‘Rainbows brightened a squally sky as choppy waters carried us to the island’
As a new travel corridor puts Chile back on the holiday map in time for the austral summer, Holly Tuppen explores the labyrinthine waterways and roads less travelled of the country’s Lake District – and gets to know its Mapuche people
‘When a child is born, we bury the placenta under a tree and that helps to decide the child’s fate,” said Regina, as we sauntered around Feria Walüng, the Mapuche market and farm. “It also means we don’t cut down any trees.” As autumn sunlight crept through spindly silver birches, the market’s makeshift food stalls and the sturdy rucas (traditional houses) nearby were speckled with white. Volcán Villarrica towered ominously overhead, chicks fluttered underfoot, and a nonchalant sow let out the odd grunt as a busy litter clambered over her head.
Although only eight miles from Pucón, a lakeside holiday haven for San23, tiago’s elite, it felt centuries away. I soon found myself huddled in Regina’s ruca for tea around the fire with several others (shoulder to shoulder without a second thought, like people did in 2019). The conversation delved deeper into Mapuche life – the need to overcome prejudice; why their culture is under threat; raising children; climate change – and I struggled to tear myself away.
This time of year marks the start of peak season in the Chilean Lake District, when the promise of summer’s longer days and clearer skies lure enough travellers to support a hefty chunk of the economy. This year, Chile’s international borders reopened on Nov
just in time to restore much-needed employment and income. The news this week that visitors from the UK are no longer required to quarantine on arrival or back home will no doubt help.
Often overlooked by tourists who dart between the more extreme climes of the Atacama and Torres del Paine, the Lake District is the perfect place for those willing to go a little slower. Distances are manageable on well-connected roads, making it easier to be independent and visit less touristed areas. It also offers a practical Covid-era option, too – the self-drive holiday.
Despite the beguiling landscape, my trip was dominated by my encounters
with South America’s most influential indigenous group: the Mapuche. I’m not the only one to have my plans derailed by this ancient tribe. Thanks to the Mapuche’s egalitarian structure (the Inca’s hierarchy made it easier to seize control from the top) and fierce determination, the Conquistadors never conquered south of this region (La Araucanía). Instead, they settled alongside the Mapuche, who today make up nine per cent of Chile’s population.
Arriving in Castro – the blustery capital of Chiloé – I wondered whether I might have been better exploring the English Lake District instead. I was in good company. In 1832, Charles Darwin proclaimed, “I do not suppose any part of the world is so rainy as the Island of Chiloé… in winter the climate is detestable, and in summer it is only a little better.” Unlike Darwin, I was lucky enough to retreat from the damp into Tierra Chiloé’s architecturally magnificent cocoon. A beautiful wooden hotel on stilts, creature comforts here include handwoven slippers and honey-infused pisco sours, plus floor-to-ceiling views of the wetlands and the bay.
Chiloé’s Pacific coast offers several dramatic hikes, and the south is home to hundreds of outlying islands. I headed to Achao to find a Chiloé that time has forgotten. Javier, my local Tierra guide, explained: “The Spanish only came here two days a year, so we adopted our own version of Christianity. We only really bother for funerals, which are a huge three-day party ending in a packed-out church service.”
Chiloé’s churches are unique – like upside-down boats, built with no nails and colourful wood shingles. In the 1960s, a 7.6-magnitude earthquake ripped through the island, yet these flexible churches remained standing.
Sandra Naiman escaped the “relentless” salmon industry to single-handedly manage her organic farm. Over a pumpkin and potato soup (the island has 60 potato varieties) at her smallholding, she explained. “It’s hard work but important. I collect algae for fertiliser and plant over 900kg of potatoes by hand. I learnt much of this from my grandma, and now everyone wants a piece of it.” Her goods end up on plates all over Chiloé.
