After Ushuaia we went all the way up to the Pacific coast to a place called Puerto Natales. Puerto Natales is in chile, and nothing more than a small port. It is closest village on the way to Torres de Paine, a famous national park with way to many tourists and a way to high entrance fee. You will ask you now: "Why the hell did you go there?" Okay, well we are waiting for a ferry which brings us all the way up to Puerto Montt. I could tell you more about that, but we will get back to this later.
The thing was, we had to wait there for three days. So what to do there? I didn't know first, so I was quit bored and little annoyed of this place. Suddenly walking down the avenue, I found this small paper which said there will be a rodeo tomorrow. What, a rodeo? I have never been to a rodeo. Let's go there!
Next day, it was rodeo day!
—We took a taxi that brought us to the rodeo a few kilometers out of Puerto Natales. When we arrived there, it was just a bunch of cars around a field. I had no idea of what will happen there. Walking around the area we found a very important corner. The grill place which they call "asado". They had hole lamps around a fire, french fries in pans and "completos" which is the chilenian hot dog. I can tell you: "they fucking love their completos!"
After a short time searching for a good spot to see something, the hole thing was starting. In the beginning we had no plan of rules or anything. Than we met this dude, a young american which is working on one of the cow farms in this area. He could tell us, how everything works. The rules are: You have to stay on the horse for eight seconds, until the bell rings. If you fall off before, you have no points at all. It is all about style. If you swing your wipe a lot and your horse is jumping around crazy you get a lot of points. The further you get in the competition the crazier the horses are. If someone did a great ride, the crowd went crazy on their car horns wich made a asome atmosphere.
We had a nice day with a lot of local people, good food and a great action.