February 7 - To Punta Arenas

Hi:
I thought I'd have nothing to tell you today, but life is always interesting, so here goes.

I was watching TV during breakfast (Spanish TV announcers talk slowly so there is some chance to recognize the odd word).  A news segment comes on with the following action:  A man is walking down the street; something drips or is thrown on his jacket (bird poop?); a volunteer jumps forward to help the fellow clean himself up;  she takes the victim's jacket; helpfully cleans it up and hands it back; but MINUS his wallet (which she palmed & handed off to a co-bad person).  Apparently, this is a scam down here.  So, folks, keep this in mind.

Lonny and Jordan had this happen to them when they were down here last year, but they recognized it and were able to thwart the threat.  Thanks for the heads up Lonny.

Enough about breakfast.  Off to the bus station and get on the bus.  Yahoo, I have an empty seat beside me.  Minutes before we go another bus (with Bus-Sur) leaves, also going to Punta Arenas.  15 minutes out of town that bus is involved in an accident.  I don 't think the bus passengers are hurt badly, but the other vehicle is smashed up and in the ditch.  This delays us long enough so that I might have missed my flight had I been trying to go straight to the Punta Arenas airport instead of going a day earlier.

The rest of the trip is uneventful.  I get to PA, get into my hostel, unpack and head downtown to a museum I had missed previously.  It's an all purpose museum: 
- Natural History with a lot of info on fauna - the first animal I see is castor canadensis (c'mon folks you know who this is).
- Lots of displays on the region's indigenous peoples and their history
-History fo the area's religious figures
- Etc, etc.  I won't bore you with the details but I enjoyed it.

   
The museum is the 2 story building behind the church; and, here is the statue at the top of the church's steeple.  The church is relatively new, completed early in the 20th century.














 After the museum it's down to the waterfront for another look there.  Here is the remains of an old railroad coal loading dock (the museum had a section on coal mining and current petro fuel activities).











I don't know how I missed this earlier.  Pretty funky, eh?  The plaque beneath the fountain says it was inaugurated by His Excellency the President in January 2014.  Maybe it was under a sheet then.












Last waterfront photo:  A big mural on the wall of a building across from the waterfront.  Punta Arenas is cleaning up and redeveloping the waterfront, which has some grotty areas.








A sad reminder of some of Chile's history.  The phrase painted on the building says "here is torture."  The plaque beside the door describes it as a "detention and torture centre 1973 - 1990" (the Pinocet years).

Here's Michael Jackson, or a busker (white suit at right) doing his thing with a big boom box for accompaniment.  After he finished he held out his hat and the audience came forward to donate.  


So, that's today's notes.  Off to Santiago tomorrow and pick up Laura Sunday.  

See you with my next update.