The seafaring Mapuche tribe that settled on Chiloé hundreds of years ago are known as the Williche (Huilliche), which is also the name of Tierra’s elegant boat. Rainbows brightened a squally sky as choppy waters carried us to the tiny island of Chulin. Giant conch shells beamed like fog lights on the black sand, and shaggy dogs leapt up to greet us. Windswept and desolate, the main attraction is one of Chiloé’s oldest cemeteries – a series of quaint houses that protect souls before they transcend to the universal soul. Over lunch on the boat (to avoid repetition) we watched five fishermen walk along the seabed looking for sea urchins using nothing but a hosepipe for oxygen.
Back on the mainland and heading north, the Mocho-Choshuenco volcano and glacier rose into view, marking my next stop; the 240,000-acre Huilo Huilo Private Nature Reserve. It seemed impenetrable, but soon several logstrewn, tree-shaped buildings peeped up from the dense Patagonian rainforest.
Huilo Huilo’s three hotels, Nothofagus, Montaña Mágica and Reino Fungi, are connected via glass-covered waterways and walkways that weave between vast atriums, rooftop viewpoints and fireside nooks. I sunk into the bar with a glass of carménère red and uninterrupted forest views. Activities at Huilo Huilo are as eclectic as the buildings. A mile-high cable car imported from Switzerland chugs up one side of the valley, while snowmobiles take the more adventurous to the glacier. There are mountain bike tracks, hot springs, conservation activities, a volcano museum… and a brewery.
I eased in gently as my guide, Hugo, lead me through the thicket, past tempestuous waterfalls to a 250-year-old, lichen-laden sequoia. Skirting the hot springs, ingeniously channelled into hollowed tree trunks for bathing, we followed a turbulent stream towards Puerto Fuy on Lago Pirihueico. After the dark forest, the vista was a welcome relief as we came to the end of the road. Cobalt blue skies and water beckon guests onwards to Argentina via a ferry.
The next morning, the promise of fairies and piglets lured me to nearby Nultume village. As mist slowly lifted, revealing the pinks and greens of spring, I met Ronaldo, a 16-year-old whose fortune has been turned around by the Huilo Huilo Foundation. By offering tours, Ronaldo and his family have been able to maintain their traditional Mapuche way of life. They sell felt fairies and animals to guests, and also educate local children about the forest’s natural treasures.
My next stop was andBeyond’s first foray into South American lodges: Vira Vira. If Huilo Huilo mimics the forest, Vira Vira mimics a Mapuche farm, with low-lying buildings awash with traditional fabrics and an impressive vegetable garden surrounded by trees.
“I’ve learnt a lot from their way of life,” said andBeyond guide Jorge of the Mapuche as we toured Vira Vira’s greenhouses and tree nursery. “They’ve been self-sufficient for over a thousand years, and now we need to learn from them.”
Down on the shore of Villarrica Lake, silence prevailed. Even on a sunny Saturday, it was deserted, with nothing but the odd rowing boat propped up against the twisted bark of the arrayán trees. Although sacred to the Mapuche, deltas like this are increasingly under threat from fish factory pollution, construction and hydroelectric schemes.
A little further upstream in Kurarewe I stood in open fields with guide Simon from Rutas Ancestrales Araucarias (a Mapuche-led tour operator). “In our Mapuche language,” he said, “every tree, river and mountain has a name. It’s impossible to understand what is going on around us without this spiritual connection to the land.”
And then, finally, I hiked through thick snow into Villarrica National Park’s Narnia-like Araucaria araucana (monkey puzzle) forest. These prehistoric giants grow only 2in a year, and many have been standing for more than 800 years. Thanks in part to their piñon fruit, used by the Mapuche for everything from popcorn to coffee, the trees are now sacred and protected, having been logged extensively until the 1990s.
After walking among them, I realised that the trees encompass everything I’d come to admire about the Mapuche culture. They are resourceful, long-sighted and resilient – traits that have carried them through centuries of crises, and might help us do the same.
Overseas holidays are subject to changing restrictions. See Page 3.