Patagonia & Chilean Fjords With Mendoza

Buenos Aires is one of the largest cities of Latin America, a major world port, and Argentina’s commercial and social center. Heavily industrialized, he city is one of the world’s leading exporters of processed foods. It was founded in 1536, abandoned, then resettled in 1580, and was the first Latin American city to revolt (1810) against Spanish rule.

Officially independent in 1816, it became the capital of a united Argentina in 1862. It grew into an urban colossus in the late 19th century, when railroads into the agriculturally abundant pampa to the west began to supplement the great inland river transportation system that linked the city with Uruguay, Paraguay, and Brazil, and immigration from Europe increased. Famous landmarks include the 19th century cathedral, the opera house, and the many beautiful municipal parks.

The premier wine-making region of Argentina, Mendoza is a modern city with a historic past. At the foot of the Andes, this thriving city of over 500,000 is a terrific base for exploring the local wineries and Mt. Aconcagua, the highest peak in the Andes.

Santiago, city (1992 pop. 4,233,060), central Chile, capital of Chile and of Santiago prov., on the Mapocho R. Chile’s largest city, housing a third of the country’s population, it is the commercial and political heart of the republic and a manufacturing center with iron and steel foundries. The city is modern in appearance, but its ground plan is colonial. Since its founding in 1541, Santiago has survived floods, earthquakes, and an attack by the Mapuche people. In the early 1970s it was the scene of mass political demonstrations.

Situated on the southern shore of the island of Tierra del Fuego, Ushuaia is the southernmost town in Argentina. It faces the Beagle Channel, where Captain Fitzroy and Charles Darwin encountered the now extinct Yaghan Indians. In the magnificent Parque Nacional Tierra del Fuego, discover hanging glaciers, verdant beech forests, towering mountains, bottomless sphagnum bogs, crystal clear lakes and spectacular rushing rivers. And look for Andean condors, albatross, upland geese, guanaco, beavers and maybe a puma or two.