Patagonia (Chile)

• 🌍 Coyhaique — surrounded by dramatic mountains, it is the jumping-off point for traveling the spectacular Carretera Austral
• 🌍 Puerto Natales — the gateway to trekking in Torres del Paine or Bernardo O'Higgins National Parks
• 🌍 Puerto Rio Tranquilo — its highlight is the marble caves at Lake General Carrera
• 🌍 Puerto Williams — one of the southernmost settlements in the world offers wild and romantic nature and diverse trekking opportunities
• 🌍 Punta Arenas — the largest city in Chilean Patagonia, is an important starting point for trips to Antarctica and the Falkland Islands
• 🌍 Villa O'Higgins — a tiny town at the southern-most end of the Carretera Austral, on the edge of Lake O'Higgins, it is a fantastic base to go trekking or sport fishing

Chilean Patagonia is home to many of the country's pristine national parks. It includes the country's most iconic national park, Torres del Paine National Park, and the country's largest, Bernardo O'Higgins National Park.

• 🌍 Alberto de Agostini National Park – one of Chilean Patagonia's most off-the-beaten-path destinations
• 🌍 Cabo Froward — a very challenging hike to the southernmost point in the American mainland
• 🌍 Bernardo O'Higgins National Park — the largest protected area in the country cover the fjords and canals of the west and most of the southern ice field
• 🌍 Cabo de Hornos National Park – the world's southernmost national park home to Cape Horn
• 🌍 Laguna San Rafael National Park — includes the Northern Patagonian Ice Field, and a fjord more than 16 km long
• 🌍 Pali-Aike National Park – home to one of the oldest settlements on the Magellan.
• 🌍 Patagonia National Park – one of the newer national parks in the region, only designated in 2018.
• 🌍 Queulat National Park – known for a "hanging glacier".
• 🌍 Torres del Paine National Park — the astonishing Paine massif and its beautiful peaks, azure lakes, emerald forests, roaring rivers, radiant blue glaciers, and rugged mountain terrain topped by looming peaks
• 🌍 Tierra del Fuego (Chile) — an archipelago off the south of South America, separated from the mainland by the Strait of Magellan.

This region is composed of two of Chile's fourteen political and territorial divisions: Aysén and Magallanes.

The extreme south has a population of more than 200,000 inhabitants, the population of this area is mainly descended from Chilean immigrants, especially from Chiloé and other areas south of the Biobío, and from foreign immigrants of Croatian and Spanish origin or to a lesser extent from other European countries that colonized the area more than a century ago. The Croatian community settled in Punta Arenas, Magallanes. The massive arrival of Croats in Chile began in 1864 and migration grew steadily until 1956 to reach a number of more than 58,000 Croats living mainly in the extreme south of Chile. Large number of Sudeten German settlers from Hranice in present Czech Republic settled Puyuhuapi, a village of Cisnes, Aysén Region.

It is an immense bioregion that presents a very varied geography which results in a great diversity of landscapes, climates and ecosystems: from the Patagonian pampas, to the east, passing through the mountains, fjords, channels and islands, due to the sinking of the Cordillera de los Andes, to the west.

Route 9 runs through the region. Route 255 (This road comes out from Route 9) crosses into Argentina becoming Argentinian Route 3. More Routes in this region include, Route 257, and Route Y-50.

Bus service in smaller towns may be infrequent, with buses passing through only a couple of times each week.

The roads are only paved in exceptional cases, and the rivers are often crossed by archaic ferries that are driven by the current. The north of the area was only opened up with the construction of the Carretera Austral in the 1970s to 1990s. In 1999, the southernmost stretch to Villa O'Higgins was inaugurated. This road forms the southernmost part of the Panamericana network west of the Andes.

The Laguna San Rafael is a glacier lake near Puerto Aisén.

The Torres del Paine are pointed rock mountains in a glacier landscape in the national park of the same name.

• Fishing is popular in the Palena, Figueroa and Cisnes rivers, plus many other tributaries. Lake Rosselot and the lakes surrounding Coyhaique are also well known as a sports fishing destination.

Many of the towns in this region do not have ATMs (or have ATMs that don't seem to work with many foreign cards). Make sure to keep a good stash of emergency cash on hand before venturing out into the smaller towns.

Centolla (Southern King Crab) is fished in this region

• The Antarctic Peninsula is reachable by cruise ship and the occasional airplane.
• Argentina