Northern Chile

The north of Chile is a land of contrasts, where the altiplano and the Atacama Desert come together to offer strikingly beautiful sights.

The Atacama Desert is said to be "the driest in the world." In fact, rainfall has never been recorded in some areas. What causes such extreme dryness?

The altiplano, or high plateau region, receives occasional tropical rain in January and February. Here, it is the altitude rather than the lack of water that challenges life in this area: only the hardiest, most specialized flora and fauna can survive the hardships of life at over 3500 meters (11,483 ft).

Vast and colorful, dotted with lakes, swamps, salt flats, and geysers, crowned with volcanoes 6000 meters (nearly 20,000 ft) high, the altiplano links Chile with the great cultures of the central Andes.

Today, the Chilean high plateau is home to the traditional Aymara Indians, who wander among volcanoes and swampy meadows with their tame llamas and alpacas. They gather periodically to honor their saints in fantastical lime-bleached ceremonial villages. Large areas of this remarkable region are protected by a system of spectacular national parks, including Lauca National Park, declared a World Biosphere Reserve by UNESCO.

Some of the rainfall is filtered through the mountains, emerging in springs and streams to transform the landscape, creating swaths of wild vegetation and crops, wildlife habitats and human settlements, salt flats and salt mountains.

These strips of water and life have been discovered and used by humans for generations. San Pedro de Atacama and other oases on the Loa and Salado rivers served as stops on the pre-Incan trade routes that connected the altiplano with the Amazon and the coast. The caravans crisscrossed the desert on pathways that are now marked only by geoglyphs, the most impressive archaeological remains in northern Chile.

From north to south, the main tourist centers in northern Chile are Arica, Iquique, Calama, San Pedro de Atacama, and Antofagasta. Except for Calama and San Pedro de Atacama, they are all coastal cities with excellent beaches unthreatened by clouds, much less by rain.

Lodging, transportation, and other services are on a par with those of the capital. Each city provides access to a part of the desert, the mountains, or the altiplano. Walks, ethn o-tours, excursions in all-terrain vehicles, mountain climbing, and archaeology are some of the more common activities in this region.

Near the southern part of this region, the cities of Copiapó and La Serena are the doorway to the slender valleys that cut across the Andes from east to west. They are known for their production of the country's beloved pisco, or grape brandy, and for having the clearest skies in the southern hemisphere, which attract professional and amateur astronomers from all over the world.

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Central Chile

Central Chile is the cultural heart of the country. The largest cities are located in this area, as are most of the universities and industries, vineyards, the best farmland, and examples of architecture from the Colonial and Early Republic periods.

In a way, central Chile is a microcosm of the country located between the northern deserts and the southern forests, with a capital city nestled up against the highest peaks in the Americas on one side and with easy access to many excellent beaches on the other.

The capital of Chile, Santiago, is a focal point of the Latin American economy. Most international flights arrive here.

Clean and modern, with excellent hotels and restaurants to satisfy the most discerning palates, Santiago is located in the valley between the Coastal mountain range to the west and the Andes Mountains to the east.

The ski slopes of the central Andes are only 45 minutes away, up a series of hairpin curves that climb 2200 meters (7200 ft) in only 42 kilometers (26 miles). Many vineyards, belonging to six different wine-growing regions, are close to the capital. Numerous hot springs, 17th century haciendas, and national parks in the Andes and coastal ranges can be easily visited on day trips. At night, visitors can choose among a wide variety of restaurants serving regional or ethnic foods. Excellent hotels guarantee a peaceful night's slee p for the business traveler or tourist.

Towards the west, modern highways connect the capital city with the coastal cities of Viña del Mar, Valparaíso, and San Antonio. Like Santiago, the central coast has a Mediterranean climate, with short, mild winters and sunny eight-month summers.

Here, stretches of white beaches and coastal towns have something for everyone, from luxurious vacation resorts to isolated cabins, from beach picnics to fresh seafood served in open-air restaurants.

Toward the north, the climate becomes drier. The beaches and vacation spots stretch north to La Serena, Chile's second-oldest city and the de facto capital of the pisco-producing region.

South of Santiago, the climate becomes colder and damper. These fertile lands were the first to be claimed by the Spanish conquistadors. Here the Chilean huaso, or cowboy, still lives all day in the saddle wearing his traditional poncho and wide-brimmed hat and perfecting his technique for the annual rodeo.

