Places are often best known—and best remembered—by a particular image.

Sometimes it is a man made structure: The great Mayan pyramid, Kukulkan, in Chichen Itza in the Yucatan, The Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem, The Taj Mahal, The Eiffel Tower; sometimes it is a creation of nature: the Grand Canyon, the Matterhorn, the Rock of Gibraltar, Yosemite’s Half-Dome. Patagonia—that vast land, part Argentinian, part Chilean at the bottom of South America—has its own iconic symbol. It is known as the Torres del Paine, the Towers of Paine, sharp vertical protrusions among big-shouldered mountains, rising out of rolling pampas. Close up they are awesome, formidable to all but the most intrepid climbers who rate them as very pinnacles of their obsession.

But to me what is even more impressive and memorable are the more distant vistas of the mountains themselves. Like Montana in the U.S., Patagonia is a big sky country. And, on a recent first-time visit, I couldn’t get enough of them.

In many ways, like so many others, I had gone to the area with some idea of what to expect. My premonitions were both mundane and inspirational. The mundane came from the little purple, blue, red and white logo on several items of clothing I have been wearing in recent years. It is a mountain range over the word PATAGONIA.

The more sublime source was anything but commercial. It came from the poignant prose of the late travel writer Bruce Chatwin. Chatwin left a rich legacy in his vivid descriptions of remote places on earth. But to me, none is more powerful than his evocation of Patagonia. Finally getting to see it all first-hand made me regret not having gone there long ago. It is truly a magical place—one in which real life does more than imitate the designers art and emotions are stirred even more by actual witness than even by the most skilled wordsmith’s rendition, the latter characterized by fine descriptions of ice and wind and water, huge open spaces with wild llama-like animals called guanacos, ostrich-like rheas, prolific penguins, huge condors, and, especially, magnificent mountains.

My wife and I started our trip in Ushuaia, Tierra del Fuego, Argentina. After several days there we boarded the cruise ship, M/N Via Australis and spent four glorious days sailing the inland passages of the Beagle Channel and the Straits of Magellan, visiting the storied Cape Horn and getting up close to several glaciers and thousands of penguins.

After disembarking in the Chilean city of Puntas Arenas, we took a local bus for the three-hour trip to Puntas Arenas, the gateway to the Parque Nacional Torres del Paine. Passing miles and miles of open pampas, we arrived at our new anchorage, the three-year old luxury hotel, Remota.

The handsome Remota, a very modern u-shaped wooden building surrounding waving grasses moved by incessant wind off the water, has 72 double rooms, an incredible indoor swimming pool, colorful lounges and dining areas, traditional circular fireplaces, and huge, irregular windows offering spectacular views the bay below and red and yellow houses, green fields and snow-covered mountains behind.

Designed by the noted Chilean architect German del Oro, the stylized structure draws inspiration from the surrounding sheep ranches, with local materials used to enhance its unique blending of tradition and modernity.

Remota has its own crew of guides and all-inclusive packages of three, four, and more days, that includes their services. Over 15 excursions are offered. In our days there, we managed to do four of them. The first was a six hour hike on and around a huge hill, Cerro Benitez, where we trekked through open fields and beechwood forests, saw soaring condors and ancient cave drawings and never were out of sight of the panorama that is Patagonia.

We then took a long ride on horseback in the Sierra Dorotea area led by the baqueano (the Chilean name for a gaucho). On a rest stop in a wooded glen, the guides introduced us to the Chilean drink called mate, made in a gourd packed with tea to which hot water is added.

On another day, we hiked down to the Eberhadt Fjord to Puerto Bories. Along the way, we listened to our guide tell us the history of the area, the establishment of the huge estancia (ranch) through which we walked, and new developments in ecotourism in the entire region.

We were also driven up to through the Parque Nacional Torres del Paine, frequently stopping to take in different vistas of the iconic peaks and to get close to huge herds of llama-like guanacos and ostrich-like rheas.

Equally impressive were the huge blue-toned icebergs, one of which seemed to be a scale model of the mountains that loomed behind them. En route to view the floes, we saw an array of local birds including woodpeckers, parrots, and upland geese.

Before leaving Hedy and I paid a final visit to the town of Puerto Natales, an interesting outpost steeped in the traditions of ranching but clearly retooled to accommodate and provide services for the steadily increasing numbers of tourists, trekkers, and mountaineers. This is especially evident in the growing number of souvenir shops featuring stenciled T-shirts and polar fleece jackets with appropriate logos and stores selling top-of-the-line camping, hiking, and climbing gear.

Like many such communities in transition around the world, it was clearly apparent that just as when it was founded over a century ago, Puerto Natales is divided into distinct social categories—locals, truly indigenous people and the descendants of early settlers); outsiders who run many of the establishments, including touring companies and guiding services, ex-pat groups of special visitors who come mainly to “use” the mountains; and tourists who come mainly to see them. I guess we fit into the last cohort. And what we were able to see—and do—was well worth the long, long trip to the bottom of the world.

This was our first trip to Patagonia. With two weeks we were able to sample nature’s attractions are Ushuaia, Argentina, and the waterways of Tierra del Fuego aboard the good ship, Via Australis, and then, with the helpful mentoring of well-trained guides based at the resort hotel, Remota, to hike and ride the trails and passes of the pampas and mountains to its north. Hopefully, it will not be the last visit.

If You Go
For further information:
www.australis.com
www.remota.cl
www.patagonias.net
info@visitchile.cl

PHOTOGRAPHY BY PETER AND HEDY ROSE

Peter Rose, writer, photographer and editor of SoGoNow.com Travel Magazine. His wife, Hedy, took the photo number one and many of the other pictures in this story.