Chilean Heli Ski News

Hello Skiers,

I would like to sincerely thank the many friends, colleagues and guests that wrote to express your concern for us here in Chile since our very powerful earthquake. We greatly appreciate your friendship and your expressions of empathy.

I can inform you that, over all, Chile is doing well and is actually a country very well prepared for these type of natural events. There are very high seismic engineering standards and strict building code practices legislated, as well as a very well prepared response action plan in place.

The great majority of structures in Santiago and indeed in most other areas of the country have received, no to very insignificant damage, especially considering the magnitude of the quake. The most severe damage being received in and near the Conception area. Here the buildings and rural areas have been very severely affected. Some coastal towns have also been severely affected due to the Tsunamis that were generated and landed within the hour after the initial quake.

I can say from first hand experience that as my first big earth quake, it was quite an amazing and personally very interesting natural phenomena to go through…..
Life in the country is returning to a more normal rhythm again despite receiving another very powerful aftershock early this morning.

I made a visit to the Puma Lodge site last Wednesday to review the situation and can happily report the construction so far completed is in perfect condition in all aspects. With the only noticeable changes occurring on the road, where some small rocks had released onto the road surface, but nothing that was not movable by hand or greatly impeded the access.

As some of you have already learned, due to some issues that have arisen with our contractors, we have made the difficult decision to delay the completion of Puma Lodge until November of this year. We feel this is the best course of action to take to ensure that we are able to provide you with the very best Heli Ski experience available and deliver to you a product that we will be extremely proud of sharing.

This will be our final season operating from what has been our base location of the Hotel Termas Cauquenes for the past 4 seasons. This Swiss owned and operated hotel is renown for its excellence in gastronomy. Skiers are provided with very comfortable amenities that include quality ‘skier’ massage, single or group hot pool facilities for relaxing in after a long day of big vertical and deep powder skiing, games room, an excellent selection of wines, etc..

Attached are a few pictures of the lodge construction progress and of the Hotel Termas Cauquenes for those of you who may be interested in viewing either.

More new and updated information will posted on our website in the next several days, so please have a look.

Looking forward to hearing from you and skiing with you in the coming austral season.

Sincerely
Mark H. Jones
http://www.chileanheliski.com/