The next day we all crossed the Quiroz. Halfway through our crossing, a yellow helicopter slowly approached and passed us from one direction, then turned around and buzzed past us again from the other direction. We didn’t pay much attention. We were too busy actually having a little fun riding the cable car—even though we were getting thoroughly soaked from the waist down because the cable sags and the car drags the rushing water for most of the trip across.
Aaron Sanger is our Patagonia Campaign Coordinator and a former trial lawyer whose ground-breaking work protecting Chilean forests has been featured in the Wall Street Journal as well as in high-profile Chilean publications such as El Mercurio. Read his full bio here.
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Here are some animals and plants—part of the Pascua’s world—that we observed on our expedition:
Birds:
Cinereous harrier (Circus cinereus)
Hellmayr’s Pipit (Anthus hellmayri)
Dark-faced ground tyrant (Muscisaxicola macloviana)
Red-backed hawk (Buteo polyosoma)
White-crested elaenia (Elaenia albiceps)
Austral thrush (Turdus falcklandii)
Mourning sierra-finch (Phrygilus fruticeti)
Thorn-tailed rayadito (aphrastura spinicauda)
Andean condor (vultur gryphus)
Torrent duck (merganetta armata)
Ashy-headed goose (chloephaga poliocephala)
Magellanic woodpecker (campephilus magellanicus)
Patagonian tyrant (ochthoeca parvirostris)
Austral blackbird (curaeus curaeus)
Black-throated huet-huet (Pteroptochos tarnii).
Chucao tapaculo (scelorchilus rubecula)
dark-bellied cinclodes (cinclodes patagonicus)
Yellow-bridled finch (melanodera xanthogramma)
White-bellied seed-snipe (attagis malouinus)
Green-backed firecrown hummingbird (sephanoides sephanoides)
Amphibians:
Yellow-striped toad
Mammals:
Huemul (hippocamelus bisulcus)
Trees:
Magellanic coigue (nothofagus betuloides)
Guaiteca cipres (pilgerodendron uviferum)
Nirre (nothofagus oblique)
Lenga (nothofagus pumilio)
