Nature - Chilean Patagonia
Glacial ice from the Chilean fjords
Chilean Patagonia
Another section in our trip to south America. There were two parts to this section, namely Cape Horn and the Chilean fjords, and Torres del Paine National Park.
Before describing them in a bit more detail, I’ll point out that the cover picture is a mother puma eating from the carcas of a guanaco (I think) she had hunted down earlier. Her cub was nearby and did come within range of my camera but I wasn’t able to get a good shot of them together. The mother was about 200m from the rough gravel road we were travelling on.
The guanaco resembles a llama and is ubiquitous in this part of the world. They roam freely in the National Park just as deer do in our more remote forests.
One common feature of the fjords and land-locked National Park is glaciers. One of the interesting things I learned about this part of the world is its status as a large fresh water reserve. After the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets, Patagonia holds the third highest reserve of fresh water in the world. I’d never seen a glacier up close before. Their immense size is awesome.
Our hike up the French Valley was around 22km, much longer than we’d normally undertake. I won’t lie and say it was easy, especially the final section to the French Glacier viewpoint. However, it was worth it for the view and to see the glacier cracking and snow cascading down its face.
Cape Horn was interesting because of what it represents. My picture reminds me of views from the Outer Hebrides in Scotland. However, that peaceful scene belies just how dangerous the storms can be here. There are thousands of wrecked and sunken ships just offshore.
Finally, the last image is of peaks in Torres del Paine. They remind me of the Alps in Europe and the Rockies in N America. All of them have been tall enough to protrude above the 75,000 to 100,000 year cyclic periods of sheet ice that blanketed the higher latitudes over the past 2.5MM years. In Scotland, we don’t have such sharp peaks because our mountains have been periodically blanketed by 1-2 km thick (I think) sheet ice, and their sharp peaks ground down by the moving layers.
Cape Horn
Chilean fjord
Torres del Paine French Glacier
Torres del Paine