Mirador Glaciar Exploradores @ Puerto Rio Tranquilo

Mirador Glaciar Exploradores is about a 1 hour drive away from Puerto Rio Tranquilo in Chile. The very same road runs all the way until the river where the Exploradores glacier tours are continuing on by boat.

Since this is not a very long trip we left right after I have done the Marble Caves tour in the morning. The scenery on this trip is exceptionally beautiful, this was easily the most beautiful drive we did on this road trip. We passed by lakes, rivers, waterfalls, snowy mountains where the melting snow created hundreds of small springs all the way down from the top of the mountain. We stopped every 10 minutes to take photos and to enjoy the view.

The mirador which stands for viewpoint in Spanish, has its own parking and an office where you can purchase the tickets and use the toilettes.

The mirador is located on top of a hill and it takes around 40 minutes to walk up there. The first section of the trail is going through a forest the second section is a steep hike for about 15-20 minutes to the mirador.

The 360 degrees panoramic views from there is fantastic, you can see the Exploradores glacier in the distance, the ice fields and the Lake Bayo on the other side. We spent about half an hour up there, had a sandwich and enjoyed the view.

If you plan to hike up to the glacier through the ice fields you can only do that by an organized tour and that leaves from a location very close to the mirador. On the way back we stopped by Cafeteria La Nutria to grab a bite, it turned out that the owner was speaking quite good English so we had a good chat. He runs this camping and café with his mom and dad, they purchased the land a few years back with nothing on it and they turned it into a little Patagonian paradise.

Building and work in progress as they plan to have cabanas built later on. They are located in the middle of nowhere, he said that they even source their water from a nearby spring, bake their own bread, have their own meat. They are open all year long. While we were waiting on the food and drinks, we went outside and played with the baby goats.

There were actually around 30-40 of them running around the campsite and the yard and I can tell you they were not easy to catch. One of them was very brave though, she started eating, biting our clothes, trying to eat it off. If you around this area, stop by here, grab a bite and have fun with those baby goats. It is about 30 minutes from Cafeteria La Nutria to get back to Puerto Rio Tranquilo.