One of the most interesting drives in my life was Chile from the island of Chiloe to the Tatio Geysers in the Atacama. Just so many different climate zones, and all in relatively close proximity.
Chiloe and Puerto Montt were damp, cold, and fog-shrouded in Summer (Jan-Feb), very similar to parts of the coastal pacific northwest.
The area to its north, centered around the German-influenced town of Valdivia, was California-like. Very temperate in Summer, and very green. Lots of pastures and rivers.
The region becomes progressively more "Mediterranean" as you move further north; one gradually sees fewer pastures and woodlands, more vineyards, olive trees, and fruit orchards. Santiago is on the far northern end of this Mediterranean zone. The great wine regions are generally to the south and west of that capital city.
A few hours north of Santiago and all is desert -- but it's a fairly live desert, with all sorts of succulent plants and many types of flower. Most of the road traffic in these parts comes from copper miners and their work trucks.
Continue north and you're in a dry, mostly empty, moonscape. Antofagasta and Calama are nice enough towns, though, and the interesting drive from the former to the latter takes just two hours but sees you rise from sea level to +2000m. It's such a gentle and relentless slope that you barely notice it. Nothing at all like driving in the Alps.
I broke something in my rental car when I continued to the geysers at +4000m, but it was worth it.
> Just so many different climate zones, and all in relatively close proximity.
Another place like this, perhaps lesser in scale, is the Big Island of Hawaii. Its latitude means the trade winds are blowing from the same direction year-round, bringing moisture to the windward side (e.g. Hilo, HI with 120" average annual rainfall) and leaving the leeward side dry (e.g. Kailua-Kona, HI with under 20" average annual rainfall), on the other side of massive volcanoes. And you can go from the ocean to almost 14k feet in elevation in an hour's drive; this may be one of the only places in the world where you can do that.
All of this means that as you move around Big Island, based on the precipitation, humidity, and elevation, you're going to see wildly different environments mere minutes' drive from each other. It truly has to be seen to be believed.
I was recently in the big island and this was both unexpected and wild to me. The difference of a couple miles could have an enormous impact on the weather over time. We stayed a couple of days in Volcano Village and like clockwork it'd be rainy there but sunny or at least partly sunny just a few miles down the street. Then there are rain forests, cloud forests, deserts, and every thing in between.
It's expensive, and it's a long way away from anything else.
I've been twice and both times the Big Island was my favorite. Maui and Kauai are spectacular in their own ways, as are the few rural areas of Oahu, but there's nothing like the Big Island. The drive from Kailua-Kona to Hilo over the Saddle Road (which, in itself, goes to around 6600 ft) is spectacular, and if you have enough time to make a day of it, coming back around via the southern ring road is well worth it. If you get up early, Waimea and the surrounding area (esp the NW protuberance of land) are worth seeing as well. Huge variation in biomes in very short distances.
Just by the sea, beaches and small banana plantations. Go slightly inland and up the hills, you're in an arid region. Continue slightly further up, and you get into a lush, verdant forest. All within maybe 20 minutes' drive.
Best part? There's no airport on the island - you have to fly to Tenerife and take a ferry.
And yet another place like this is in Southern California if you drive in an easterly direction starting on San Diego and ending in the Salton Sea, going through Ramona and Julien. You go from an area with a Mediterranean climate to temperate deciduous forests to coniferous forests to cold, high-elevation desert to hot, low-elevation desert (Anza Borrego Desert). This is all within about 50 miles (80km). It's a fascinating drive!
>so many different climate zones, and all in relatively close proximity
Yes. Just mountain climbing in northern Patagonia (between Bariloche & Villarica, really only 100mi of north-south distance) became my favorite part of the world for your reason. In a single day (or two), we could walk in the dry, dusty bottom of a canyon dug out by glacier melt, cross through a humid jungle, rest on the shores of an alpine lake, pick your way across a massive rocky field of a'a lava, up a glacier and look down inside the caldera of an active volcano.
The only other place I have been that come close to having that amount of diversity of terrain in a limited area might be the Tetons/Yellowstone.
Torres del Paine in the south is pretty brutal to get to if you're not used to long flight but it is breathtaking. Definitely a bucket list trip if you enjoy nature and wildlife, hiking, etc.
It's nice, but unfortunately listed on nearly every tour guide of Chile, so these days it's flooded with tourists most of the time. You'll have a much better time seeing other places slightly off the beaten track.
During the summer months yeah, but I've been there last year during the end season and, although there are still lots of tourists, it's not overwhelming and some of the hikes were pretty chill.
Going straight to the Torres themselves will usually be crowded (depending on the time of the day). But some of the other hikes less so. I've done the W Circuit (a multi-day trek) and during some days I barely saw another hiker.
I hate visiting touristy cities but I mind don't mind it as much in nature areas. Mainly because the nature isn't changing itself for the tourists.
I visited Torres de Paine and it was refreshingly different from national parks in the US. On the upside, you can get water and basic snacks at the refugios which reduce the load you have to carry, and makes for an overall safer experience than unsupported wilderness backpacking but still with minimal impact on nature. On the other hand I did not like that they close a lot of viewpoints long before sunset.
"Nevertheless, recent paleoenvironmental studies performed within the Park indicate that fires have been frequent phenomena at least during the last 12,800 years."
So fires are a normal thing there, or they have tourists since 12,800 years ..
Yeah I hate that, but at first glance it didn't seem to be a huge problem in TdP compared to most other national parks around the world I have been to. Most people I encountered seemed quite responsible. Chile is overall a very well-educated country though, and TdP takes significant effort to get to compared to so it is perhaps a natural filter.
Vancouver when the cherry blossoms are in bloom is interesting, the different elevations and the different progress of the trees is fun to pay attention to.
I travelled to Chile earlier this year and visited Atacama and Torres de Paine.
The thing that boggled my mind was that you can't drive between the two without a very long detour through Argentina. Chile has literally no road linking the northern part with the southernmost part without going outside the country.
It is also mind boggling that rail is not more popular there. A long, slim country is ideal for high speed rail.
Actually you can cross the entirety of Chile by car if you don't mind taking a ferry that starts in Puerto Montt and arrives in Puerto Natales. It is 4 day trip, but the scenery is gorgeous.
Regarding the rail system, Chile had a great rail system that went from Arica to Puerto Montt with lots of spurs going into inner towns. However it was slowly dismantled and now most of the rails are in disuse, or used for the transport of goods.
There is still a main rail for passenger transport, but most people prefers taking the bus or driving because of convenience.
Looking at the map of southern Chile, it's pretty obvious why this is so. It's just immense mountains and fjords. Building a road across that terrain would be a major challenge, requiring many bridges capable of surviving harsh conditions. All to deserve a minuscule population? Chile isn't Norway...
Latitude-wise, Torres de Paine is comparable to northern Belgium than it is to Norway. Even Ushoaia, the southernmost major city in Americas, looks more like Belfast in the UK, or Gdansk in Poland, which are both into way more nicer climates than Norway. I just think that having some infrastructure in place, linking the southern parts of Chile with the rest, may be exactly what is needed for addressing the stounted growth there.
I tried to cross the border into Argentina north of Puerto Montt. I wanted to check out the Argentinian side for a day or two. But they wouldn't let me across the border with my rental car, and I got turned back. I suppose the rules are a little bit different in the far south?
If you want to bring a Chilean rental car into Argentina you need to obtain and pay for a specific permit at least a few days before you pick up the rental car. Maybe that was missing? When I crossed the border they were very thorough with checking this permit.
> If you want to bring a Chilean rental car into Argentina you need to obtain and pay for a specific permit at least a few days before you pick up the rental car.
Classic Argentinian bureaucracy, making the country lose money since time immemorial
Actually it is because you need car insurance for accidents against third parties. This must be bought before going over the border. Usually there are shops in border towns that can help you with the paperwork.
I don't know anything about the history of trains or carriages, but in the heyday of railway development in Britain (iron rails, steam locomotive, etc.) it would have been far less acceptable than today too. And still all trains I'm aware of/have been on have two classes of carriage. Indian trains have several, and similar cultural need for that I imagine (I don't really know anything about Chile).
I’m told that prior to industrialization there were areas along the Andes (in Peru for sure, presumably Chile as well) where you rarely if ever met the tribes living uphill or downhill from you. It was way easier to travel north and south.
Quite the contrary, the management of the different ecological floors was the specialty of the inhabitants of the Andes, even now. The same community owns and uses land at different altitudes, which can range from 1000 to 4000 meters above sea level. This generated an economy based on the exchange of goods along vertical lines.
Might have been an urban legend or someone confusing their locations.
There was a very similar model in California as well. Seasonal migration from the sea to the hills and back. Given the supposed patterns of settlement of the Americas maybe this is not particularly surprising.
Chiloe and Puerto Montt were damp, cold, and fog-shrouded in Summer (Jan-Feb), very similar to parts of the coastal pacific northwest.
The area to its north, centered around the German-influenced town of Valdivia, was California-like. Very temperate in Summer, and very green. Lots of pastures and rivers.
The region becomes progressively more "Mediterranean" as you move further north; one gradually sees fewer pastures and woodlands, more vineyards, olive trees, and fruit orchards. Santiago is on the far northern end of this Mediterranean zone. The great wine regions are generally to the south and west of that capital city.
A few hours north of Santiago and all is desert -- but it's a fairly live desert, with all sorts of succulent plants and many types of flower. Most of the road traffic in these parts comes from copper miners and their work trucks.
Continue north and you're in a dry, mostly empty, moonscape. Antofagasta and Calama are nice enough towns, though, and the interesting drive from the former to the latter takes just two hours but sees you rise from sea level to +2000m. It's such a gentle and relentless slope that you barely notice it. Nothing at all like driving in the Alps.
I broke something in my rental car when I continued to the geysers at +4000m, but it was worth it.