A week of school in Pucón

After some time has passed, we are here again to report on our "school week." To further improve our language skills for the next two months, we chose the small town of Pucón for a one-week language course.

On the way there, we were able to try out the highly recommended Chilean bus network for the first time. After leaving Santiago at midnight, we made ourselves comfortable in the so-called "Salon Cama" bus for the next 10 hours. In Chile, there are three different classes for bus rides: Semi Cama, which is similar to what you would find in European coaches with regular seats. Salon Cama, which only has three seats per row, making them wider and they can be reclined much further back. Premium 180 is the luxury class, where the seats can allegedly recline 180°, providing a flat surface to lie on. For the first overnight journey, we treated ourselves to a bit of luxury and booked Salon Cama. The ride was surprisingly comfortable and we were able to sleep quite well, so we arrived in Pucón somewhat refreshed the next morning. From the bus station, we made our way to the hostel, dropped off our backpacks, and went to Border Café for breakfast, a true hipster café that you could also find in Friedrichshain. However, unlike the Nescafé, which is very popular in Chile, we finally got a decent cup of coffee here, so we became regulars over the next few days and felt a bit at home every time we visited.

Other than that, Pucón impressed us from the beginning with its beautiful scenery. On one side of the city, there is the large lake with a beach (unfortunately, the water was too cold for a relaxed swim) and on the other side, there is an impressive view of the Villarica Volcano - one of the major tourist attractions in the area. After a day of acclimatization, it was time for us to meet our host family on Sunday, with whom we would spend the next 8 nights. To start off, we were thrown directly into the deep end since our host mom, Silvana, had her birthday on the day of our arrival. That's why the whole family was already there when we showed up for the first time. But we were warmly welcomed by her, her husband Israel, and the rest of the family. At the same time, we were now completely surrounded by the Spanish language. Tabea did very well from the start and was able to have conversations with everyone about anything and everything. I (Tim) struggled more with my limited knowledge of Spanish from school, so I mainly focused on listening, which worked quite successfully at least in the beginning.

From Monday onwards, our week had a fixed rhythm. Breakfast, lunch, and dinner together with our host family, and 3 hours of private Spanish lessons in the early evening. Especially since the meals with Silvana were always accompanied by many nice conversations, there wasn't much time left in the day. But we still managed to do a bit of exploring alongside all the eating. During the week, we went on a small bike tour into the surrounding area of Pucón and visited the Ojos de Caburgua, a small national park with waterfalls and round water pools. The highlight of the week was supposed to be the ascent of the volcano on Saturday. Unfortunately, we had to reschedule and postpone the tour, so we will come back to Pucón for one more day in the following week to finally climb the volcano.

Therefore, our experience in Pucón is still somewhat unfinished for now, but hopefully, we can complete it next week. Nonetheless, we had a wonderful week there and were able to improve our Spanish skills. We may not be native speakers yet, but we definitely feel much more confident in our daily lives here. Now we are continuing south to the island of Chiloé, where besides penguins, there are also many old wooden churches and beautiful landscapes. And on our way back, we will reunite with Pucón.