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Chile....say Chee-lay. Just the word brings back miles of memories, dreams of rivers and mountains and faces. People often ask me, "Where is the best boating in the world?." After
California, to which my bias leans, I hold Chile a close second. Although the whitewater runs are often some distance apart, the experience of kayaking in Chile is altogether fantastic. For
the boater accustomed to running rivers in North America, Chile may well seem a wide and unfettered freedom. For the most part it's life at her simplest: boat, eat, sleep, drive, and socialize (learn Spanish and
talk to Chileans for the full experience). Chile is rustic, and in all but the biggest cities, unhurried. I notice "modernization" over the years, but for the most part the small towns maintain their
distinct custom. Everything shuts down at midday for the three-hour almuerzo and comes alive again in the evening. There are still horses, bikes and oxcarts on the village streets. Stop at a small restaurant
in the early afternoon and order cazuela de ave. Ask the merchant or huaso (cowboy) at the next table what life is like in his town. There's a good chance you'll be treated to some form of famous Chilean hospitality.
For the class V boater, runs of supreme quality await. The Bío-Bío, Futaleufú, Fuy, Palguin, Trancura, the Claro's Veintidos Saltos and Siete Tazas are world-class
kayaking rivers. And there's more. Generally, the further downstream one ventures on a given river the easier the water. The realm of class III and easier has not, to my knowledge, been much explored. I believe
there is more intermediate water in Chile than there is difficult. Whitewater in Chile is synonymous with variety. Around Santiago rivers drain six-thousand-meter-high glaciated peaks and
run big and brown with non-stop gradient. Several hundred kilometers to the south rivers are strewn with granite boulders and appear replicas of Sierra Nevada canyons. Volcanic river channels predominant in the
expansive Lake
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