Bottom of the World - Punta Arenas, Chile

In one of our very first conversations we talked about traveling from Alaska to the southern tip of South America, so after spending a month and a half in Peru, we headed to south. To save a week of travel, which the trip would have been by bus, we flew to Punta Arenas, Chile. Punta Arenas felt like an old west frontier town. Located on the stormy Strait of Magellan, the town's small, rectangular buildings huddle together and hold on for dear life to save themselves from huge gusts of wind coming from the west across the Pacific Ocean. As you'd expect in this kind of environment, the people seemed to be independent and hard-working. The food, like hot, steamy seafood chowders, is warming and comforting. It reminded us a lot of Alaska.

The weather changes drastically and fast in this part of the world. The first day we woke to rainy and windy weather. We ducked into a cafe for some sweets and to catch up on things back home (thanks to a decent WiFi connection). While we were there, it snowed and the temperature dropped. Then, just as we were about to leave, the sky cleared up for us and the sun came out. We took a short walk up to a overlook with a great view of the city and of the Magellan Strait. Before the building of the Panama Canal in the early 1900s, all ships traveled through this channel of water (about 1.2 miles wide at narrowest point) when crossing from the Atlantic to the Pacific by way of South America.

Here's a vista of Punta Arenas and the Magellan Straight on the horizon:


Conditions are harsh in Patagonia, so things that actually grow in the area flourish. We saw the biggest dandelions we've ever seen in our lives. These were the first of many we saw during the rest of our travels in Patagonia.


There wasn't a lot to do in the town. Our host at the hostel recommended we visit the cemetery. Yes, another cemetery on vacation! The cemetery was different than most in the U.S. It is very common for families to build mausoleums for their family's final resting place.


There are also very colorful vaults. Family members take flowers and decorate the outside of their loved one's vault.

Punta Arenas isn't a dead city. It is alive and kicking... literally! Check out these soccer fields next to the cemetery:

There was another, more lively tourist must-do outside the city of Punta Arenas... visit the Magellanic penguin colony. We were expecting to see penguins on the ice like in the movie March of the Penguins, but these were a different kind of penguin and there was no ice.

Here are our versions of the march:

March of the Penguins from Chad Carson on Vimeo.

March of the penguins - part 2 from Chad Carson on Vimeo.

We got really close to the penguins, and in fact, some of the penguins cross the visitor trails on their way to the ocean.

It was so fun to watch them waddle around!

This one reminded Kari of an ultimate frisbee player who laid out to catch the disk. We couldn't find the disk, though, so it must have been resting.

There were many burrows in the area (about 20 per 100 square meters). An interesting thing about these penguins is that the males and females take turns incubating the eggs (on about 2 week shifts) while the other goes to find food. They have the same partner for their whole life (average is 25 years). Males return to the same burrow every year, and the female is able to find the male based on his call. Here's a picture of their burrow:

The penguins swim about 50 miles off the coast for their food, and the distance is increasing as climate changes are displacing fish populations. Here are some on the coast after dinner with their flock:

There were actually many other animals we saw at the reserve- rabbits, skunks and this flightless emu-like bird called a rhea. Chad had flashbacks of his days chasing emus around his family's farm!

After a couple of days catching up with things in Punta Arenas, we took a five hour bus ride north to Puerto Natales, which was a jumping off point to Torres del Paine National Park.