Ski Chile 2022

[Casey E]

Not skiing but I am trying to find a flight I can afford to Puerto Montt area last 3 weeks in February. Any tips on flying somewhere close and taking other transportation or something?
Gracias

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You can fly to Osorno (closest) or Temuco. Feb is high season, but you should be able to find flights now. Sky, Latam, or Jetsmart.

[jhyatt]

You can fly to Osorno (closest) or Temuco. Feb is high season, but you should be able to find flights now. Sky, Latam, or Jetsmart.

Thanks dood

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[riff]

I’m getting so pumped- flying down the 10th of this month. Headed to Coyhaique, going to day trip around there a bit and then hopefully get on San Lorenzo….
Getting my gear list together, feeling some of those pre trip butterflies!


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[NWFlow]

Super curious to hear back on that. My gf has family there somehow and it'd be cool to go visit. I haven't found much in the way of day trip or skiing info though. Thinking for next October, so please just put together an easily imitated itinerary.

[riff]

I’ll take notes- maybe even do a trip report here on the forum….


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[Norseman]

Please do

[Casey E]

Shortlist of awesome destinos in Aysen, besides San Lorenzo, or Monte San Valentin, “around” Coyaique

https://maps.app.goo.gl/w25qKqgtQrNV7AnW6?g_st=ic :

Chaitén
Rio Palena
Puyuhuapi
Quelat
Cerro Castillo
Cuevas de Mármol
Bahia Exploradores
Laguna San Rafael
Puerto Bertran
Rio Baker
Tortel
Villa O’Higgins

For a start. You will not regret it, wind and rain withstanding

[riff]

Thanks for the ideas! I had interest in Cerro Castillo and had drawn a few traverse tracks, but my pal had already been in there. I have an idea with a packraft exit on Volcan Hudson but it’ll have to wait as well.


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[riff]

There’s a bunch of excellent looking peaks in that NE corner of the icefield, and San Rafael and Puerto Bertrand are ranked highly for investigation.


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[abcdethan]

I would love a trip report. I'm very curious about that area.

[Casey E]

We are back from a leisurely circuit route through Argentina and Chile. Trip report coming up.

Villarrica - San Martin de los Andes - Villa Angostura - Antillanca



We were in a hurry and did the Pucon Mahuil Malal pass route, thru Junin to San Martin, which was a bit desolate on the Argentine side. A better way to get there is the Puerto Fuy ferry thru Paso Hua-hum. 3 huge lakes and mostly native forests (and all paved now I believe).



Cerro Las Peinetas on the border, with Araucaria trees creeping up the cliffs.



San Martin at the end of Lago Lacar.

[Casey E]

The forecasted storm came as forecast with a dreary first day, wet, windy, and cool, good for restaurant hoping. And then it cleared up overnight, as fcst. The ski area, however, 600m above the town, was mostly shrouded in fog, and got no new snow, just a good hardening. But blue bird fixes everything..

Cerro Teta Del Mallin chair and V Lanin



North Teta and about as extreme as it gets inbound



Cerro Chapelco at the back and Del Mocho chair



Woody schusses





Or you can ski the trees, nice spacing for pow, but short stretches



Liked the trees

[riff]

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[jummo]

Nice! We did something very similar. After Portillo and Ski Arpa, we flew to Puerto Montt and took a taxi to Puerto Varas where we spent the night.
Friends from Bariloche met us that night and we drove back to Bariloche.
Huge lakes and volcanoes. And the Monkey Puzzle Araucanias.

San Martin de Los Andes might be our favorite town in South America. At least so far.
As an interesting aside, some of the gondola cabins at Chapelco used to orbit Aspen Mountain.

We also skied a few days at Cerro Bayo which was even more scenic which is hard to imagine.

I'll try to post some pictures, but ever since we came back they are all upside down. My IT department has gone to bed and she isn't as interested in circle jerking on the Interweb.

[jummo]

Sideways and upside down again. Fuck you Al Gore, this isn't what I was promised.

[Casey E]

San Martin to Villa la Angostura, the "route of 7 lakes", 120km of forests and water bordering Chile.







Santo Diego was present



And finally, the massive Nahuel Huapi lake was dead calm.





The light sand color is mainly from the ash and pumice, product of the 2011 Caulle eruption in Chile. 50cm of ash fell on La Angostura, our hotel owner loaded 14 trucks with ash to clear his modest lot.

Dawn from our room on Playa Mansa.

[Casey E]

Cerro Bayo ski area was already closed when we arrived, mainly due to a lack of enthusiasm and maintenance. But it looked like a lot of snow from our boat ride, on a day that was a bit too hot to think about skiing





Apparently, a major lift was out of commission due to faulty parts.

The dock at Parque Nacional Los Arrayanes, with Cerro Catedral (Bariloche) in the distance.



So the famous Arrayan forest is a human construct of many decades ago, when a forestry baron decided to log most trees, leaving the Arrayanes. It is a nice forest in this touristic section, as is the whole 12km long peninsula and mixed forest trail. BUT, depending on who you believe, the Arrayanes were damaged after the Caulle eruption, when the tourist board decided to try and wash the trees with water pressure to remove the ash and reveal the orange bark. They died instead. The unwashed ones are fine. According to the park, they died due to a drought around the same time.

