Tunel Las Raices

Tunnel entrance

Area map

Inside the tunnel

January 31, 2010
Sunday
This morning I was up at the crack of 10:00 o’clock and decided to take a bike ride to a place I’ve been to before, but not on the bike. I’m talking about the “Tunel Las Raices”, that is about two to two and a half hours away from the Farm by bike. The sky dawned clear as a bell yet it was just a little cool at ten in the morning, so I put on the jacket and gloves and headed out. When I reached the town of Victoria, I stopped for gas since I only had half a tank and I like to fill it up whenever it reaches half empty because you never know when you’ll be in an area that has no gas stations and you’ll run low on fuel. Continuing toward the tunnel you come to the town of Curacautin, but there is no real reason to stop there and I drove right thru. Between Curacautin and the Tunnel there are a few stretches of very tight turns and you have to be very careful in these areas. It’s also very scenic in that stretch of the trip, as you drive on you can see quite a few volcanoes in the distance. As I reached the tunnel, I expected to have to pay before I entered, but I was told by a person there that now you had to pay at the other end. It wasn’t long before the barrier went up and the vehicles were allowed to enter the tunnel. It’s been quite a few years since I last drove thru the tunnel, and back then it was just gravel placed over the railroad tracks because this used to be a railroad tunnel that was converted to a tunnel for vehicles to use. I was very pleasantly surprised, as I entered the tunnel, to find that it has now been completely paved and lighted as well. In the early days it was an experience to drive thru the tunnel with water raining down thru the rocks inside and no lighting what so ever. This tunnel is nearly three miles long and only wide enough for one way traffic, as it is only 11.5 feet wide at its widest point and the width of the road is less than that. On the other side of the tunnel there is a very scenic valley with a mountain at one end that is perpetually covered with deep snow. It makes for a very nice place to take pictures, and that’s exactly what I did before heading back thru the tunnel and back to the Ranch. Total time was about five hours.