The
Tierra del Fuego archipelago forms the southern tip of South America. The
Strait of Magellan separates
the area from the South American mainland.
Punta Arenas, Chile's largest city in the area is located at the Strait.
Tierra del
Fuego is a cold and windy place with lakes and moraines in the eastern lowlands, and the heavily
glaciated tail
end of the
Andes mountains to the west.
The wildlife-rich Beagle Channel forms the southern end of the main island. Here you
find Ushuaia, the world's southernmost city.
Located even further south,
Isla Hornos, also known as
Cape Horn, houses a small
Chilean Navy station with a pilot service. The
Albatross monument commemorates all the sailors that perished here.
He noticed the many fires lit by the locals and named the hostile coast Land of Fire.
Late
in the 19th century a
gold rush brought droves of Argentines and Chileans to the area and they de-facto wiped out the
local
Yaghan and
Selk'nam people.
Oil was found in the 1940's. A dispute over islands almost led to a war between the
two countries in 1978. So, during the
Falklands War the Chileans happily reported Argentine jet movements to the British forces.
