Yendegaia National Park, National park in Tierra del Fuego, Chile
Parque Nacional Yendegaia covers 150,612 hectares on south-central Isla Grande de Tierra del Fuego, between the Azopardo River and Fagnano Lake to the north and the Beagle Channel to the south. It takes in the eastern Darwin Range, glaciers descending from it, Magellanic forest, lakes, rivers and fjords, and part of Yendegaia Bay.
Yendegaia National Park was first conceived in 2011 as one of the projects marking Chile's Bicentennial. The state contributed 111,832 ha of fiscal land and the Tompkins' Yendegaia Foundation donated the 38,780 ha Estancia Yendegaia, a former forestry and cattle estate bought in 1998. After a 2014 comptroller's hold and Douglas Tompkins' death in December 2015, the park began official operation on 22 March 2016.
The park's name comes from Estancia Yendegaia, the former forestry and cattle estate that Douglas Tompkins's foundation bought in 1998 and later gave to the Chilean state. The Y-85 road and the ferry link to Puerto Williams are the access routes now being developed for visitors.
Access is by sea from Puerto Williams or along the Y-85 road south from Porvenir, which was still under construction when the park opened in 2016. No official trails exist yet; informal routes of varying difficulty start at the end of the Y-85 and near Lake Fagnano. Winter temperatures can fall to 11 °C below zero, and rain and overcast skies are frequent.
The park protects one of the last remaining sub-Antarctic beech forests, a remnant of the Gondwana supercontinent dated to about 180 million years ago. Among its trees are lenga (Nothofagus pumilio), coigüe (Nothofagus dombeyi) and canelo (Drimys winteri).
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