Chile Guide
The Carretera Austral
From Puerto Montt, the Carretera Austral, or "Southern Highway", stretches over 1000km south through the wettest, greenest, wildest and narrowest part of Chile, ending its mammoth journey at the tiny settlement of Villa O'Higgins, a long, long way from anywhere. Carving its path through tracts of untouched wilderness, the route takes in soaring, snow-capped mountains, Ice Age glaciers, blue-green fjords, turquoise lakes and rivers, and one of the world's largest swaths of temperate rainforest. Most of it falls into Aisén, Chile's "last frontier", the final region to be opened up in the early twentieth century. A hundred years on, Aisén remains very sparsely populated, and still has the cut-off, marginal feel of a pioneer zone.
Highlights
1 White-water rafting at Futaleufú "Purgatory", "Hell" and "Terminator" are just three of the world-class rapids you can hurtle down on the "Fu".
2 Termas de Puyuhuapi Soak your bones and gaze at the southern night skies at Chile's premier spa resort.
3 Ventisquero Colgante Gawk at the suspended glaciers that seem to defy gravity along the Southern Highway in the Parque Nacional Queulat.
4 Laguna San Rafael glacier Catch it while you can: this gigantic tongue of ice with its own lagoon may be gone by 2030.
5 Crossing Lago General Carrera Bundle up before taking the ferry across the second-largest lake in South America.
6 Villa O'Higgins If you want to say you went as far down the Carretera Austral as you could.