Ruta de los Tehuelches

Those of you who know me, know that my secret life-long interest and ambition has always been to be an anthropologist. The academic nature of the study of culture fascinates me to no end. I’ll readily admit that I should’ve majored in anthropology in college, not photography, but that’s a discussion for another time.

So when I had the chance to join an archaeology expedition in the northern Patagonian region of Aysen, my heart skipped a beat. The idea was to be in the field ten days, housed in the estancia Punta del Monte located about 40 minutes outside of Coyhaique, Chile and right on the frontier with Argentina. Kémel Sade, a young archaeologist who studied in Mexico and Leonardo Pérez, a paleontologist, led the expedition which included three archaeology students from Aysen and a two-person team to document, which was Evelyn Pfeiffer, my journalist colleague, and myself.

The three students were to fly together with Evelyn and I on a flight from Santiago though, until we got off the plane for a chilly layover in Puerto Montt’s airport, we had no idea who they were. I took the initiative and walked up to two grizzled young men and a young lady and asked them if they were archaeologists and in confirmation of my hunch, they were.

After Kemel picked us up and shuttled the students to their families or friends, Evelyn and I settled in at Kemel’s place. For the next ten days, we walked, documented, registered artifacts, walked transects, observed, searched, located, and walked some more. We stayed with the caring Galilea family, owners of the estancia Punta del Monte, and were entertained by don Pablo’s stories, reaching back to the 1960s, when they originally arrived to that land.We also got to hear from Juan Carrasco, from a neighboring estancia, who personifies the character of the old, gruff gaucho and whose time on the land stretched further back than the Galilea’s.

In the end, Evelyn and I were also able to compile some material for future use of the sheep shearing labor which just so happened to be occurring during our stay. There was much talk and planning for the future of tourism in Aysen, being a region so disconnected from Chile’s modern tour industry. There is the grand opportunity to create the “Ruta de los Tehuelches” or Route of the Tehuelches, which were the ancient inhabitants of the place.

I’ll be posting a few photos and maybe multimedia from the registry, but for now… backstage photos of the crew at work!