BLACKBOOK THE HANDBOOK BLACKBOOK THE HANDBOOK Above: excursions at Vira Vira include horseback riding; right: one of the hotel‘s suites and its library “Why go to Patagonia?” Michael asked one afternoon as we strolled the property, which includes a vegetable garden and dairy farm. He doesn’t consider the Lake District to be part of the region – a direct contrast to signs around the area marketing “Northern Patagonia”. He thinks the perfect Chile itinerary starts at the Atacama Desert in the north, then heads south to Santiago, Viña Vik and Vira Vira. He likes that there is an excellent German hospital near his resort. Southern Patagonia, he tells me, offers very little in the way of medical help. Regardless of Vira Vira’s location, its activities embody the Patagonia ethos. There is something for everyone, all within half-an-hour‘s drive of the hotel. Most people schedule two activities per day, one in the morning, around 9:30am, and one in the afternoon, around 3pm, interspersed with on-property gourmet lunches and dinners (think chicken soup, tomato salad, fettuccine, pot roast and carrot sorbet). In the evening, it’s all about relaxing around the lodge. Book one of the 12 villas, which are designed with Swiss precision. They all overlook the Liucura River, running behind the property. Each villa has a mudroom, a living room (with floor-to-ceiling windows), a rain shower and an outdoor bathtub. I picked fishing, snowshoeing, horseback riding and cycling. My fishing guide, Philippe, had a wooden boat kitted out with reel and fly rods. It was spring, so we were trying to hook rainbow trout instead of summer salmon in the crystal-clear river behind the hotel with views of the Villarrica volcano at every bend. A different guide, Mario, took me horseback riding in a hilly forest at a stable run by a former coach of the Spanish Olympic equestrian team. He also T H E R O A D L E S S T R A V E L L E D The Southern Highway provides a window into unpopulated Chilean Patagonia Guide Olaf Wündrich met me at Balmaceda airport, 500km from Puerto Montt, to drive me 305km further south on Route 7, also known as the Carretera Austral, to Patagonia Park. The road, snaking past snowcapped mountains, jewel-tone blue lakes and rivers, and thick forest, is the northern region’s only north–south highway. Its construction began in 1976 under Augusto Pinochet’s dictatorship and continued for 20 years. It is still almost entirely unpaved. There are two must-stops. The first, 90 minutes in, is the restaurant run in the home of Mary Sandoval Muñoz (+56 9710 63591). An advance reservation is needed. Muñoz served me salmon, potatoes and bread rolls from her wood-burning stove. Three and a half hours farther south (and two hours and 15 minutes north of Patagonia Park) are the Marble Caves, below. On General Carrera Lake, they are accessed by boat, and the captain to hire is Pedro Contreras (+56 6722 58168). The caves are made entirely of marble that’s been carved by the water over 6,000 years. “IN PATAGONIA, YOUR SPIRIT NEEDS TO BE WATERPROOF!” SAID MY GUIDE MARIO snowshoed with me up the active volcano (which last erupted in March 2015 and, according to Mario, was safe to climb). He also took me mountain biking. As we got started, he pointed to some clouds and said, “Look, it’s going to rain a little bit.” It started to drizzle. And then it started to pour. I told Mario I wanted to stop, but he dropped a bomb. “You said you came to Chile because you wanted to experience Patagonia. This is Patagonia!” By God, I biked on. When I got back to the hotel, my hair was dripping wet and my clothes were soaked through with mud everywhere. “You look awesome!” Mario said. (It was hard not to feel awesome.) I went back to my villa and ordered hot chocolate. Housekeeping came to pick up my cycling clothes, which the hotel laundered in less than two hours. Drying out my shoes in front of the wood-burning fireplace, I couldn’t help but smile, thinking about what Mario had howled into the rain while we were biking: “In Patagonia, your spirit needs to be waterproof!” PHOTOS CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT: © VIRA VIRA HACIENDA HOTEL (3), IMAGEBROKER/ALAMY 40 CENTURION-MAGAZINE.COM CONTACT CENTURION SERVICE FOR BOOKINGS
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