Good evening from Puerto Varas, Chile. My new favorite place on earth (alongside Hawaii).
The last few days have been so interesting. Just when you thought this trip had thrown all it could at us as far as the "wow" factor and seeing all of God's beautiful creations across the globe, then we stumble across Puerto Varas and the surrounding areas. Absolutely breath-taking. The scenery here is straight out of a story book.
The greenery is stunning. The volcanoes are awe-inspiring. The rivers are the most beautiful I have
ever seen, and they are so blue. Words can not describe how beautiful it is here. You must come see for yourself.
The town we are staying in resembles that of a mountain town in northern Europe. The designs are spectacular. The food is great. But, I can not get over nature's beauty here. This makes me not want to come home. Someone pick up my daughter and fly her to me, please. This is the way to live.I will look up the names of all the volcanoes and will let you know (because I can't remember right now off 5 hours of sleep), but here is one that we were only about 5 nautical miles away from while
shooting today. Wow. Just to think, we were about 20 feet from another. In all, they said that we were surrounded by about 10 beautiful volcanoes within a very close radius. All within a few minutes driving distance from each other.
So, where are we? Check out the Geo tags on the web albums. Google maps will show you. But, to put it into perspective... we are about an hour's flight or so from Antarctica.
We also spent some time in Pechilemu, Chile which is a surfer town. The waves and the bay were also stunning. I loved that town, too. But, to me, does not compare with the tropical region we are in right now. However, Pechilemu was marvelous and I saw one of the most beautiful sunsets there. In fact, I have seen the sun set more times on this entire trip than I think I ever have. At least from these wonderful vantage points.
Enough with the adjectives. I think you get the picture. But, please allow me to say wow once more. WOW
Feel free to check out all the web albums. Here are the most recent links:
Remember, I have albums from every city on this trip. The short list includes Gatlinburg, TN; Great Smoky Mountains National Park, TN; Hong Kong, China; Santiago, Chile; La Serena, Chile; Vicunia, Chile; Cerra Tololo, Chile; Puerto Varas and surrounding areas, Chile; Puerto Montt, Chile....... and more.
More shooting to come from South Chile. Then, it is back to the great USA. What an experience.
Good night, World.
Good afternoon from Santiago, Chile.Great last couple of days for shooting. Witnessed the most spectacular night sky I have ever seen from the top of a mountain in the Andes at an observatory. We could see our own milky way from there, as well as two other galaxies with our naked eyes.Also, we got to look through one of the telescopes to see Saturn, its rings, and its moons. How awesome is that? You could never see in the US what we saw here in the southern hemisphere.Still running and gunning. Lots of traveling here in Chile. Spent the better part of 30 hours in a shuttle van. And about to do another 4-5 this afternoon to the next location. We have gone thru 3 vans and 4 drivers now. WHEW!gotta run. Enjoy the latest round of pics here:Cheers!
Long day in Chile. But, what a beautiful one it was. We are short for time as we have been out all day and most of the night shooting/traveling, and we have to get up again at 5am with bags packed and ready to go on a 7-8 hour drive into the Andes Mountains.
Had a very interesting shoot today. What an experience. Check out the photos at the link at the bottom of this posting. The "snow" 
you think you see on the top of one of the mountains is actually a glacier. And that mountain is considered by locals as a "hill." Well, it is a 12,000 ft hill. We shot from about 6,000 ft. But, I guess when we see the Andes, we will know what big mountains are all about.
Wonderful people. The BEST food I have eaten this entire trip around the globe... and it was all home made. I had the pork with mashed potatoes and gravy. Desert was watermelon and pineapple. Yum!
I will post more on this later. But, enjoy the link below for now......
Good morning, America. It is 7:30am here in sunny Santiago, Chile on Monday. Happy belated Easter to you all.
We made it safely to South America, but no one seems to be getting any rest. Most of us have been up since between 2am and 4am today. Even though we are on Eastern Time now, our body's internal clocks are still set to Hong Kong I guess.
The good news is that there is a Starbucks about a block away. That will solve a lot of problems. For a little while, at least.
No pictures taken yet. I will be getting some today for everyone to see. We are hitting the road to do some location scouting shortly. We will be in a canyon in a remote Chilean area embedded in the Andes Mountains, so that should be interesting to see.
