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Home , Cockburn Channel, Patagonia, Ring of Fire, Ushuaia

PATAGONIA I: ports and excursions

Bob Carson 4 March 2015 (orange)

Inches 56 48 40 32 24 16 8

ARGENTINA • 42 million • 18 million Population

• 2,800,000 km2 (1/3 Area • 800,000 km2 contiguous USA)

Significant • 1960 • 1982 date

Buenos Aires, capital of • Population, 3 million • Mean annual precipitation, 39 inches Uruguay • Area, 176,000 km2 • Population, 3.3 million • Capital, Montevideo – Population, 1.4 million – Mean annual ppt., 37” Montevideo, Uruguay

Falkland Islands, (Islas Malvinas) • Population: 2500 nonmilitary people, 700,000 sheep • Mean annual precipitation: 11-25 inches • Capital: Stanley • Migratory birds (including ); marine mammals • Bog burst -> flow (30 November 1878, 3 June 1886)

Just after midnight on Friday, November 29 [1878], one of the inhabitants was awakened by the continued barking of his dog, and thinking that a cow had strayed into his garden, he went outside, when to his alarm he found that his house was surrounded by a black moving mass of peat several feet in height, and travelling down the hill at about four to five miles an hour It was not until daylight that the extent of the disaster was manifested.

Bailey, 1879, in Dyer, 1886, Peat floods in the Falklands: Nature

• HMS Beagle visited the twice, in 1833 and 1834, and during the first visit Darwin discovered shells, mostly brachiopods. His first impression had been unfavourable, but after that discovery he noted in his diary: “The whole aspect of the Falkland Islands were however changed to my eyes … for I found a rock abounding with shells; and these of the most interesting age.” Darwin published his account of Falklands’ geology in 1846. The “interesting age” proved to be Devonian, and as more data were acquired a close and surprising similarity was established with the fauna of equivalent age in South .

Phil Stone, The Geology of the Falkland Islands

Tierra del Fuego ()

• “Land of Fire” (originally “Land of Smoke”) – Magellan saw many fires of the Yaghan • Area, 73,746 km2 (2/3 Chile, 1/3 Argentina) • Southernmost (highest elevation, 7999’) • Precipitation, 20 (E) - 180 (W) inches/year • Population, 135,000 • Discovered by Magellan, 1520 – c. 10, OOO indigenous people – c. 1870, c. 350 (smallpox, measles, genocide) – Today, “a few” indigenous people • discovered, 1879 • discovered, 1945

Tierra del Fuego beavers

• No natural predators • 2011: 200,000 beavers • Fur trade unsuccessful • Beavers felling trees • Ponds killing trees • Control or eradication by trapping

Tierra del Fuego cruising and ports

• February 27 – • February 28 – , Chile – – Alley • February 29 – , Argentina • March 1 –

Ushuaia, Argentina Ushuaia, Argentina • Southernmost on • Population: 57,000 • Mean annual precipitation: 21 inches

Mt. Olivia Tierra del Fuego National Park

Hike to El Glaciar le Martial

Strait of Magellan

Cockburn Channel

Beagle Channel

Glacier Alley, narrow part of Beagle Channel north of Isla Navarino

Cape Horn, Chile,

• Latitude, 56° S: southernmost land on Earth except • between Cape Horn and Antarctica

• Darwin: "One sight of such a coast is enough to make a landsman dream for a week about shipwrecks, peril and death."

Punta Arenas, Chile Punta Arenas, Chile

• “Sandy Point” • Population: 128,000 • Mean annual precipitation: 16 inches • 2 nearby rookeries for Magellanic penguins

Excursions from Punta Arenas: Peninsula or , Los Glaciares National Park, Argentina Torres del Paine National Park, Chile

Isla Magdalena Zaandam Canal Sarmiento, Chile

Chilean Cape Horn (55° S) to Reloncaví Estuary (42° S)

Puerto Montt, Chile • Population: 219,000 • Mean annual precipitation: 69 inches • Economy: , agriculture, cattle, forestry, fishing, aquaculture

1862 Osorno Volcanoes in Chile

• Pacific • Estimated numbers of Chilean volcanoes: 105, 137, about 500 • Volcanoes erupting in : 123 • Osorno: 11 eruptions, 1575-1869, mostly lava flows [41°S] • Chaiten: 2008, 2011, dome, ash, [43°S] • : many eruptions, including 1964, 1971, 2015 [40°S], pyroclastics, lava flows, lahars, , intermittent lava Plate -Chile zone: volcanoes and Chaiten

Villarrica

Valparaiso, Chile • Chile’s second major seaport (after San Antonio) • 70 miles WNW of • Population: 285,000 • Mean annual precipitation: 15 inches • Historic quarter = UNESCO World Heritage Site

1830 c1863 Valparaiso/Santiago earthquakes • Plate convergence 65-80 mm/year • 13 May 1647, M c 8.5 • 8 July 1730, M c 8 .7, • 20 Nov 1822, M c 8.5 • 18 August 1906, M c 8.2, tsunami • 22 May 1960, M 9.5, tsunami [#1]

• 27 Feb 2010, M 8.8, tsunami [#6] 1906 • 3 March 2014, M 8.2, tsunami Chile of 22 May 1960 • At M 9.5 largest earthquake ever recorded • displacement 560-620 miles, • Subsidence followed by 80-foot-high tsunami • 1600 deaths, 3000 injuries; every port damaged • 35-foot-high tsunami in Hawaii, 61 killed • 18-foot-high tsunami in , nearly 200 killed • Small in Hawaii and then Chile • 24 May: eruption of Cordon-Caulle (after nearly 40 years of inactivity) Subsidence Landslides

BEFORE tsunami AFTER tsunami Hilo Santiago, • Founded in 1541 capital of Chile • Elevation, 1706 feet • Population, 6.3 million Letter from , hewn into the rock of Park Santa Lucia, Santiago, Chile. Darwin is supposed to have looked out at the city from here. LET’S GO! Ushuaia THANK YOU!