Towards the east, the Andes Mountains are an unforgettable sight, crowned in white during winter and spring. The spring thaw high up in the mountains feeds the rivers that irrigate the heart of Chile.

Beyond the first range of peaks, visible from anywhere in the central valley and from many places on the coast, lies a labyrinth of canyons carved out by glaciers, forests with microclimates, alpine lakes, and torrential rivers. Roads leading into the mountains provide access to numerous parks and unlimited opportunities to enjoy skiing, hiking, mountain climbing, mountain biking, horseback riding, and rafting.

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Southern Chile

The lake and volcano region of southern Chile is the expression of nature in its inimitable beauty and surprising exuberance.

Among volcanic cataclysms, iceberg sculptures, rain and snow, torrential rivers, and temperate rain forests, we find a landscape in movement, one that is constantly modeled and changing before our eyes.

This is the motherland of the Mapuche Indians, one of South America's most important indigenous cultures. For almost 300 years, the Mapuches defended the Araucanía, the northern area of this region, against the Spaniards. They fought, dispersed, and changed their culture, spreading out over the pampas. Three centuries of resistance: so much strength! But that is the nature of the lake region.

Strong, yes, but safe too, and with a European elegance that is surprisingly familiar. As the Mapuches relinquished their territory to the newly-independent republic, the European settlers poured into this paradise of rich volcanic soil, ancient forests, and limpid glacier-fed lakes whose waters reflect the range of active volcanoes towering on the eastern horizon.

These settlers advanced toward the mountains, cutting and burning their way through the temperate forest. They built cities throughout the central valley, and ports the length of the indomitable Pacific coast and on the banks of innumerable rivers and lakes. The serene landscape of the region's central valley -wide, rolling meadows, German style haciendas, quiet, neat towns- can to a large extent be attributed to the hard work and vision of these 19th century immigrants.

The forests, which so challenged the first European settlers, are a source of constant awe to the modern traveler.

There are national and private parks in Araucanía that protect the last araucaria forests, an age-old pine native to the region aptly termed in English the monkey puzzle tree. It dates back to the Jurassic period and is today a national monument in Chile.

The cities of Temuco and Pucón, built in the heart of Mapuche country, are gateways to the wide range of attractions that the region offers, undoubtedly one of the Chile's prime tourist destinations.

Farther south, the Valdivia rain forest -the world's second-largest temperate rain forest- covers the Coastal and Andes mountain ranges. The cities of Valdivia, Osorno, Puerto Varas, and Puerto Montt are good places to start exploring the beautiful Andes lakes, some of which straddle the Chile-Argentina border.

Still farther south, where the central valley finally sinks into the Pacific and the Chilean Patagonia begins, we find magnificent ancient alerce forests, a tree sometimes referred to as the South American redwood. Some hard-to-find specimens are over 3500 years old.

All of the region's cities offer excellent hotels, restaurants, shopping centers, and transportation, as well as attractions for all tastes, ages, and physical fitness levels. Of particular interest is the chain of national parks that runs along the border with Argentina and protects numerous ecosystems, from native forests to volcanic plateaus.

There are many vacation options for families or people with general interests. Travelers can choose to visit the parks, take an Andean lake cruise towards Argentina, or visit a myriad of vacation spots along the lakeshores. For those with more specific interests or adventure seekers, hiking, mountain climbing, rafting, bird watching, mountain biking, and horseback riding are just a few of the almost unlimited possibilities offered by Chile's lake and volcano region.

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The Far South (Patagonia)

Patagonia is the setting for some of the world's greatest adventures. Even if we don't know much about the area, its name dwells in our subconscious, whispering in our ear untold stories about this far corner of the world.

We imagine vast stretches of silent wilderness, tempestuous seas, and wind-blown loneliness.
The first Europeans to lay eyes on this land were led by Ferdinand Magellan, the first explorer to cross the perilous Straits that bear his name today. His expedition named the continent Land of the Patagons, or Big Feet, because of the large footprints they found in the snow, giving rise to the myth of a race of giant Patagonians. They saw the smoke of native fires darkening the southern horizon, so they named this region Tierra del Fuego, or the Land of Fire. Thus began the legend of Patagonia.

The indigenous groups that lived in Tierra del Fuego fully deserved to become legendary, being the world's first and greatest adventurers.
Their arrival in Tierra del Fuego was the final stop on the longest human migration ever. They had arrived at the end of the world, where the Andes sink into the sea and glaciers creep towards the shore.

