Final Stop on the Carretera Austral: Chile Chico Population: 3000 From Cochrane we back tracked north on the Carretera to get to Chile Chico for a night, a border town only 8km from Argentina. It was our farewell to the Carretera, as we planned to […]
Stops 6 & 8 on the Carretera Austral: Cochrane Population: 2900 Both on the way to Caleta Tortel, and on our way back north after Caleta Tortel, we stopped in Cochrane. Cochrane was a necessary stop on our Carretera route due to funky rural bus […]
Stop 7 on the Carretera Austral: Caleta Tortel Population: 320 If you’ve been following our Carretera Austral posts, you may notice that we skipped stop 6 and went straight to 7. We ended up back in stop 6, Cochrane, for a longer stay after stop […]
Stop 5 on the Carretera Austral: Puerto Río Tranquilo Population: 400 Puerto Río Tranquilo was of the same character and build as Puyuhuapi; roughly the same size, same types of minimarkets (including limited available produce), same cultural flavor of kindness and seriousness from the locals, […]
Stop 4 on the Carretera Austral: Coyhaique Population: 50,000 The 5 hour bus ride from Puyuhuapi to Coyhaique was an incredibly beautiful section of the Carretera for us. The sun was shining, there was blue sky and puffy white clouds, and colorful spring wildflowers filled […]
Stop 3 on the Carretera Austral: Puyuhuapi Population: 300-500 Unfortunately the cloudy, misty weather we had in Chaitén followed us throughout the 5 hour bus ride south on the Carretera to Puyuhuapi. It was difficult to see out the bus window at times, but most […]
Stop 2 on the Carretera Austral: Chaitén Population: Varied Estimates between 1,000 and 3,000 (4,500 pre Volcano Eruption) We knew the town of Chaitén had been affected by the eruption of Volcano Chaitén back in 2008, but we had assumed that by now, 6 years […]
The Carretera Austral Begins From Puerto Montt we began our road trip down Chile’s famed Carretera Austral highway, known as one of the most amazing road trip highways in the world. The Carretera Austral was built over a 20 year period, starting in 1976, under […]