Final frontiers

Five travel writers journey far and wide to find the world’s last unexplored wildernesses

Patagonia
Lucinda Baring

Arriving in Patagonia, the region spanning Argentina and Chile at the southernmost tip of South America, I really felt I’d reached the end of the earth. The journey is an epic but rewarding one – this was the most spectacular scenery I’d ever seen. My destination was Hotel Salto Chico in the Torres del Paine National Park in Chile. This small enclave of comfort, surrounded by wide green lagoons and sheltered by snow-capped mountains, is designed specifically to cosset you after a day spent amongst the elements. Windows span the length of every room and with no mobile reception, television or internet in the bedrooms, it is easy to forget the life you have left behind.

Patagonia is the only land in the 51st latitude and the wind blows from west to east with incredible force, bringing with it the most changeable weather.