Heart of Chile

   2024
  • Please download the Heart of Chile 2024 itinerary.  
  • This is a completely NEW and different trip from our previous Chilean tours. We decided that it would be better to create a shorter trip where we were traveling a tad less, and birding more. This trip covers the Atacama desert and highlands, the central zone with its high Andes, coast and pelagic, as well as the southern forest zone in Chiloe where we will look for the iconic tapaculos, Magellanic Woodpecker and maybe even the recently described Pincoya Storm-Petrel. A patagonian extension to see Torres del Paine and Pumas is offered. 
  • Oct 29 - Nov 14, 2024, Puma extension Nov 14 - 20, 2024. 
  • $7650, main tour double occupancy from Santiago ending in Puerto Montt, includes multiple domestic flights. 
  • $3850, Torres del Paine and Puma extension. Includes two days of professional Puma trackers looking for Pumas for us. Puerto Montt - Punta Arenas flight not included. 
  • Comfortable to very comfortable accommodation, including great spots right where the birds are.
  • Superb food and wine.
  • Led by Alvaro Jaramillo, author of Birds of Chile, and fantastic Chilean birder Ricardo Matus. Both fun, personable and easy going in their style. Great teachers, great birders.  
  • Unique itinerary which allows for a wonderfully diverse and rich proportion of Chile’s bird life, and scenery.
  • We will have a chance for all of Chile’s mainland endemics, and we will look for Chile’s many other specialties.
  • We will try to see or experience: the world's main wintering area of Hudsonian Godwit, with luck 5 species of albatross, Chile's unusual desert nesting storm-petrels, Diademed Sandpiper-Plover, all three High Andean flamingos, Horned and Giant coots, Magellanic Woodpecker, the huet-huets, turca and Chucao tapaculos, Andean Condor, the driest desert on earth, gorgeous snow-capped volcanoes, and the southern temperate forests of South America where they are most diverse. Great food and wine, with lots of seafood available. 
  • Half day pelagics that will astound in terms of numbers and diversity. We are back on the dock by lunch time! We will search for the desert nesting storm petrels from Mejillones in the north, while Valparaiso is a paradise for albatross and amazing abundance, and in Chiloe we will try and find Magellanic Diving-Petrel and the rare and recently described Pincoya Storm-Petrel. 
  • Friendly people, modern infrastructure, potable water, and very safe nation.
  • A longer and more detailed, although still moderate in pace, tour than Chile & Argentina: Birds and Wine.