with double beds. All made up (and no one home), and room with locked door (I'm thinking linens) but no stair case. Everything was deserted including the front desk.
I headed upstairs to see if there were other options when I heard Bob say "found it".
It was thru room 5.
You had to enter room 5 and walk past the bathroom to see the door to outside stair case.
As we walked down the outdoor stair case it dawned on me that there was a sign taped on the inside of the front door with red marker that said...
"Salida por habitacion 5"
Our French had kicked in and we wondered why this would be an exit for room 5. Now we know.
"Salida por habitacion 5"
Which translates to
"Exit thru room 5"
Hind sight is 20-20
With that out of the way, Bob headed to the store while I waited back on the little terrace. It was beautiful. Perfect temperature a slight breeze and tranquil surroundings. Table and chairs, perfect.
Then I smelled something burning. The kind of fetid smoke you get when you put plastic on a fire. Then I could see black puffs billowing out from the side of the building. But it was thru a chimney. Or I should say a metal pipe sticking out about a foot from the floor of the terrace. What the heck?
The superintendent had asked me to move our bikes so he could start the furnace. I didn't realize that the furnace was there and although it used wood pellets, I think he started out by lighting some plastic wrappers on fire.
When Bob returned we moved inside (to room 5) and had our supper.
This was probably the reason why we had no hot water, because they start the furnace at 8pm to heat the water. So you get hot water starting at about 8.15pm.
It was a restful sleep and as usual there were the usual dog fights, barking, car alarms and roosters cock-a-doodle-doing all hours of the night/morning. It's interesting, the things you get used to!
B bye hotel Claxon.