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| Torres
of the Paine, Tierra del Fuego
(Fireland) and Cabo de Hornos
(Cape Horn) are located in the 12th Region
of Magellan and in the Chilean Antarctic Territory. |
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| This sector is
called Patagonia and the name is due to the legend of
the giant Patagonian people. It is a territory that has
generated the most incredible stories, where nature is
found in a virgin and captivating state. |
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Torres del Paine |
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Tierra del Fuego |
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Cabo de Hornos |
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| The Torres del
Paine National Park is Reservation of the Biosphere since
1978. In this area located the colossal towers and granite
horns that have given it world fame, with heights of up
to 3.050 meters above sea level. The climate here is unstable
and even in summer the winds can be faster than 120 km/h. |
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| The landscape of
the National Park Torres del Paine is due to movements
of the earth 12 million years ago that gave origin to
impressive cumbers like Monte Paine Grande
(3.050 m.a.s.l.), Los Cuernos del Paine
(2.600, 2.400, 2.200 m.a.s.l.), Torres del
Paine (2250, 2460 y 2500 m.a.s.l.), Fortaleza
(2800 m.a.s.l.), and Escudo (2700
m.a.s.l.), with glaciers on some of them. Due to the vicinity
of the Southern Ice Fields, the park has countless rivers,
lagoons and lakes that owe their formation to the thaws
of the glaciers. Among the lakes, the most interesting
are the lakes Sarmiento, Nordenskjold,
Pehoé, Grey,
Paine and Dickson.
There are many lagoons of varied sizes like Verde
(Green) lagoon, Azul (Blue)
lagoon and Honda (Deep) lagoon,
among others. |
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| The biggest rivers
are Pingo, Paine, Serrano and
Grey. The most important is
the Paine river whose origin is in the Lake Dickson, in
the park’s north end, and crosses various lakes
to end in the Lago del Toro, on the park’s
southern end. On his way, the river has three
spectacular cascades: Paine, Salto Grande
(big jump) and Salto Chico
(small jump). |
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| The park conserves
fragile ecosystems inhabited by guanacos, foxes, ñandus
and flamingos. The park has various circuits to follow,
some to be done by car, but the most touching
are the trekking and the horse back ride paths. |
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| This wonderful
park offers the visitor the possibility to carry out many
trekking trips through properly marked circuits. You can
make these trips with a hired guide or on your own. The
duration of these walks varies (depending on the interests
and the tourists' aptitudes) between 1 and 7 days. The
must popular circuit is the one called "W",
which can be made easily in 4 days and 3 nights, where
you will enjoy unbeatable views and landscapes. |
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| Other options plows
horseback rides of different duration in specially trained
horses, sailings in kayak with specialist guides, or the
excellent possibility of fishing an exemplar of brown
trout or a rainbow trout in the Serrano river. |
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| For the lodging
there are from well equipped refuges to basic camping
sites, all of them under the supervision of the National
Forest Corporation (CONAF). |
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| Tierra del Fuego
is beyond Magellan's Strait. Hernando of Magellan called
it this way because, when discovering the territory in
1520, he sighted a series of fires in its coast. They
were lit by the Onas-selknam, the original inhabitants
that were violently exterminated during the colonization. |
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| The island, full
of mysteries and legends, invites today to enjoy an unique
landscape and of extraordinary places for sport fishing,
the life in the “estancias”, the observation
of flora and fauna and sailing in the channels of the
south of the world. |
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| Crossing bays and
fiords, you can arrive to the Darwin's Mountain
range, the beginning of the thick Magellan forest, crowned
by glaciers. Not much farther to the west it is the bay
D'Agostini that opens the way to the snowdrift
Serrano. |
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| The journey to
Tierra del Fuego continues through channels
like the Magdalena and the Beagle,
which are the way (through landscapes of mountains and
cascades) to arrive in Puerto Williams, the most southern
town in Chile. |
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| Cape Horn is the name
of the most southern end in the archipelago of Tierra del Fuego,
in the south end of Chile. Considered traditionally as the most
southern point in America, it is also the most southern in the
three big capes and it marks the northern border of the Drake
Passage. |
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| For many years
Cape Horn was a major milestone on the clipper route,
by which sailing ships carried trade around the world.
However, the waters around the cape are particularly hazardous,
due to strong winds, large waves, and icebergs. |
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| With the opening
of the Panama Canal, the merchant sailing around the cape
has decreased notably. However, sailing around the Horn
is widely regarded as one of the major challenges in yachting,
and a number of recreational sailing events sail this
route, sometimes as part of a circumnavigation of the
globe, like the Vendée Globe. |
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