Chile

Rotem Haskia
Apr 20, 2020
10 min read

My first country in South America! I am super excited to share with you the beginning of my 9 months adventure around this continent. With some of the best hikes I have ever done, marvelous glaciers, exquisite food and countless of adventures, I invite you to join me on my joinery around Chile.

Santiago

We started our trip from Santiago the capital and largest city of Chile. Here you can enjoy a "Soft landing" since it is a very big and comfortable city and it's also a strategic location since from here you will find public transportation almost to anywhere you would like.

What to do?

Passeo Ahumada street: offers a lot of stores and beautiful buildings.
Plaza De Armas: the city's main square that features many ancient churches and government building such as: Metropolitana (the impressive cathedral), mail office and the Audenica palace. Tip: Be careful from thieves and keep you belonging close to you.

Palacio De La Moneda: the seat of the President of the Republic of Chile and three cabinet ministers.
Barrio Lastarria: an historical neighborhood in the center of city with many restaurants and bars.
Cerro San Cristobal: a beautiful hill the offers an amazing view over the city and the Andes mountains. We got up to the hill with a cable car and down with the funicular (lift). Tip: Buy the funicular ticket on the top since it will be cheaper.

Bellavista street: this colorful street is covered by beautiful street murals and local artists work.
Mercado Central: the famous fish market where we ate a seafood lunch including the traditional empanadas in a seafood version.
Sky Costanera: the tallest building in the land that beside being an amazing shopping mall it also offers a 360 point of view over the whole area.
Santa Lucia hill: a small hill in the middle of the city that is a memorial site and on the top you will find our favorite viewpoint over the city.

Pucon

A Chilean city 780 km south of Santiago and offers many attractions like horseback riding, sky diving, rafting, many waterfalls trips, lakes and snapling but it's most famous for its hot springs and the Villarrica climb to an active volcano.

What to do?

Huerquehue National Park hike: This day started in a one hour bus drive from Pucon to the park (costs 4000 peso back & forth). We arrived to the park around 09:30, paid for the entrance 2500 peso and started our walk right after. Tip: Make sure you know all the bus hours for the ride back since there are very few and very specific and you don't want to miss it. After choosing the hour that you want to come back use the park ranger to pick the right trip plan for your time limits since some routs can take even more than one day. In Huerquehue you will take a beautiful walk between the green trees and arrive to beautiful viewpoints over the lakes and the Villa Rika volcano. On the top you will see beautiful colorful lakes and waterfalls between white snowy and massive mountains.

Ojos del Caburgua waterfalls: This beautiful park is completely magical and offers a lot of opportunities from beautiful views, camping, lake dipping or lunch at the barbecue area.

Caburga lago: a blue lake surrounded by marvelous snowy mountains.
Salto Del Claro: we took an absolutely magical horseback riding trip the breathtaking and spectacular Salto Del Claro- almost 90 meter tall waterfall with an intense water float crashing in a green forest area.

La Poza mirador: which offers a great view of the of a beautiful lake right underneath of the Villarrica volcano. Tip: bring some snacks and enjoy a picnic by the lake with the volcanic view.
Pucon's park: a lovely green park and right behind it we visited the other side of the lake.
Termas Geometricas: Pucon offers many hot springs but in my opinion and in many others the best one is Termas Geometricas. In the middle of an enchanting green forest, surrounded with impressive waterfalls and rivers that comes out from every corner you will find 17 completely natural hot spring pools that can reach to the heat of 43 C . After visiting hot springs all around the world I can say that this one was the best and just felt too dreamy and unreal. Tip: Come here after a hike to completely relax your muscles and body.

Climbing the Villarrica volcano: We started this very exciting day with getting ready and gearing up at 06:30 am and at 07:30 we were already at the bottom of the Vilarika volcano ready to start climbing. The climb took us 7 long and extremely hard hours due to 5 meters of snow but it was for sure one of the best moments of my life. The feeling of successfully climbing this insane mountain, seeing an active volcano just underneath my feet and lava in front of my face will forever be one of my best highlights of my trip. Eventually we put on a plastic dippers on our behinds and slid all the way down from the top of the volcano!

