To many people, the word Patagonia conjures up myths and legends at the end of the earth. El fin del Mundo. A land of monsters, roaring seas, freezing winds and empty spaces.

Patagonia has always been an evocative place. To the first explorers it was a land of monsters, untamed and unknown. To the Victorians, the archetypal wilderness, a place at the end of the world where the restrictions of polite society could be escaped. To recent commentators, it is a land of exiles and nomads, who, from the first Indians to the refugees and bandits of the twentieth century, have been arriving at the end of the world with no where else left to go.

Geography
Representations of Patagonia have also always owed more to myth and legend than to geography but most agree that it comprises a diverse region south of Temuco in Chile and the Rio Negro in Argentina, occupying about a million square kilometres.

With coastlines stretching along both the Pacific and Atlantic oceans, it is home to immense empty grasslands, ancient forests, freshwater lakes, salmon-filled streams, fjords, glacial valleys, volcanoes and of course the jagged peaks of the Andes Mountains, the longest and youngest mountain range in the world.

When to go
Most people visit Chilean Patagonia in the southern-hemisphere summer between November and March. Our scheduled trips run during this time. However, the rest of the year should not be ruled out and we can arrange custom trips at any time of year. Spring (September to October) can be a great time to take advantage of quiet trails, spring flowers and some fairly mild weather. Autumn too has the advantages of fewer people and occasionally less wind. Weather can start getting colder at night but as many hotels and refugios remain open during April this should not be too much of a problem.

Winter is a beautiful time to visit and some of the hotels are open all year. Days are of course colder and much shorter but the wildlife can be plentiful and the days crisp, clear and windless. Winter snow is common, especially on higher elevations. Santiago offers some great skiing destinations in winter.

The Patagon
Patagonia was named by Ferdinand Magellan who sailed through the straits that now bear his name in 1520. The name may refer to the supposedly large feet of the resident natives or to the Grand Patagon, a dog-headed monster from a sixteenth century romance that Magellan was fond of.

Settlers
At the time the first European settlers arrived by sea, the area was home to some 400,000 inhabitants. The main indigenous peoples were the Mapuche and Tehuelche. Described by some as the world’s first and greatest adventurers these people travelled to the end of the earth and survived by fishing in the oceans and hunting guanacos and rheas on the plain.

The Tehuelche were a tall, nomadic group that wandered the huge lands in search of fur and animal hide. The Mapuche, ‘people of the earth’, were warriors who displaced other tribes in areas further north around the Chilean and Argentine lake districts. Later they adapted well to a less nomadic lifestyle and turned to cultivating crops in the rich local soil. They fought off the conquistadors in the sixteenth century and were the last indigenous group in southern South America to be conquered.

On The Road
The Carretera Austral (Southern Highway) takes the driver through over 700 miles of jaw-dropping scenery and incredibly diverse climates, vegetation and geography. This highway, built fewer than 20 years ago, also passes through numerous national parks. With no more than five per cent of the total population of Chile and Argentina living in Patagonia, this camino is gloriously empty. Its natural conclusion is the insurmountable barrier of the Southern Ice Field.