Welcome to Patagonia

Would you travel to the edge of the world to ride horseback for eight hours for two consecutive days, trek for nine and go down a river by Zodiac, after nearly freezing to death to see a glacier? Of course you would!

TEXT: Soledad Castro
Photos: Diego Araya

I’m hugging a 100-foot-tall lenga tree, surrounded by another 500 lengas. There’s no one else around because they went on ahead awhile ago, and it will take Becca 15 minutes to find me.

This is how I fell unabashedly in love with the Nothofagus pumilio and its neighboring relatives atop a carpet of russet, orange and golden leaves. Others that fall to the ground are a rich brown. Far above, an ill-tempered wind brushes through the yellow hair of my lenga. He waves his arms, protecting me from the Patagonian fury, or maybe just to say hello. I feel more welcome that ever.

It’s getting dark in Paine. Drops of rain begin to fall, and I know that I’m at least a three-hour walk from home (the spa and sommelier-equipped Hostería Las Torres). As foolish as the virgins of Biblical lore, I ignored the list imploring me to bring a flashlight. But nothing else matters as much as this fraternal embrace with my lenga.

I feel as bold as the famous Lady Florence Dixie, although later I’m told that I’m guilty of a mauvaise honte, being shameless enough to say it (I use the French expression because she does the same in her book). Not to be confused with a pirate, native or castaway, this English noblewoman arrived i with the commendable objective of touring Patagonia (not to raise sheep, find gold or discover oil). She spent a month and a half on horseback, hunting guanacos, rheas and even pumas for food (she took a pelt home to London, along with a lucky dog named Pucho). She wore long dresses as befitting a woman of her era, without any of my ultra-warm Capilene or Goretex clothing.

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