The Forgotten Continent Expedition

[dhackney]

Maintaining Perspective - Part 1

Our rig came off the ship at 6:20AM on Sunday, 14 January.

We had a chance to inspect the rig that day and knew it was damaged, perhaps destroyed. We sold our house to clear the decks for these years of travel, so this meant we might have lost our home. It was a quiet ride back to the hotel.

Back in our room I wandered out onto the balcony to listen to the waves, watch the sunset and contemplate things.

The vista was flawed by the one thing that strikes mortal fear into anyone from San Diego, a raging wildfire in the hills above Valparaiso.

Over the last few days the local TV news and papers have been filled with coverage of the fire, the "Inferno of La Cruz."

In total 88 homes were destroyed and over 350 people made homeless. One woman died of burns over 90% of her body. A volunteer fireman is still in critical condition after being crushed by a burning tree. (All the firemen in Chile are volunteers.) Many local residents were burned as they rescued family members or fled the flames.

Yesterday we asked our guide and interpreter, Jorge Valdes, to take us up to the area to see if there was anything we could do to directly help those impacted.

Today, we visited the neighborhood.

The fire started when a couple of young boys were playing with matches up in this canyon.

The fire roared down the canyon into the La Cruz neighborhood.

And, as fires do, simply destroyed everything in its path.

This disaster scene shared many similar characteristics to other places we've been providing volunteer relief.

There were piles and bags of clothes donated by the local community. Everybody has some old or unused clothes around the house. They are quick to gather and easy to deliver. This neighborhood was swimming in donated clothes.

There were groups of church volunteers, including the kids working in the neighborhood church basement cooking donated food.

There were groups of local men volunteering to clear debris, all uncomfortably wearing unfamiliar hardhats.

There were utility crews restoring services.

 

[dhackney]

Maintaining Perspective - Part 2

But mostly, like all disaster scenes, there were the constant reminders that for these people, for these families, for these children, last Sunday, their world ceased to exhist.

Now, their doors led to nowhere.

Their family meals were taken curbside.

And there would be no more bicyle rides.

But even in the ruins, children still play.

And our new friend Nickolas, whose family lost everything in the fire, including his father's lifetime of football trophies, whose father was burned rescuing his sister from the fire, who has nothing but the blue t-shirt on his back, can still find a reason to have fun with his friends.

 

[3trdmarine]

Very cool story so far! Will be following along. Be safe, but take chances! Thats the stuff stories are made of:smiley_drive:

 

[dhackney]

Maintaining Perspective - Part 3

And, out of the tragedies of the ashes, injuries and death, miracles emerge.

We saw television news coverage of the fire as it was burning. I’d estimate the winds were blowing at least Force 5, maybe 6.

The fire burned right up to the blue building in the background of this shot.

That blue building is this little church.

During and after the fire Steph and I saw TV news video of the homes burning on this street. In the videos, the wind was blowing so hard the flames were extending horizontally out over the street.

The church’s pastor, seen here, told our interpreter, guide and friend, Jorge, the roaring wind blew the flames alongside, up and over the church.

The house next door to the church, that once stood a few feet behind the pastor in this shot, was gone. Everything between where the fire started and where the pastor stood was gone.

We looked at the church. We walked along the entire fire side of the church. There was a little charring in a few small spots on the church, otherwise it was untouched.

I don’t know how many firemen were deployed for the Inferno of La Cruz. I have heard it was every fireman in Valparaiso and half of the available force from Viña del Mar. If that’s true it was probably at least 200 firefighters.

I don’t know how many pieces of firefighting apparatus were deployed on the Inferno of La Cruz. If the local anecdotes are accurate there were at least a few dozen.

I don’t know where any of the firefighters and their equipment were physically located in relation to the fire, this neighborhood or this church.

I don’t know any of those hard numbers. I don’t know with certainty any of those facts.

What I do know is that the raging, wind whipped firestorm that I saw with my own eyes stopped right there, in a narrow walkway alongside a tiny church perched high on the hills overlooking Valparaiso.

I don’t have any explanation for it. I don’t know if anyone ever will.

But I can tell you, with certainty, the people of La Cruz who started that Sunday with next to nothing and ended the day with just plain nothing, the people who are sleeping under tarps and tents, the people whose homes and every single thing in them vanished beneath a wall of flame, the people who lost family, friends and neighbors to injury and death, desperately need some good news in their neighborhood. In their eyes, from the death and destruction of the Inferno of La Cruz the church has emerged, as if a phoenix, as the Miracle of La Cruz.