How to make the best of your climb: 1. This climb is a bit dangerous so choose a reliable company (sadly I can't recommend mine). 2. Check all of your equipment before leaving to the volcano. A lot of people including me had missing equipment that was very necessary. 3. Choose the weather wisely, you want a sunny and most important not windy day in order to have clear sky in order to see the breathtaking views, a less hard and dangerous climb and also to not freeze. 4. Take sunglasses and sunscreen since the sun reflect from the ice and it will burn you like crazy (from experience). 5. Bring your own good pair of gloves, thick socks and a lot of motivation.

The Carretera Austral

This Road trip goes back and forth between Chile and Argentina but I recommend to start in Argentina for a better route and also a much cheaper car rental fees so I'm going to write my road trip plan in my recommended order from Argentina the way I did.

The Carretera Austral is the name given to Chile's Route 7 that offers the views of special towns, amazing parks, incredible hikes, countless activities and so much more. The best option in my option is to rent a car and do this trip at your own pace and schedule but you may also use the common option of hitchhiking or a van trip with more people through a company.

Important tips: 1. This Road trip goes back and forth between Chile and Argentina but I recommend to start in Argentina for a better route and also a much cheaper car rental fee.

2. fuel gas in every gas station no matter what is your gas situation since sometimes the distances between the gas stations can be really far.

3. Do a full grocery shopping before since Argentina is much cheaper but do not buy vegetables or other products that are not completely close since they are not allowed in the border crossing.

Day 1- Leaving Bariloche The Carretera Austral (Argentina):

We started our road trip and drove almost two hours to El Bolson where we walked around the city center and had breakfast on the top of Cerro Amigo which offers great viewpoints over the city's green view.

From El Bolson we drove another 2.5 hours to Trevelin Chubut where we were lucky enough to witness the blossom of the 47 types of tulipanes that blossom only on October.

After Trevelin we continued for another hour to Futaleufu where we crossed the border to Chile, enjoyed a calm afternoon and spent the night.

Day 2- The Hanging Glacier (Chile): We left Futaleufu early in the morning and drove 4.5 hours to National Park Queulat that offers breathtaking views of a crystal-clear river and green forest but the far most famous attraction is the 3 hours hike to the Hanging Glacier- a massive glacier hung between two mountains. From Queulat we drove to Puyuapi enjoyed the local hot springs and spent our second night.

Day 3- Coyhaique (Chile):

On our 4.5 hours way to Coyhaique we stopped at Cascada La Virgen in the beginning of Rio Simpson National Reserve. After that we drove 30 minutes to Coyhaique where we visited Coyhaique national reserve and ate lunch at Laguna Verde. in the evening we spent the afternoon at the city's main square where you can find restaurants and bars.

Day 4- Puerto Tranquilo (Chile): We left coyhayke and drove 3.5 hours to Puerto Tranquilo. We were supposed to arrive early in the noon but after some car problems we arrived at 15:00. In Puerto Tranquilo the main thing you have to do is the boat trip to the Marble Caves- you absolutely can't say you've been to Puerto Tranquilo otherwise. After the boat trip we only had time for dinner and we spent the night in a local hostel.

Day 5- Glaciar Exploradores (Chile): Early with dawn we went to see the sunrise over the city's lake and right after we drove 50 km (about one hour) to Laguna san Rafael national park where we started our hike to Glaciar Exploradores. On the way we stopped at La Nutria waterfall and around 09:00 we started walking in the park. The first two hours are a bit challenging since they include jumping between rocks but when you put your crampons on and start walking on the glacier it's much easier. This amazing hike includes two hours on the rocks and two hours on the glacier underneath the enchanting view of mount San Valentine. On the glacier you will see impressive and massive ice hills, beautiful blue clear ice, deep blue Lagoons and the highlight for me was to walk inside an ice cave when magical blue ice surrounds you from all over, so clear that you can look inside of it. I highly recommend this hike since it's not hard, good for everyone and offers breathtaking nature views.

Day 6- Chile Chico (Chile): We left our beloved Puerto Tranquilo and drove 3.5 hours in more amazing views to Chile Chico. On the way we stopped at Laguna Verde and arrived to Chile Chico with noon. In the city we had a picnic lunch on a beautiful mirador over the blue sea at Plaza Del Viento, visited the city huge cotton fields and had a peaceful afternoon at the local amazing beach.

