A stunning piece of wild nature at the “uttermost part of the Earth,” this former cattle ranch of more than 95,000 acres stretches from the Beagle Channel up into the Darwin Range at fifty-four degrees south. Southern beech forests, expansive grasslands, rugged coastline, wild rivers, and sublime mountains make Yendegaia one of the most spectacular places on the island of Tierra del Fuego.

The property first came to the attention of the Conservation Land Trust through the intercession of Scottish forest activist Alan Watson Featherstone and Graciela Ramaciotti, an Argentine conservationist. In 1998 they accompanied Doug and Kris Tompkins and other wilderness advocates on a multiday camping trip to explore the area. All were struck by its outstanding conservation potential and later that year Doug Tompkins founded a Chilean nonprofit to purchase the land, which was being sold by a jailed drug dealer hard up for cash to pay his lawyers and debts. Financial support came from the Conservation Land Trust, Swiss philanthropist Ernst Beyeler, American conservationist Peter Buckley, and other donors. After some financial and administrative difficulties, the land was later conveyed to Fundacion Yendegaia, whose board of directors is composed principally of Fundacion Pumalin staff. These experienced conservationists manage the property and oversee its stewardship and restoration.

Besides offering incredible beauty, Yendegaia serves as a landscape bridge between two of Patagonia’s wildest protected areas—Chile’s Padre Alberto de Agostini National Park to the west and Argentina’s Tierra del Fuego National Park to the east—allowing an unimpeded flow of wildlife. Ultimately, the goal of Fundacion Yendegaia is to donate the land to the Chilean national park system to enlarge Agostini National Park. This would be an ideal marriage of two world-class wilderness parks and create the first transboundary conservation area along the Chile-Argentina border.