*********************​

A PDF version of this story is available at: http://www.hackneys.com/travel/chile/infernooflacruz.pdf

 

[boblynch]

Thanks for the story. The stark contrast between your bent Fuso door and the fire is a gift to all of us stateside. Most of us sweat the little stuff way too much. Thanks for the perspective. Have a wonderful trip!

 

[RoundOut]

Excess

Doug,

Reading your blog on the La Cruz fire really helps put things in perspective. As we spend enormous (by La Cruz standards) sums of money preparing our vehicles and taking vacations, there is immense suffering and poverty all around us. It reminds me a bit of the movie Schindler's List, where in the end, Oscar Schindler, after having done so much, regretted not selling his car so he could have bought the lives of a few more Jews. While I wonder when the next vacation or expedition will occur, the people effected by the fire in La Cruz wonder where they will spend the night.

The miracle of that church building's survival is remarkable, and surely gives a beacon of hope for the people of La Cruz.

Thanks for giving me fresh perspective. Your reports make a difference for those of us who cannot be there.

Godspeed.

.

 

[dhackney]

Shipping to Chile

Here's a summary of shipping to Chile.

Chile is a very developed economy. It is regulated, efficient and so far completely devoid of the corruption common in Mexico and some other Latin countries.

Valparaiso is a small to medium sized port. It is more a roadstead than a harbor. A breakwater provides some protection to the wharves but the ships are vulnerable to ocean swell.

The only true Roll On / Roll Off (RoRo) service I am aware of here is factory car delivery ships. All other ships served are medium to large container ships or small coastal pallet tramps.

It is important to note that your freight forwarder may tell you, even in response to a direct question, as ours did, that your vehicle will be shipped RoRo but if it is coming to Valparaiso it will be craned on and craned off.

If your vehicle will not fit in a container and must go RoRo I recommend putting it on a flat rack. Chain it and lock it to the flat rack. The unload crew here unloaded a new Porche Turbo while we were waiting on customs clearance. They cut it off of the Porsche platform and craned it out the same way they did our truck and damaged the Porsche the same way the did our truck. They laughed about it afterwards.

I do not recommend shipping via standard crane lift tube cradle into or out of Valparaiso.

There are the typical assortment of government agencies, corporations, sub-contractors, etc. involved in the port.

In general, your shipping experience will follow this typical scenario:

The entities here are:
MARVAL - overall port management
TPS - German company that runs the container wharf operation
San Francisco - Subcontracted company that loads and unloads for TPS

As in any international shipping experience it is very, very important to pick a good freight forwarder and customs broker.

You will need full, fluent language skills for this transaction. If you do not speak business level Spanish, you need an interpreter who is an experienced business person. Knowledge of shipping, receiving and vehicles is very helpful.

There are some unfortunate consistencies about ocean shipping:
- You will probably be lied to repeatedly throughout the process
- The ship's schedule will change often
- The ship will almost certainly be late
- Your vehicle will take much longer to process through customs than you think it will or will be told
- There will be some extra and unanticipated costs

It is very important to remain patient, steady and even keeled through the experience.

We delivered our truck to Houston on 10 December, 2007. Our truck offloaded 06:20 AM 13 January, 2008. It cleared customs 9PM / 21:00 16 January, 2008.

Count on a minimum of three to four days in customs.

Valparaiso is at the end of the world's supply chain, so shipping costs are very high.

Costs were:

~$11,500 for shipping, including freight forwarder fees, dock fees, crane fees, etc.
~$1,000 for customs broker, intra-dock transport, dock fees, crane fees, etc.
~$115 storage
~$1,500 Valparaiso interpreter / coordinator / fixer
~$150 tips / grease



Freight Forwarder:
Transpotrade International Inc.
2700 Greens Road
Bldg E300
Houston, Texas* 77032
(281) 449-5288

Judy Nowak - jnowak@transpotrade.com

Recommendation: Use at your own risk. I would never have shipped by crane. If I had not been lied to about the lack of RoRo service in Valparaiso I would have put it on a rack.



