Thunder Pass

Explore the remote Resi and Mountains fjords, while you go trekking off trail moving from one camp to another, to finish on board of an exclusive floating refuge, in the new National Park Kawesqar, belonging to the Route of Parks of Patagonia.

During this 4 days expedition our expert local guide will take you to the most amazing viewpoints of the impressive Sarmiento mountain range to admire its glaciers Bernal, Hermann, Kiara, Alsina and Paredes. At the same time learn about the formation of the landscape and the ancestral history behind the beautiful scenery of this huge and new National Park.

Visit Bernal and Alsina glaciers and then enjoy of a drink with its millenary ice.

Disconnect yourself from the world and reconnect yourself with Earth! Get lost in nature and feel the energy of the Patagonian fjords.

Every day after a great day of excursion take a deserved rest in our different camps Resi & Kiara and on board of our exclusive floating refuge Explorador, in the heart of this breath taking fjord!

Be part of a sustainable project and with your participation in this expedition contribute with the remote community of Puerto Eden.

DAY 0 / Briefing of the expedition in Puerto Natales.

Our local guide will meet the participants at the night before the expedition to give general information about this adventure, to confirm pick up time, to solve some doubts the participants might have and to deliver the equipment that we supplies.

DAY 1 / Puerto Natales - Resi fjord / 2.5 miles - 2 hrs Trekking. 

We pick up the participants of the expedition from the Hotel around 09:45 am, then we take a boat to navigate 5 minutes from Puerto Natales to Antonio Varas peninsula across the Señoret channel. We continue by vehicle for 1 hour through a gravel road until Estancia Mercedes, where we take our fast boat Explorador IV and navigate for one more hour until the end of Resi fjord. Here is the entrance to Kawesqar National Park and it’s where we have our first campsite, equipped with expedition tents to sleep and a Dome tent as shelter, kitchen and dining room for us while we are in the camp.

During the navigation it is posible to watch seals, dolphins, penguins, cormorants, condors, and other species. We have lunch when we arrive to the camp.

In the afternoon we’ll go trekking off trail for about 2 hours to Resi viewpoint, where is possible to see and appreciate the beauty of entire area from a high view. We finish the day in Camp Resi with a tasty dinner in our dome.

DAY 2 / Thunder pass - Mountains fjord / 9.9 miles - 8 hrs Trekking. 

After breakfast we begin our trekking circuit. We go 8 kilometers bush walking through a beautiful valley characterized by evergreen forests, waterfalls, peatland, erratic rocks and moraines colonized by colorful lichens and mosses. After about 4 hours trekking by imposing mountains with whimsical shapes, we arrive to the Thunder lagoon, which is surrounded by huge rock walls that look like an amphitheater. The powerful action of a gone glacier has transformed one of these rock walls into a natural pass that makes it possible to go up through terraces over the Thunder pass till the Mountains fjord.

From the pass it's possible to see some of the summits cover by ice that belong to the Sarmiento mountain range. We will enjoy our lunch by the Thunder lagoon, before going through the pass.

We continue through moraines and erratic blocks as we pass by two beautiful lagoons before we finally have a clear view of the entire fjord that seems tiny surrounded by huge mountains and glaciers in the horizon. From here the terrain is more rocky and solid than the first section, making it easier to trek down towards our campsite Kiara, equipped with expedition tents to sleep and a Dome with an exclusive panoramic view to enjoy of another rich dinner.

This camp is located at sea level. Across the fjord is Kiara glacier which is very active, so it's possible to hear and watch ice avalanches breaking off.

DAY 3 / Paredes, Alsina, Kiara, Hermann & Bernal glaciers / 5.6 miles - 5 hrs Trekking. 

We begin the day with a good breakfast. Then we start trekking off trail from the camp heading to the north of the fjord for 5 km, going by erratic rocks, evergreen forest, peatland and some streams that we'll have to cross. It will take us about 2 hours to arrive to a beautiful beach with Alsina glacier in the background, a live postcard. From here we go uphill until we get an incredible panoramic view of the glaciers Alsina and Paredes, both flowing down from the icy summits of the Sarmiento mountain range till the fjord itself. Here we'll have our lunch with such a view.

We come back down the same track to the beach where our boat West Patagonia awaits for us to take us all the way to Bernal glacier navigating 30 minutes towards South in the Mountains fjord. During the boat ride we will visit Alsina glacier, getting a better perspective of this beautiful glacier with huge seracs.

We disembark in the coast of Bernal glacier and hike through a particular trail with colorful moraines that cross a pro-glacier lake, allowing us to get close and safe enough to touch its ice. This permits us to watch and understand the glacier movements and how it changes the landscape through the years.

The contrast of colors between the vegetation, the ice, the mountains and the fjord in the background, makes any picture postcard worthy.

After visiting this glacier, we navigate again in our boat West Patagonia 10 more minutes to the remote Huiros bay where we will find our exclusive floating refuge Explorador. Here we can enjoy the facilities, a hot shower and a delicious parting dinner.

DAY 4 / Alacalufes path - Return to Puerto Natales / 1 mile - 1 hr Trekking. 

After a nice breakfast, we will go out for a 1 hour hike around the Huiros bay, to Buena Vista lookout, an awesome hike for a last amazing view of the fjord, the mountains, the glaciers, the bay with the floating refuge and the route we must take to go back to Puerto Natales.

We begin the return to Puerto Natales trekking by an Indian Pass known as Alacalufes Path, named as the canoeist ancestors Kawesqar who inhabited all the fjord lands in the last 5,000 years and used this pass to connect the Mountains fjord with Resi fjord. We have to go for 1 kilometer to reach the Acantilados lagoon, which is incased between huge rock walls all around, so the only way to go across it is by boat, so we have to navigate 5 minutes to get to the other side of it to continue hiking for 20 more minutes to get to Resi fjord.

In Resi fjord we are back to the beginning point, so we meet again our fast boat Explorador IV and navigate one hour until Estancia Mercedes in Antonio Varas peninsula as the first day.

We eat our lunch somewhere on the way and continue until Puerto Natales, ending this expedition around 15:00 pm, weather conditions permitting.