About Chile

Deserts, mountains, lakes and glaciers are all part of Chile’s fabulous geography – an elongated, tapered strip of land with towering Andean peaks and oceanic depths, extending from the Antarctic in the extreme south to the Atacama Desert, the most arid in world.

Chile is the southernmost country in the world, in the extreme southeast of Latin America. Perhaps its most striking feature is that it is one of the longest and narrowest countries on the planet. It borders Peru in the north, Bolivia and Argentina in the east, the Antarctic in the south, and the Pacific Ocean in the west, along 4,300 kilometer-long coastline (2,700 mi). Its terrain is mountainous – no more than a fifth of the country’s surface is flat.

It is a tricontinental country because aside from the fact that its territory is on the American continent, it has sovereignty over the area between meridians 53° W and 90° W of the Antarctic; Rapa Nui or Easter Island in Polynesia, which has been Chilean territory since 1888; the Juan Fernandez Archipelago, which includes Robinson Crusoe, San Félix, San Ambrosio and Salas y Gómez Islands; and over its territorial seas or Exclusive Economic Zone, equivalent to 200 nautical miles.

Location on the Map

Chilean territory sprawls across the American continent from 17º30′ latitude south, at its northernmost limit, until Diego Ramírez Islands, 56º30′ latitude south on the southern portion of Latin America.The Chilean Antarctic territory includes the area framed by the meridians 53º and 90º longitude west up to the South Pole, 90º south.Its westernmost part is Easter Island, situated approximately at 27º latitude south and 109º longitude west.

Surface and Extension

The total surface of Chile is 756,950 square kilometers (292,183 sq mi), which grows by 1,250,000 square kilometers (480,000 sq mi) when one adds the Antarctic territory. Its total surface is 2,006,096 square kilometers (1,246,530 sq mi).

Relief and Diversity

Nature in all of its diversity seems to manifest in Chile. Millenary glaciers, salt gleaming white like snow, the most arid desert on the planet, forests, lakes, jungles and volcanoes shooting fumaroles up into the heavens.

The country’s continental territory from west to east is formed by the coastline which borders the Pacific Ocean, a coastal mountain range called the Cordillera de la Costa Coastal Range, the intermediate plains and valleys, and the majestic Cordillera de Los Andes the Andes Mountain Range.

The coastline stretches almost 4,300 kilometers (2,700 mi). Several cities line it, such as Arica, Antofagasta and Valparaíso. Because of the Humboldt Current that originates in the Antarctic, the waters of the Pacific Ocean tend to be cooler farther to the south and center of the country, while towards the north their temperature rises as a result of the tropical currents.

In the midst of the sea we find the Polynesian island of Easter Island or Rapa Nui, of volcanic origin that date back to the times of our planet’s most remote antiquity. The gigantic Moais greet the visitor from their mysterious originary culture. The Juan Fernandez Archipelago guards its own secrets as well, and the story of Alexander Selkirk, the celebrated Scottish shipwreck who inspired Daniel Defoe’s novel, Robinson Crusoe. One of the archipelago’s islands is called, precisely, Robinson Crusoe Island.

The Coastal Range rises in the vicinity of Arica and extends to the Taitao Peninsula in Patagonia. It is broken up in its longitudinal extension by rivers that disgorge in the sea It reaches its maximum 3,000 meter (9,842 feet) altitude to the south of Antofagasta, in the Sierra Vicuña Mackenna (Vicuña Mackenna Range).

Between the Coastal Range and the Andes lies the intermediate depression, formed by transversal valleys and plains. The landscape and climate in this depression is extremely diverse. The north is characterized by desert zones, and the south by forests and lakes, the largest of the latter being Lago Llanquihue.

The main cities are found in the so-called intermediate depression, flat areas favorable for urban growth.