A German hiker called Jan Dudek has created his own 1,300 km long trekking route across Patagonia using mostly horse trails, minor dirt roads and even packrafting sections (with alternate ferry or hiking routes). He and his Chilenean girl friend have so far been the first and only hikers to hike the entire route. But Jan Dudek has created a fabulous website with one of the best trail descriptions I know. He even includes gpx tracks and waypoints for the entire route.
Here is how he summarizes the trail:
“This first long distance trail in South America leads right through the heart of the legendary Patagonian Andes. It’s a stunningly beautiful and diverse trail that crosses volcanic fields, idyllic Andean valleys, snow covered mountain ranges, lush green forests and deep blue lakes and rivers.
On this trail you will meet herdsmen with their animals, indigenous Pehuenche on their homeland and courageous settlers that ventured into a challenging backcountry.
The Greater Patagonian trail is not an official trail that was planned and set up by a government agency. It’s better: it’s a compilation of the most beautiful and diverse trails, minor roads and cross country sections through the Patagonian Andes selected by a passionate hiker.”
I have met Jan and his girl friend personally yesterday and we had a long and enthusiastic talk about his project. After reading his webpage and talking to him I could not help but being convinced to hike this trail in the near future. To my knowledge it is the only continuous long distance trail in South America – all other trails in this region are much shorter (Torres del Paine ciruit) or exist mainly on paper (Sendero de Chile).
Jan does not pursue any commerical interest with this project. He mainly wants to prevent the tracks from getting overgrown due to disuse. (His route mainly uses old horse trails or dirt tracks that are less and less used by herdsmen.)
