Fun fact#715
Chile is over 4,300 km long
Chile stretches from desert to glacier over 4,300 kilometres but averages only about 180 kilometres wide.
Chile
Four thousand three hundred kilometres long, 180 wide, and home to the clearest skies on Earth.
6 entries · 2 stories, 4 fun facts
Chile at a glance
The practical numbers, before the stories.
- Capital
- Santiago
- Currency
- Chilean peso (CLP)
- Official language
- Spanish
- Climate
- The driest desert on Earth in the north, Mediterranean in the centre, cold and wet in Patagonia.
- Best time to go
- November–March for Patagonia, year-round for the Atacama
- Time zone
- UTC−4 (UTC−3 in summer); Easter Island two hours behind
- Driving side
- Right
- Plugs and voltage
- Type C / L, 220 V
Worth knowing: 4,300 km long and about 180 km wide. Two regions can be in opposite seasons on the same day.
Planning a trip to Chile
The decisions that determine whether the trip works, whichever country you are going to.
Chile stretches more than 4,300 kilometres from desert to glacier while averaging only about 180 kilometres wide. Some weather stations in the Atacama have never recorded rain, and NASA tests Mars equipment there. Dry air and altitude also make it the best place on the planet for optical astronomy, which is why the major observatories are clustered along its spine.
Excavations on Rapa Nui showed that the famous moai heads sit on full buried torsos covered in carvings. Further south, only Antarctica and Greenland hold more ice than the Southern Patagonian Ice Field.
Entries from Chile
Fun fact#717
Atacama is the driest desert
Some Atacama weather stations have never recorded rain, and NASA tests Mars equipment there.
Fun fact#719
Atacama skies are the clearest
Dry air and high altitude make the Atacama the best place on Earth for optical astronomy, hosting major observatories.
Fun fact#721
Easter Island's statues have bodies
Excavations showed the famous moai heads sit on full buried torsos covered in carvings.
Story#811
The W trek weather
Four seasons before lunch on every single day. Nobody bothered changing clothes for the rain because it would be sunny again in twenty minutes.
Story#815
Stars in the Atacama
The guide switched off the last light and asked us to wait ten minutes for our eyes. The Milky Way arrived as if someone had turned it on.
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