With nowhere else to go, they stayed, fishing from their canoes along the coastline, gathering shellfish, and hunting guanacos and rheas (South American ostriches) on the pampas. Photographs from early in the century show a Stone Age culture where extremes had crystallized: It was the end of the road for history's longest wandering people.

Protected from the rain on the east side of the Andes, the Patagonian pampas are an enormous desert; some say it's one of the world's five largest.
On the west side of the Andes lies a different world. Here, both the Central Valley and the Coastal Range have dropped into the ocean. What were once glacial valleys are now fjords, and what were mountain peaks are now islands.

Erosion along the coast has exposed the sources of hot springs, while the huge glaciers continue to break up the landscape, making sea or air travel through the region a necessity. Large forests stretch over the Andes Mountains from the Pacific coast to the edge of the continent, crossed by winding emerald-green rivers that carry glacial sediment to the sea, creating a habitat for reckless trout and salmon.

This vast territory is really two separate regions divided by the Southern Ice Fields.

Northern Patagonia is one of the last great wilderness areas in the world. It is reached by a gravel road known as the Carretera Austral, the Austral, or Southern, Highway, completed in 1988. However, overland access to the road is not yet complete, and travelers on this Southern Highway must board several ferries to cross the mouths of the great fjords.

Here, the port of Chaitén provides access to the north end of the Austral Highway, where the rafting and fly fishing are among the best in the world, and visitors can take cruises to see the glaciers and island hot springs. Farther south lies the city of Coyhaique, the capital of the Aisén Region, an ideal spot for fly fishing and for organizing overland trips to the southern part of the Austral Highway, to General Carrera Lake, and the Ice Fields.

South of the Ice Fields, the Magallanes Region is a world apart, where vast expanses of pampas meet the snowy Andes peaks. Paine Towers National Park -a World Biosphere Reserve- is the most famous of all the conservation areas in the Magallanes Region, and protects ecosystems that provide habitats for guanacos, foxes, rheas (South American ostriches), and flamingoes. South of the national park lies Puerto Natales, the port for the ferries coming south from Puerto Montt. It is used as a base from which visitors take hikes, ride horses, board glacier cruises, go on overland excursions, and go kayaking or white water rafting.

Punta Arenas is the capital of the Magallanes Region. Across from the Straits of Magellan and Tierra del Fuego, Punta Arenas is the main starting point for cruises and flights to Tierra del Fuego, the Beagle Channel, Navarino Island, Cape Horn, and Antarctica.

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Easter Island

Easter Island is a destination that seems to inhabit our subconscious. The image of those great stone moai with their backs to the vast Pacific strikes some chord within us, recalls some ancient, creative urge.

This is the world's most isolated bit of land, a tiny pinprick in the great pacific, a mound of consolidated lava and ash from three submarine volcanoes. The natives call their island Rapa Nui or Te Pito o Te Henua, 'the navel of the earth.'

Linguistic and cultural comparisons indicate that the first humans on Easter Island arrived from the west, most likely from the Marquesas islands or Mangareva, as part of a greater migratory process which spread Polynesian culture throughout the south Pacific. However, the twelve centuries which elapsed between the arrival of the first intrepid 'settlers' near 500 AD and the 'discovery' of the island in 1722 by the Dutch admiral Jacob Roggeveen are among the world's great mysteries.

European sailors visiting the island found that the natives could not explain the construction and transport of the great moai megaliths, the largest of which exceeds sixty feet in height.

Nor could they decipher the rongo rongo tablets whose hieroglyphic script appears to be a forgotten form of written language.

Somewhere in the past - a past which seems to have seesawed from ancestor worship, monument building and population growth, to deforestation and food shortages, feuding and in some cases even cannibalism - the old knowledge had been lost. It is the mystery of these disappeared artisans, and the awesome presence of their works, which continues to draw scientists and seekers from across the globe.

Today, Rapa Nui National Park protects most of the island's archaeological sites, and the native todomiro forests that once graced the island are being replanted.

Opportunities for hiking, mountain biking, and horseback riding abound on the island, while a rich marine ecosystem of corals and colorful tropical fish makes Easter Island a prime destination for scuba diving and snorkeling.

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Published on: 2005-01-12 (2388 reads)