Rio Cipreses Nature Reserve -

Hiking & Mountain Biking

Stretching from  below the meeting point of the Rivers Cipreses and Cachapoal, deep into the territory of the prowling Puma and skulking Andean Fox where flocks of colourful and adorable Burrowing Parrots gather under the watchful eye of the eagle and further upstream, condors soar high above herds of grazing guanacos within kilometres of the Argentine border, the Rio Cipreses Nature Reserve covers almost 37,000 hectares and takes in evergreen forests on the valley floor, hidden emerald-blue mountain lagoons tucked away in the higher plateaus, rusty-grey gullies and ravines and white snowy glaciers hanging from the sides of towering snow-capped volcanoes in its furthest corner 5000m above sea level.

Due to the wealth of flora and fauna here, Charles Darwin was another visitor to the area during his research in Chile, but he was certainly not the first….

Prehistoric hunter-gatherers left their mark throughout the reserve with petroglyphs depicting the sun god 5000 years ago, while at the height of the Inca Empire, the Incas criss-crossed the surrounding mountains on their way to what is now Mendoza, Argentina and during colonial times local Picunche Indians used the area as a base from which to launch cattle-raids and steal horses from the Spaniards.  In the years after independence, this was bandit country; the domain of the daring and notorious Royalist warlords-turned-highwaymen the Pincheira brothers during their reign of terror in the early 19th century when, on the run from the authorities of the newly independent Republic of Chile, the outlaws took refuge in the park’s ravines and mounted trans-Andean raids into Argentina.

Today, it is one of the region’s fastest-growing tourist attractions.

Tour One: Salto de la Leona Mountainbiking Tour

A tall and narrow gorge surrounded by caves, cascades and boulders and overlooking turquoise-green rapids which bubble and foam before crashing and spilling over the gigantic rocks and into the wider river just meters away, Salto de la Leona (Spanish for “The Lioness’ Leap”) is a stunning natural formation near the confluence of the Cipreses and Cachapoal rivers and is also a popular haunt of the Puma (hence the name), and here you may well even see some of her tracks, although its extremely unlikely that you will see one, as although her traces are clear, and her presence is always felt, the Puma rarely allows herself to be seen….

Our mountainbike tour will take us from the campsite near the entrance of the park to the vertigo-inducing Salto La Leona, where a slim stone bridge is all that stands in the way of a sheer 30 metre drop to the raging torrent below.

Tour Two: Rio Cipreses Nature Reserve Trekking Tour

On this trek we visit up to four attractions in the reserve:

1. From the entrance of the reserve, along paths first beaten by Jesuits leading to the smelter of their copper mines before their expulsion from South America by King Carlos III of Spain in 1767.

2. There is a brief stop for refreshments at the campsite as we prepare to continue on to the La Guardia viewpoint, with its spectacular view of the Cachapoal valley floor and its surrounding peaks in the middle of majestic Andes Mountains, just in time to spot some condors if we are lucky.

3. Later, we will take another route higher up into the foothills through a thick deciduous forest, to stop for a picnic by a nice, cool waterfall and rock pool before continuing on up to a second viewpoint higher up.

4. We end with the shortest leg of the trek and a visit to the nesting grounds of the reserve’s famous and adorable flocks of burrowing parrots, who are most active at this time of day.

Feel free to pick and choose which ones you might like to leave out if you are not up to visiting all of them.