One of Argentina's most popular holiday destinations, the
lake district of central and northwestern Patagonia
is famous for the great network of easily accessible national parks
that spreads itself along the cordillera. This is a land of immense
glacial lakes, thick forests, jagged peaks and extinct volcanoes,
which was controlled, until a little over a century ago, by the
Mapuche. The lake district comprises the southwest of Neuquén,
western Río Negro, and the northwestern corner of Chubut.
Shaped like a fish's tail and bigger than Portugal, Neuquén
Province is Patagonia's most northwesterly region: its eastern
half is a level plain, while the west is dominated by the Andes and
parallel mountain ranges; and whereas the mountains in the north of
the province are harsh and dry, in the south they are covered in
dense Andean forest. The eastern and central region look much like
any chunk of inland Patagonia, but here the huge expanses of
parched steppe and meseta hide deposits of fossils and
fossil fuels. The area is very important in paleontological terms -
every few years, it seems, the bones of ever more gigantic
dinosaurs are discovered. You can check out this legacy in
the museum at El Chocón or in the museums of Neuquén
, the province's namesake capital. Centred on Chos Malal ,
the little-visited north of the province is a zone of transition,
much more akin in scenery to Mendoza and the Cuyo than to the rest
of Patagonia. At this latitude, the mountains are harsh and barren,
typified by the spiky Cordillera del Viento around the mining
region of Andacollo and the hump-backed Volcán Domuyo
. The great Patagonian Andean forests that are so magnificently
represented in Parque Nacional Lanín in the south of the
province are little in evidence, although the most northerly
vestiges of the Patagonian Nothofagus forests can be found
here at the beautiful Lagunas de Epulafquen .
South of Andacollo, at the mountain resort village of
Caviahue , you find the first significant groves of
araucaria , or monkey puzzle tree, growing on the harsh
basalt soils of Volcán Copahue. Flanking sparklingly clear
waterfalls, these groves are much more impressive than the
over-hyped thermal springs of Caviahue's sister resort,
Copahue . Further south, against the cordillera, are the
most majestic of the araucaria forests. From Paso Pino
Hachado down into the north of Parque Nacional Lanín you have some
phenomenal opportunities to trek, ride horses or mountain-bike past
the trees that the indigenous Pehuenches considered to be sacred
beings, daughters of the moon. Check out the Pehuenia
circuit around Lagos Aluminé, Moquehue, and Ñorquinco, or
access Quillén or the Aigo Mapuche community of Rucachoroi ,
in the northern sector of Parque Nacional Lanín is a wild area,
popular with fishermen but otherwise much less disturbed than the
rest of the vast park system in the Patagonian Lake District.
Access this zone via Junín de los Andes or the uninteresting steppe
town of Zapala.
Both Junín de los Andes and the scenic resort of San
Martín de los Andes provide good bases for exploring the
better-known central and southern sectors of Parque Lanín. Junín is
more convenient of the two for investigating the area around the
park's remarkable centrepiece, extinct Volcán Lanín , a
fairytale snowcapped cone of 3776m. A mecca for aspiring climbers
as well as their more experienced counterparts, the easiest route -
physically challenging but technically fairly straightforward - is
from the northeast: head with your gear for one of the Andes' most
scenic passes, Paso Mamuil Malal near Lago Tromen .
The classic views of the volcano are to be had from the Lago
Huechulafquen and Lago Paimún area to the south,
however. The region's volcanic activity can be witnessed at the hot
springs not too far south: the Termas de Epulafquen ; and
the ones near Lago Queñi , at the western end of San
Martín's wonderful Lago Lácar . San Martín is at the
northern end of the scenic Seven Lakes Route , a gorgeous
drive past forested mountain lakes to Villa La Angostura, from
where you visit the Parque Nacional Los Arrayanes , formed
to protect a captivating wood of myrtle trees at the end of the
Peninsula Quetrihué. This tiny park is surrounded by a goliath:
Parque Nacional Nahuel Huapi , which is perhaps the most
famous, and one of the most visited, of all Argentina's national
parks. It is very popular with Argentine holidaymakers, who pack
out towns such as the archetypal Patagonian holiday resort, Río
Negro's Bariloche , every year both in summer and for skiing
in winter. They come to experience the Alpine flavour of this
"Switzerland of Argentina" - a comparison that does, in a few
places at least, bear out, although neither the scale of the park
nor the urban planning nearby is remotely Swiss. The park has a
well-developed infrastructure of trails and refuges for
trekkers , who will love the Cerro Catedral region
just to the south of Bariloche. Another base for trekking is El
Bolsón , an alternative hangout to Bariloche in more than one
sense of the word, with a hippy tradition that sets it completely
apart from its brasher big-town neighbour.
Further south, in the province of Chubut, the major holiday
destination is the Esquel region. From here, you can visit
another classic Patagonian park, Parque Nacional Los Alerces
, which has some exceptional lakes and is the best place to see
threatened, majestic alerce trees, some of which are
thousands of years old. To the north of the park is Cholila, where
you'll find the famous cabin built by Butch Cassidy , while
to the south is the engaging Trevelin , which still
preserves something of its Welsh roots. The last highlight of the
area is one of Argentina's two timeless trains: La Trochita
, which rattles and hoots its way through the steppe between Esquel
and El Maitén on a precarious narrow-gauge track.