This used to be a shipping town, but its harbor was lost to silt about 20 years ago. The population is shrinking a bit as a consequence. This hasn't stopped the political campaigning, which is still intense:
One placard we saw from the bus was actually larger than the house it was leaning against!
The shopping available in Aisen was not inspiring, but I was delighted to find a monkey puzzle tree that I could look at up close.
This is the national tree of Chile, and it is a very primitive tree - a "living fossil". We drove past a couple back in Santiago but we couldn't get in close to see the bizarre leaves:
They're a couple inches long, stiff and sharp like daggers:
They got their name because "it would puzzle a monkey to climb it"!
1 comment:
wow, that's neat! I'd never heard of that tree before. It looked very succulent, like a cactus.
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