Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Patagonia
Why Go?
On South America's southern frontier, nature grows wild, barren and beautiful. Spaces are
large, as are the silences that fill them. For the newly arrived, such emptiness can be as
impressive as the sight of Patagonia's jagged peaks, pristine rivers and dusty backwater
oases. In its enormous scale, Patagonia offers an innumerable wealth of potential experi-
ences and landscapes.
Though no longer a dirt road, lonely RN40 remains the iconic highway that stirred af-
fection in personalities as disparate as Butch Cassidy and Bruce Chatwin. On the eastern
seaboard, paved RN3 shoots south, connecting oil boomtowns with ancient petrified
forests, Welsh settlements and the incredible Península Valdés. Then there is the other,
trendy Patagonia where faux-fur hoodies outnumber the guanacos. Don't miss the spectac-
ular sights of El Calafate and El Chaltén, but remember that they're a world apart from the
solitude of the steppe.
When to Go
Nov-Mar
The warmest months, ideal for
estancia
visits and driving Ruta 40.
Jun-mid-Dec
Right whales migrate to Península Valdés.
