Speaking Spanish in Chile/Argentina is rather useful. A large amount of the community only speak Spanish and you may not be able to find anyone with the knowledge to translate. Having done very little research and not knowing much about South America and hadn’t learned anything before hand. I had a phrase book and I did my best to learn by immersion while I was there, however as I did TDP early in my trip, my trail Spanish was very limited.
On the trail English is spoken by many hikers. Most of the rangers (es: guarda) are spanish only and when passing people on the trail you normally acknowledge each other in Spanish… hola (en: hello), ¿qué tal? (en: how’s it going), buenos dias (en: good morning) etc.
If you are travelling on through Chile and you have no Spanish vocab, I would recommend perusing a phrasebook or taking some classes. I did 8 classes before travelling back to Peru and picked it up a lot quicker.
A few VERY basic phrases I used daily on the trail:
- I don’t speak Spanish – Yo no hablo español So much nicer than “no español”. At least being able to say you can’t speak Spanish, in Spanish, shows a little effort.
- How are you? – ¿Cómo estás? ¿Qué Tal? An obvious one. People will often ask you this. Learn to reply even if that’s as far as the conversation can go. ¿Qué Tal? is more casual.
- Good/Bad… and you? – Bien/Malo … ¿y tú? I definitely didn’t use malo at any point, but it’s nice to cover all bases. ‘Y’ is pronounced ‘ee’.
- Yes/No – Sí/No
- Please – Por favor
- Thank you – Gracias
- You’re welcome – De nada It’s nice to be polite and this is also a fun phrase to say.
- Sorry – Lo Siento
- Excuse me – Disculpe, Perdón I used these a lot.
- Where is…? – ¿Dónde está…?
- Trail – Sendero
- Water – Agua
Everybody I came across did their best to understand me and I had plenty of nice chats through hand waving. When I got back to Australia had to consciously stop myself greeting other hikers with “qué tal”.