The high pampas of southern Patagonia reminded me, immediately and unexpectedly, of home. Not the lush, subtropical home of southeast Queensland, but the older, drier home of the Darling Downs: flat country, big sky, occasional hills rising without particular justification from the plain. The grasses are a different gold. The animals are different animals. But
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There’s a moment, somewhere in the roaring 40s, when you look out over the water and realise you are genuinely far from anywhere. The Chilean archipelago extends for hundreds of kilometres south of Puerto Montt — islands upon islands, most of them uninhabited, unsuitable for human habitation, apparently indifferent to human existence. It is exhilarating
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I’ve been to deserts before, but nothing quite prepared me for the Atacama. This is the driest place on Earth — and it looks it. At first glance, it seems impossible that anything could thrive here. Then, by some sleight of hand, the landscape proceeds to astonish you. We’d flown into Santiago, transferred north to
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