Marble Caves and General Carrera Lake

Continuing on the Carretera Austral, you will pass by the largest lake in Chile, General Carrera Lake. It invites you to swim in its blue water. But as soon as you're in, you'll realize that the water temperature is freezing cold. Nevertheless, it was a good substitute for a shower.

In Puerto Tranquilo, you can take boat trips and glacier tours. The boat tours all go to the Marble Caves, which were carved by the waters of General Carrera Lake. The tours are also available in English, but we accidentally booked one in Spanish and surprisingly understood a lot (Chilean Spanish is not easy to understand).

From here, a gravel road leads to Valle Explorador, passing by the glacier, rainforest, and lagoons of the same name. Unfortunately, in November, the road was blocked by a huge landslide, which also formed a new lake. The glacier tours go up to the rockfall and then cross over by boat. That's exactly what the locals do now as well.

We met a German expatriate who lives there. He and his family run a hotel and now also transport their guests by car, then by boat, and then by car again to the hotel. He said they didn't even notice the landslide until the disaster management team arrived in a helicopter to provide them with food.

Meanwhile, the whole village is helping to supply the residents on the other side. The cleanup efforts are taking quite a long time.