Washed



Unwashed



The coigues are wonderful everywhere in this part of the world



My recommendation would be to avoid the expensive boat trips to the dock and 600m boardwalk (which take a few thousand visitors a day from Bariloche and V Angostura in summer), and walk the other forests instead. Arrayanes grow bigger in Chile anyway...

The view point at the beginning of the peninsula trail.

[Casey E]

The drive to Chile from V Angostura is short and beautiful.

A rock wall near the border.



The pass is low but still snowed in until November. Looked like you could ski out to the tree line in a few hundred meters.



On the Chilean side, the forest was evidently damaged by the eruption.

[byates1]

Amazing pics and trip. Nice!

Is what Doug Thompson and Yvon did down there really super legit? It sounds like they've created hundreds upon hundreds of thousands of acres of national parks and preserved land?

I'm going to come down and stay a while, like years at some point. Thx !!

[riff]

Ok guys, we’ve arrived in Coyhaique, weather looks spotty but today we pick up a car and start looking south- I’m going to start a thread in Trip Reports and put pics and updates in there as we go- may be up to a week between refreshes, but perhaps it’ll motivate me to actually do it!


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[jummo]

We skied four days at Cerro Bayo. We were told you ski there primarily for the views, which even in a place where beauty is abundant, were spectacular.
Being 'Muricans, we've had to get over being squeamish about riding funky lifts in Chile and Argentina. But nothing gives you more confidence than arriving at a ski area and the first lift you see is derailed.
Then you notice they manually push the gondola cabins around the idler wheel. Great place, long lift lines, fantastic scenery, some good terrain, and a low key friendly vibe.
Highly recommended.

I will attempt more pictures.

[Casey E]

Ok guys, we’ve arrived in Coyhaique, weather looks spotty but today we pick up a car and start looking south- I’m going to start a thread in Trip Reports and put pics and updates in there as we go- may be up to a week between refreshes, but perhaps it’ll motivate me to actually do it!


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Share a link to your trip report here, I am interested too.

Have a look at the pass just before dropping into the Villa Cerro Castillo valley. Could ski right out of there, methinks. Been thru there 4 times, all summer, once got snowed on in January.

And see if you can wing a zodiac tour, Pto Tranquilo - Bahia Exploradores - Laguna San Rafael. Need a good window, it probably rains there 300+ days a year. But we got this





Kinda like a big toilet bowl of ice getting flushed, with mini bergs spinning around amidst occasional wave surges

[Casey E]

Amazing pics and trip. Nice!

Is what Doug Thompson and Yvon did down there really super legit? It sounds like they've created hundreds upon hundreds of thousands of acres of national parks and preserved land?

Once widely denounced as some kind of plot to control resources, these massive land purchases came at the right time to preserve them when the native Chilean forest was being decimated. At one point, Tompkins bought land that stretched from the sea to the border, "cutting Chile in half!". However, as planned, his foundations lands were transferred to the Chilean state to form parts of a massive park/reserve.

https://www.rewildingchile.org/?fbcl...Eyi6XXrMSi7HfQ

The network of parks, see map here https://www.rewildingchile.org/en/pr...ean-patagonia/



Recently, a friend who co-wrote an important book, died on Dougs birthday:

"Adriana Hoffmann and Douglas Tompkins, two environmentalist friends, surely met again this March 20th in some southern forest.
Yesterday, on Douglas' birthday, we said goodbye to his friend Adriana, a pioneer in environmental education, leader of the organization Defensores de los Bosques Chilenos, and former director of Conama. A woman who taught us the relevance of biodiversity, to love nature, and to protect it.
In the 1990s, they began a long friendship that led them to work together in the edition of the book 'The Tragedy of the Chilean Forest' in 1999, a lucid and visionary work on the degradation of forests and the worrying absence of forestry policies to protect them. Adriana also played a crucial role in purchasing Yendegaia, which later became a national park.
"Adriana took us all by the hand and showed us the beauty and importance of wild nature. She will be much missed and never forgotten," says our co-founder Kistine Tompkins."

He is top five of my favorite people in history.

[Casey E]

Before getting on to Antillanca, today is the 50th anniversary of the Uruguayan crash in the Andes, and the subsequent drama and rescue. A summary from Emol:



https://www.emol.com/noticias/Nacion...yos-avion.html

[Casey E]

Antillanca gets about 2 meters of rain a year, and most of it falls in winter. The drive in is rain forest up to the ski area. Evidently, the road and trees had suffered from the storms this year, and I dubbed it the thousand pothole way.

Nice viewpoints along the way.





Then at 1,100m it is all snow.

The Haique t-bar, note the 3 missing bars, and high spacing.



The other bar almost buried.



There was always an aspect that was softening up nice during the day, but it all became slush eventually. Mrs E on the NW side of Haique, with Lago Puyehue



The wind was a steady 30-40km, and I limited myself to a short hike up the Taza crater. Nice sweep of volcanos

Puntiagudo and Osorno



Tronador



Casablanca and the Antillanca Complex



Puyehue



And La Taza, last skied by me in 1977.



Still the same bloody t-bars as 1977. The only chair was out of commission. I love funky…