I went to mass yesterday at a very old Catholic church just a few blocks away from here. Very cool. Everything was spoken in Spanish, so I didn't understand a thing, but everyone was so nice and welcoming to me even though I am not Catholic. It was like being at a Latin American church in the early 1900's. Come as you are. No piano. No organ. Just an acoustic guitar and a small ensemble for music. The setting was that of what you would find in the 1800's - early 1900's. Beautiful architecture and paintings with stained glass windows. I will go back and take some photos later. It was just too crowded to do so yesterday, and would have been inconsiderate of me to do so during a service.
Santiago is a nice city. Mostly modern. The skyline is about the size of Birmingham. I hope to have a little time to explore it, but we are busy after all. At the least, I will get some photos out for all to see.
Time to get back to work. I hope you all have a great Monday. Look for photos tomorrow from the Canyon.
Happy trails,
CM
Ni hao!
So sad to say this is our last evening here. It has truly been the experience of a lifetime. We had a great shoot yesterday. Lots of film to bring home. We shot film from the interior of the top floor of the 6th tallest building in the world. Shot timelapse of the skyline from day to night. Shot from a helicopter of the harbor and skyline area. And then to top it off, rode back to the heliport in the helicopter and got to view the island of Hong Kong at night from 1,300 feet in the air. Wow.
Allan and Joey fired up the camera again today and we are going to bring home some stunning footage of the streets of Hong Kong, too, thanks to them and our great host/guide/friend, Michael Wong.
Had a chance to take a little time to do a little more sightseeing today, as if we have not gotten enough from the past week. Well, as much as we could considering we have only scraped the surface of China. Hong Kong is like the New York City of Asia. I love it here. There is so much to do, and so many places to go. Great beaches, great temples, great everything... except the bad duck I had for lunch yesterday (ughh). But, you can not even fathom doing all of Hong Kong in a week. It would take at least a month and a half to go through all of China, and Hong Kong would be half of the trip. I will miss this place.
My favorites on this trip were flying the night skyline of Hong Kong over the harbor (oh so beautiful), perching atop the 3rd tallest building in the world (IFC building where they shot The Dark Knight), and touring the street markets of HK.
Here are some photos I took today. Not much taken, as I had to get back and do some more work. But, the black and white of the blacksmith at work is my favorite. Click link below.
Well, that is about it from Hong Kong. I am sad to go, but we will fly out in the morning for another exciting adventure to South America. Time to finish packing and get some dinner. Very, very long flight ahead.
BTW... I have a lot of home video footage of the flight last evening. My little still camera did not do well with the helicopter vibrations and the night time exposure. I can not wait to share the videos when we get back.
Stay tuned for Chile! I will have postings coming as soon as Easter Sunday. Til then, take care and God bless.
Best,
Chris
More pics up.
and
Untouched, but will get you up to speed. Shoot was great. All is well. 12:45 am here. So, beat and gotta sleep. There will be an update in the morning. G-nite from HK!
And good evening to all of you back home. We have gotten a lot done in the past few days. Most of the photos you saw were not just for sightseeing, they were from locations that we were scouting. I took many more the past two days, but I figured I would take some more before I upload them.
Yesterday, we had key card access by the security of the tallest building in China. We went to the very top, not open to the public, and were able to take shots from above the city. If you have seen The Dark Knight, there is a scene in the movie where Batman is perched on top of a building before flying around Hong Kong. Well, that is where we were. It was, however, rainy and very foggy, so the view would come and go.
Another location was on top of what I think is the 2nd or 3rd tallest in HK. Very beautiful view. This place is great.
The hours are long, and we are not getting much rest. But, all is well. Lots more to take care of while we are here. We visited Times Square and the trading district yesterday, too.
I will keep you updated when I can. Well, back to the grind. Take care and have a good night's rest.
c
ever seen, and they are so blue. Words can not describe how beautiful it is here. You must come see for yourself.
shooting today. Wow. Just to think, we were about 20 feet from another. In all, they said that we were surrounded by about 10 beautiful volcanoes within a very close radius. All within a few minutes driving distance from each other.
We also spent some time in Pechilemu, Chile which is a surfer town. The waves and the bay were also stunning. I loved that town, too. But, to me, does not compare with the tropical region we are in right now. However, Pechilemu was marvelous and I saw one of the most beautiful sunsets there. In fact, I have seen the sun set more times on this entire trip than I think I ever have. At least from these wonderful vantage points.
