Cochamo Valley

Cochamo Valley is a U-shaped valley in the Andes of Chile's Los Lagos Region, south of Vicente Perez Rosales National Park and east of the Reloncavi Estuary, named for the Cochamo River that runs through it. Granite walls rising about 1,000 meters and extensive old-growth temperate rainforest, with trees approaching a thousand years old, give the valley a resemblance to California's Yosemite Valley and draw rock climbers and hikers from around the world. Spanning roughly 250,000 acres, the valley is one of only three remaining virgin examples of its rainforest type in the world and shelters rare birds, wild boar, pudu and occasional pumas, with mountain trails over a century old connecting it to Argentina.