Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
gone a long time without wine. I've gone a long time without a lot
of things.
Brooke and Dillon have fitted right in, as if they've been with us
from the outset. They are willing workers and do anything that's asked
of them. This frees up Bernie, Ming and Gustavo. My kids run along-
side me for 5-kilometre stretches, and yesterday Brooke ran to catch
up with me while carrying a bowl of fresh strawberries, bananas and
honey. Maybe not recommended running fuel, but prepared with love.
I wolfed it down. Brooke also sings and plays her guitar for us at night,
in the short period between when I stop running and fall asleep.
I am now around 300 kilometres south of Santiago, near a town
called Parral. Normally I would have stopped in Santiago, Chile's capi-
tal, to do media engagements and meet Red Cross officials, maybe
have a run with the locals, but I powered right on through in a bid to
maintain my 90 to 95 kilometres a day and to get as far as I can before
being driven to the airport for a December 29 departure. In fact, I have
just learned that we might be flying out a day or two earlier. ALE, the
group that is flying us down to Antarctica, is worried by deteriorating
conditions near the South Pole and is thinking that the earlier we can
get in and out, the better.
I am about to sleep with the crew in a petrol station. I was just
talking to a bunch of local men who followed us today. They cheered
me on and wanted to be photographed with me. I happily obliged.
We don't speak the same language, but with Gustavo as interpreter
we all have an idea of what the other is saying . . . more or less! They
told us that they come from the nearby cities of Concepción and Chil-
lán, which were close to the epicentre of the massive 8.8-magnitude
earthquake and consequent tsunami that devastated Chile, with
enormous loss of life and property, in February 2010. It was the
sixth-largest earthquake ever recorded and claimed around 550 lives.
Some 10 per cent of the population of Chile was left homeless. Roads
and bridges were buckled and torn to pieces, and large areas were
inundated with water from the tsunami. The fishing industry in the
tsunami zone was wiped out. The effects of the quake and tsunami
were even felt in the United States and Japan. I've been noticing a
lot of road works and bridge repairs in the last day or two, and the
men informed me that this was still the mopping-up work after the
quake. The road works have been a problem. The white dividing line
