Puerto Porvenir

Chilean Tierra del Fuego has a population of 7000, most of whom live in the small town of Porvenir - the only town on the Chilean half of the main island. Founded in 1894 during the gold boom, when many people came seeking fortunes from Croatia and Chiloe, Porvenir is a quiet place with a wide open pioneer feel, streets of neat brightly painted houses of corrugated zinc, and quaint tall domed trees lining the main avenue. There is a small museum, the Museo Fernando Cordero RusqueiSamuel Valdivieso 402, daily 0900-1800, with archaeological and photographic displays on the Onas; and good displays on natural history and the early gold diggers and sheep farmers. There's little else to do here, but you could stroll around the plaza, with its Iglesia San Francisco de Sales, and down to the shoreside promenade, where there's a strange collection of 19th-century farm machinery, and a striking wooden monument to the Selknam.

Beyond Porvenir

Beyond Porvenir there is wonderfully wild virgin territory to explore. However, if you want an adventure, your best bet is to arrange a trip through tour operators in Punta Arenas, since there's still very little infrastructure on the Chilean side of the island. Aonikenk www.aonikenk.com, is recommended, offering several days' trekking into the remote mountains in the south of the island, horse riding and fly fishing. There are two tour operators in Porvenir itself, offering tours through the Cordon Baquedano to see the areas where gold was mined - recommended for great views of the Magellan strait and visits to traditional sheep farming estancias.

The fly fishingin this area is becoming world-renowned and it's now possible to stay in several comfortable lodges in Río Grande, Lago Escondido and Lago Blanco. This area is rich in brown trout, sea run brook trout and steelheads, weighing 2-14 kg, and you could expect to fish an average of eight trout a day in season. The season runs from 15 October to 14 April, with the best fishing from January to April.

Camerón

About 90 km east of Porvenir, roads head north to San Sebastián and south to Camerón. This large farm settlement is the only other community of any size on the Chilean part of the island and lies 149 km southeast of Porvenir on the opposite shore of Bahía Inútil. This wonderful windswept bay, with views of distant hills and the snow capped Darwin range all along the horizon, was named 'useless' by British engineers making a hydrographic survey here in 1827 because it has no useful port. Nevertheless, as you near Camerón, the southern mountains loom ahead and the road passes secluded canyons and bays, interspersed with a few farms, and the whole feel is dramatic, isolated and somehow rather magical.

From Camerón a road runs southeast past an airfield and into the hills, through woods where guanacos hoot and run off into glades, and the banks are covered with red and purple moss. The north shores of Lago Blancocan be reached by cutting through the woods from Sección Río Grande, with superb views of the mountains surrounding the lake and the snows in the south, or from Estancia Vicuña. It's essential to organize any trip to this area through a reliable tour operator with solid infrastructure.

From Estancia Vicuña a trail leads southwest to the Río Azopardo, which also offers trout fishing. South of here trails run across the Darwin Range to the Estancia Yendegaianear the Beagle Channel, a wonderful area for horse riding. For trips into this wild and undiscovered country, contact Aonikenkin Punta Arenas, www.aonikenk.com.