Quarantine requirements for all travel to Chile

[papageno]

I'm a U.S. citizen. I've flown to Santiago about 20 times and am usually asked about the purpose and length of stay at the Border Control kiosk. I don't want to lie and say I am staying a month so it will seem more likely I intend to quarantine...if the Border Control folks can access my return flight itinerary, lying will not go over well and my entire party of eight could be sent home. Quarantine at a lodge will be redundant for me...on the rivers I fish, there will be no humans for miles.

If you're in the U.S., why not go to Oregon or Washington, I believe steelhead season is open and you'd avoid all these international travel issues. What you'd spend on airfare could go a long way towards hiring a local guide. Etc...... or if you want to fish in warm weather, just wait a few months.

[nwdiver]

I'm a U.S. citizen. I've flown to Santiago about 20 times and am usually asked about the purpose and length of stay at the Border Control kiosk. I don't want to lie and say I am staying a month so it will seem more likely I intend to quarantine...if the Border Control folks can access my return flight itinerary, lying will not go over well and my entire party of eight could be sent home. Quarantine at a lodge will be redundant for me...on the rivers I fish, there will be no humans for miles.

If you're in the U.S., why not go to Oregon or Washington, I believe steelhead season is open and you'd avoid all these international travel issues. What you'd spend on airfare could go a long way towards hiring a local guide. Etc...... or if you want to fish in warm weather, just wait a few months.

I think he is a guide, bringing clients down, 8 sounds about right for a small lodge in the south.......maybe next year, eh.

[admin]

I'm a U.S. citizen. I've flown to Santiago about 20 times and am usually asked about the purpose and length of stay at the Border Control kiosk. I don't want to lie and say I am staying a month so it will seem more likely I intend to quarantine...if the Border Control folks can access my return flight itinerary, lying will not go over well and my entire party of eight could be sent home. Quarantine at a lodge will be redundant for me...on the rivers I fish, there will be no humans for miles.

If you're in the U.S., why not go to Oregon or Washington, I believe steelhead season is open and you'd avoid all these international travel issues. What you'd spend on airfare could go a long way towards hiring a local guide. Etc...... or if you want to fish in warm weather, just wait a few months.

I think he is a guide, bringing clients down, 8 sounds about right for a small lodge in the south.......maybe next year, eh.

without a work permit (i.e. residency) that is already illegal, and they have arrested and deported fly fishing guides for doing it.

[BOBSYDOW@VERIZON.NET]

Yes I am aware of the requirements for foreigners with regard to travel within the country, the sanitary passport, the PCR testing, etc. My final (rural) destination is at "stage 3," so they are not locked down and not forbidding entry from other areas,as I will fly there from Santiago.
The intention is to quarantine 15 hours per day at a small lodge with only my party there, but stand in the middle of a remote river each day. There will be no one to infect within miles, no risk to anyone. I am not so worried that they will fine me on the way out...I will say I was there to visit my friend the lodge owner and stayed with him, which is true, and that I quarantined and drank nice wine with him all week, and they cannot disprove that. I would guess on my way out, with a negative test, they will thank me for leaving lots of dollars there (again) and put me on my plane. My worry is that upon arrival at Santiago, from where we fly South, they see a planned stay of one or two weeks (and return air ticket) for my party and turn us around on arrival at Santiago.
So I am curious if anyone here has actually experienced the entry protocol as it actually occurs at SCL, not the technical requirements of the rules.
I'd love to stay a month or three, but some of us have a nagging thing called a J-O-B.

[BOBSYDOW@VERIZON.NET]

I am not a guide, but I do hire them a lot. The lodge owner guides me. And I already get my fill of summer fishing here in the US. If I was a guide, I'd be there all season. It's just my Southern Hemisphere place. Maybe this is the year to finally try New Zealand. But I like Chile.

[Donnybrook2]

I hope you take the advice in the spirit in which it is offered. We are not trying to argue with you but are trying to point out the problems with your plan. You sign a legally binding sworn statement on entering Chile about where you are going to be the first 24 hrs in Chile and your final destination where you will be doing your quarantine. I have no idea how it works in remote areas and I assume you are heading somewhere remote, but with the 14 day quarantine for tourists which was the previous protocol they contacted you every day by phone or text and also, occasionally showed up to check you were where you said and healthy.

I know that in some countries the protocols are offered as suggestions but that is not the case here. For example, for months we have all had to wear a mask anywhere outside our own homes. This appears to be impossible to implement in other countries. Fines for breaking any of the rules here are huge. Repeats can carry prison time. I would certainly not try to tell any authority here that you quarantined for 15 hours a day, fished remotely for the rest and spent lots of dollars so they should be fine with that.

In the end it is up to you but you should seriously consider that no one has so far thought it was a great idea.

[BOBSYDOW@VERIZON.NET]

Thanks for that, and yes I appreciate the spirit. I am 65 myself, my wife is 64, and we are very conscious of the risk of disease. I know I'd not be risking infecting anyone (we and all fellow passengers have to test negative via PCR soon before boarding,) just worried about the risk of a busted trip. The fact the authorities text you daily, and visit your lodging, is just the type of data I was looking for. We'd not be able to return a text during the day. Way out of cell range. I was not going to tell them we were outdoors at all, I know they'd not go for that. Even though it would be perfectly safe.

I know the Chileans don't play around. A previous poster mentioned US guides that got in trouble. I know all three of them, and the story is not simple. That's why we use chilenos now.

Hope we get the darn vaccine before the rivers get too low. I guess these rules are in effect until at least March. Not sure what day in March.

nwdiver, yes you have some nice wines there. They're good at that, eh?

[nwdiver]

I am not a guide, but I do hire them a lot. The lodge owner guides me. And I already get my fill of summer fishing here in the US. If I was a guide, I'd be there all season. It's just my Southern Hemisphere place. Maybe this is the year to finally try New Zealand. But I like Chile.

Chile will be difficult, New Zealand impossible.....

[GAminer]

Why don't you hold off on your vacation until they lift travel restrictions, that way you can spend the whole week fishing and not have to worry about any negative repercussions...

[BOBSYDOW@VERIZON.NET]

Yeah that was just wishful thinking about New Zealand.
I guess I have to hold off. It's just painful to reschedule eight people, get time off work, guides, lodge capacity, etc. And February has the best conditions.
Or we fly to Argentina and sneak across the border. What could go wrong? (Joke.)
I feel terrible for my good friends in the travel and fishing industry in the South. They work hard and have such a short season to begin with. And they have no election right now, so no politicians are competing to shower them with checks.

[nwdiver]

The fish will be bigger and better with a year off.....

[41southchile]

I am not a guide, but I do hire them a lot. The lodge owner guides me. And I already get my fill of summer fishing here in the US. If I was a guide, I'd be there all season. It's just my Southern Hemisphere place. Maybe this is the year to finally try New Zealand. But I like Chile.

Hahahaha. You really don’t have a clue do you?
By the way NZ is closed to foreigners, there’s about a 3 month wait even for NZ citizens to get space in the mandatory government/military run quarantine facilities that everyone has to go through for 2 weeks when they get off the plane. Good luck with the fishing