Day 7- Piedra Clavada circul (Chile): We woke up before dawn with all the neighbor's roosters and drove 25 km on the way to Reserva Nacional Lago Jeinimeni where on the way you will find the signs that will lead you to the hike. Note- the road is only for 4X4 vehicles. This very unique and unknown for tourists hike will start in an open field underneath huge weird shaped rocks that were sculptured by the wind and not long after you start walking you will start to see and get closer to the impressive 40 meters totem like rock called Piedra Clavada. After this you will continue walking in the trail in the valley and start climbing to the next stop- Cueva De Lad Manos in which you will get a small taste of the "Hand cave" that you can also see near Puerto Moreno. In such caves you can witness signs and paintings from people and animals from over 7000 years ago. Last but not least our final spot of the hike is the breathtaking Valle Lunar that is filled with fascinating rocks that give you the feeling like you moved to another planet or landed on the moon. This hike is completely undiscovered by tourists and that also what makes it so special, it's in the wild nature, very unique and different from the views we saw this far in the trip and also very very easy. After the hike you can continue to Lago Jeinimeni reserve itself and then cross the border back to Argentina where we spent the night in Los Antiguos.

In Los Antiguos you can enjoy the beautiful lake view, the local fruit markets and bakeries and the miradors: Mirador Uendeunk, Mirador Del Valle and Mirador Rio Jeinimeni.

Day 8- driving back to Bariloche: We started our drive back to Bariloche in order to give back the car to the agency, you can also bring the car back at El Calafate for a big fee. We drove almost 7 to Esquel where we spent the night. Tip: Stop for fuel in very gas station due to very long distances and also to fresh yourself up since the road is very boring.

Puerto Natales

The most popular base for excursions to the famous Torres del Paine National Park, one of the most popular national parks in Chile. The park features different trails from one day to more to the mountainous “towers” ("torres") which are an impressive and unique rock formation and also for lookout points over Grey glacier.

What to do?

The pier: visit the town beautiful pier that have a great view of the park's mountains and enjoy the sunset at the city's mirador.
Torres Del Paine park: the park offers different ways to explore the beauties of the park, the O and W trails are the most popular ones and if you are interested in camping make sure to have your reservations for the campsite months ahead! Not joking about this, it's almost impossible to find a spot. If you didn't make a reservation you can also try to find a spot at one of the park's hostels but be warn- it's very expensive. We didn't manage to get a spot so today I decided to do only the one-day hike to the Torres. The climb takes about 3.5 hours and the way down around 3, I recommend taking the very first bus (07:00 am) and to be prepared for 8 hours of hiking (4 hours up 4 hours down not including a stop on the top) and arrange your time so you will make it back to the last shuttle from the bus station at 19:00 pm. The hike is a bit difficult, for sure doable but yet be prepared for a steep hill. Prices according to 2018 (Cash only): Bus to the park: 15,000 CLP Entrance to the park: 21,000 CLP Shuttle to the starting point (one way): 3000 CLP.

Punta Arenas

The capital city of Chile's southernmost region and most known for its rich history and penguins excursions.

What to do?

Plaza de Armes: the town's main square where you can see the monument to Hernando de Magallanes, street musicians and entertainers. It is close to the cathedral and the town hall and you can have great meal at the local fish market.
Zona Franca: A duty free mall.
King penguins tour: We started the morning at 07:30 with a short drive to the ferry which sailed for two hours until we arrived to the other side. From there we started our long journey to the king penguins which included a museum tour, a visit to an historical statue and a lunch break. After everything we arrived to the "Penguins Rey" park only around 15:00. Unfortunately, although they had a nice family of penguins and even 6 chicks you can only see them from a far and barely take pictures which was a disappointment for us. On the way back we stopped again at some historical locations, took another ferry and arrived back at 21:00. This tour is a bit pricey and although it's advertised as a "king penguin tour" it's completely focused on the history of Chile and not on the penguins so take it to your considerations.

Isla Magdalena tour: an excursion that starts at the Tres Puentes dock where you will sail to the island of Magdalena. Upon disembarking at Isla Magdalena you will visit the home of between 30,000 and 40,000 pairs of Magellanic penguins.

Chile was truly the best place to start my adventure around South America, I absolutely recommend all of you to visit this wonderful country but I highly recommend to combine it like I did with Argentina and just drive between them for the best trip ever.

For more pictures click here or search @Travel_Rotem on Instagram.