Customs Broker:
Francisco Vargas Agency
Prat n 846
2 Piso Officina A
Valparaiso, Chile

56 32 254 34 80
FAX: 56 32 254 34 87

agencia@franciscovargas.tie.cl
http://www.franciscovargas.cl

Contact: Fancisco Vargas Scavia

Note: In Latin countries people use both their father's and mother's last names. Generally you address people by their father's name, so Francisco uses Francisco Vargas.

Note: Vargas Agency has no English language capabilities. You will need business level Spanish language skills or use an interpreter.

Recommendation: Highly recommended. Very professional. Very effecient. Ask for Mario for your dock coordinator (14 years of experience, knows everyone and how everything works).


Interpreter / Guide / Fixer:
Jorge Valdes
Terra Ultima Expeditions
Maipu 621
Linares, Chile

56-9-9-892-7329

jorgevaldes55@hotmail.com
http://www.terraultimaexpeditions.com

Recommendation: Highest possible recommendation. Honest, high integrity. Understands Americans as only someone who lived there for years can. Knows shipping and vehicles. One to two degrees of seperation from contacts embedded in nearly every organization and entity in Chile. World class fixer.

 

[Christian P.]

Doug,

Thank you very much for this detailed information - including the costs.

Based on my own experience, your conclusions are about right.

Having been involved in shipping a car overseas twice (my Troopie and the Limo), I can correlate to these stories. The TroopCarrier shipping was pretty much eventless but was also over budget, although not so far off.

But the shipping of the limousine has been much more challenging.
As you may have read in the blog, my friends have had to change their entire schedule as the boat never left/arrived according to the initial timeline. For some reasons the initial RoRo service that was agreed on also became something else (container) which entailed more fees.

http://limotoafrica.blogspot.com/

But your experience is even more relevant for people who intend to ship large trucks as the Unimog. It illustrates very well the gap between dreaming about an overland trip and actually doing it.

:clapsmile

 

[davegonz]

I wish I could have met up with you guys when you stopped in Round Rock. I would have loved to check out the FUSO!

File this one under: Mystery of the Universe

When we opened up the camper on the docks here in Valparaiso only one thing was out of place.

Our wine opener, a heavy, boxed SrewPull, was on the floor. The door on the cupboard it fell out of was latched closed. But that wasn't the mystery.

We weren't surprised to see only the wine opener out of place. Prior to opening the camper door we were pretty confident things would be in good order.

The reason we were confident was this:

I left that bottle of water there when I put the cover on the rig in Round Rock, TX.

That nearly empty bottle of water traveled, upright, from Round Rock (1st suburb North of Austin) to the docks in Houston, onto the ship, across the Gulf of Mexico, through the Panama Canal, down the Pacific coast of South America, into the docks of Valparaiso, through the destructive crane lift off the ship onto the docks and into receiving storage.

Remember that four screws and a screwdriver rode on the other end of this bumper for over 75 miles of rough mountain roads during our test loop.

We think the Bigfoot bumper must be some type of special warp in the space time continuum where gravity is both suspended and extended.

But, regardless of how it worked, it is definately a Mystery of the Universe.

 

[dixieoutlaw]

Doug,
Thanks for update. As you can see finally figured out the forum registration snafu.
Take care of Steph for us.
Regards,
Gary

 

[dhackney]

The Next Sunday

Sunday, 20 January, 2008

One week ago, our rig came off the ship damaged. We didn’t know if it was destroyed or not.

One week ago, a couple of kids playing with matches started a brush fire that became a wind driven firestorm that destroyed 88 homes in Valparaiso’s Cerro La Cruz neighborhood. That fire became known as The Inferno of La Cruz.

Photo by Stephanie Hackney

Today, one week later, the next Sunday, we returned to Cerro La Cruz.

Click here for the rest of the story: http://www.hackneys.com/travel/chile/thenextsunday.pdf

 

[kcowyo]

Tremendous. :clapsmile

Absolutely stirring and moving images. I found the latest installment absolutely inspiring. Those expressions reveal so much about the indomitable human spirit. Your Giving Pictures project is a commendable effort.


"The essence of any adventure is not knowing how it's going to come out."

Thanks Doug -

 

[grahamfitter]

Yeah, what he said.

Cheers,
Graham

 

[Ursidae69]

That was the best thing I've read in a long time off this site. Thank you.

 

[Desertdude]

Really fantastic!

One of the greatest gifts can be touching another human, with respect and dignity.

You both appear to have chosen the right path for your destiny :victory: