Patagonia National Park

Delighted after securing last minute ferry tickets for Puerto Yungay to Puerto Natales for the 25th February, we were a little richer with time so headed into Parque Nacional Patagonia to explore for a few days.

The Patagonia National Park is one of Chile's newest parks, officially created in 2018. It is made up of the former Tamango and Jeinimeni reserves, and Valle Chacabuco, a sector that was donated to the State of Chile by Douglas Tompkins, and which was formerly one of the largest cattle ranches in the country. In the 1990s Tompkins (North face founder) and his wife, Kris McDivitt Tompkins (former CEO Patagonia) bought and conserved more than 2 million acres of wilderness in Chile and Argentina with the focus of park creation, wildlife recovery, ecological agriculture, and activism, with the goal of saving biodiversity.

Driving into the park, we saw lots of herds of guanacos everywhere before arriving at the neatly presented visitor centre. This park has a very American feel with well built and maintained infrastructure which we enjoyed compared to other CONAF parks. We decided to stay for two nights in the west winds campsite to complete the 20km sendero lagunas altas trial. Here we met a nice Canadian family from salt spring island off Vancouver who were delighted to hear Joe had visited previously and knew of Joe's friend- small world! We enjoyed hearing the dad David's stories of meeting the Tompkins and visiting their lodge when it was still a private park.

After westwinds, we headed on to Alto Valle campsite at the other end of the park for one night. Here we completed a small walk up to Mirador Douglas Tompkins where we got rewarded with a beautiful but windy look out onto lake Cochrane.

On 23rd February, we headed back through the park to the carretera austral, stopping into the park museum on route where we learnt about the importance of National Parks, conservation of ecosystems and the history, flora and fauna in the area.

Recommendations:
Really enjoyed the park museum
Nice signposted walking trails
Best view at Mirador Douglas Tompkins
Book: A Wild Idea: The True Story of Douglas Tompkins―The Greatest Conservationist You've Never Heard Of
Do the multiday trek to lago jeinimeni (we didn't have time)

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