Quieter trails and migratory birds-why you should see Patagonia off-season

In the calm, bright morning, the frontier settlement of Puerto Natales feels like it’s catching its breath. Beyond the wind-raked waters of Last Hope Sound, the Paine massif rises — a snow-bound cathedral of glaciers and granite spires. Their beauty draws travellers to Torres del Paine National Park, a wilderness just to the northwest that’s been shaped by time on an epic scale. But on this October morning, with the crowds yet to arrive for the austral summer and winter barely loosened from the land, the view is particularly soul-quietening.

Inevitably, any exploration of the park starts here, in the gateway town of Puerto Natales. I’ve crossed the flat pampas from the wind-blasted port of Punta Arenas by 4WD, with a plan to discover the popular region’s hidden corners at a quieter time of year — over the past decade, visitor numbers have almost doubled, exceeding 360,000 a year.

Guide Rosario Wevar meets me by the waterfront — her warm smile an antidote to the bitter chill — and we walk through streets of mismatched, low-strung architecture, some with worn timber facades dating back to the town’s 1911 founding.

“Due to the amount of travellers coming to Puerto Natales, it has evolved,” she says, nodding at the boutique hotels and brunch cafes that now mingle with trekking outfitters and weathered pubs. “A lot of people come in January and February to tick off famous hikes like the multi-day W Trek, but they aren’t prepared for how busy it gets. To feel wilderness here, you need to find quieter places.”

I take that advice to heart. Leaving town the next day, I travel the road stretching across an open steppe, dwarfed by distant massifs. The first stop is Rupestre, a 5,000-acre private farming estate that offers a glimpse into Patagonia’s past. From here, guide Natalia Cruz leads me up a pitted track and into the hills above Lake Sofía.

The landscape closes in and we notice the first plants to spark colour across this region each spring: gnarled lenga boughs snag at our coats while scarlet gorse shrubs bloom in fiery domes at our feet. The stillness is punctured by birds — meadowlarks, finches, hawk-like caracaras. As we climb, we regain the horizon, greeting in turn the hulking Arturo Prat and Señoret mountain ranges, before coming to a sheltered area of shallow sandstone caves.

“This was all once seabed”, Natalia explains, tracing a finger over the rock, “carved by retreating ice 20,000 years ago.” Faint ochre patterns reveal some of the oldest human expressions in this part of Patagonia: abstract strokes and silhouettes, likely left by ancestors of the Aónikenk people over 3,500 years ago. “They may be ceremonial signs,” Natalia says. “There’s not much we can know for sure, except they called this land home long before European ranchers arrived.” On this rugged trail, we haven’t seen another hiker all morning.

That afternoon, I keep driving north, the 4WD humming across arrow-straight tarmac before the road breaks into uneven gravel. The 70-mile route towards Torres del Paine is as much a part of the experience as the park itself. I slow for guanacos, watch dust whirl across the verges and feel the steering wheel judder over potholes. When the mountains emerge, they’re a revelation above a curve of teal water.

I arrive at Pampa Lodge in Río Serrano at sunset, its picture windows and timber decking facing the full southern wall of the massif. With hiking season just beginning, there are few guests. The receptionist tells me that, while the weather can be unpredictable, this is her favourite time in Patagonia — quieter trails, returning migratory birds and mornings when “the whole valley feels as if it’s waking up with you”.

Dawn proves the point. I leave my curtains open and, as the first light catches the peaks, the mountains blush. Wild horses graze beside the forest boardwalk that leads to breakfast; beyond them, workmen are already out levelling gravel roads for the season ahead.

Today the plan is to set out into the park’s south — one of the most popular regions, but woven with trails that, with so few travellers at this time of year, feel like new discoveries. First, I park up at the trailhead for the Salto Grande Waterfall, an exposed route where a wooden arrow at the trailhead gauges wind strength. It’s in the green today, so I follow the path up to the cascades and push onwards through brushland to the lip of Lake Nordenskjöld. Here, I bask in the shadow of the Cuernos — a trio of dark-tipped granite peaks. There are only a few other people, spaced out along the rocks as if in a silent congregation.

Later, driving west, the road passes the silvered skeletons of burnt trees, before reaching Lago Grey. From its shore, winds whip spindrift off the water, icebergs drift and the wall of Grey Glacier glows against the dark lake. From here, it’s a clamber to reach Ferrier viewpoint — a challenging half-day trek — where my reward is the sight of Torres del Paine, spread out at my feet like a map.

For the last few days, I head to the park’s eastern boundary, where understated Estancia Cerro Guido offers a way to experience the region’s ranching heritage. Set on 247,000 acres, the estancia’s century-old buildings mix history with hospitality: log fires, sheepskin rugs and sepia photographs of early settlers are complemented by the scent of roasting lamb drifting from the kitchen. From the windows, the eponymous towers of the national park flicker through cloud like a mirage.

Before dinner, over a shared gourd of mate — a hot, herbal drink — resident gaucho Víctor Sharp tells me about the life of a Patagonian cowboy. Tourism, he says, helps keep gaucho traditions alive as technology replaces horsemen in the fields. “There are fewer and fewer places like this, where you can still see gauchos working,” he says.

Preserving gaucho culture is one of Cerro Guido’s aims; the other is a new conservation project reshaping attitudes to Patagonia’s apex predator, the puma. Until recently, as many as 100 were killed annually on the ranch in retaliation for livestock losses. But since 2019, the estancia has worked with biologists to monitor them instead, adjusting herding practices to foster coexistence.

I join one of the conservation patrols at dawn. The car bounces towards a rocky escarpment, the sunlight creeping over the border with Argentina. “Pumas are a keystone species,” biologist Diego Carvajal tells me, his dark eyes sparkling in the cold. “They keep ecosystems balanced and tell us how healthy the land is.” We pull over and scan the ridges through binoculars. A radio crackles. Then a flash of gold: distant but unmistakable. For a long moment we fall quiet, watching the cat become part of the landscape again. Torres del Paine may be Patagonia’s headline attraction, but it’s only the beginning of the region’s story.