Mirador Glaciar Serrano

Mirador Glaciar Serrano is a beautiful glacier viewpoint at the end of a short forest walk in Bernardo O'Higgins National Park. The journey to reach this viewpoint is also photogenic at every turn starting with a guided boat tour from Puerto Natales, riding up the Última Esperanza Sound past the hanging Balmaceda Glacier and folded rock walls before landing and walking about half an hour through native forest to this glacier lookout. The Serrano Glacier sits spilling down from the mountains into a small lagoon, where broken chunks of ice drift on the water and give you the perfect foreground. The colours are an amazing mix of deep blue and white in the ice, milky turquoise in the meltwater, and rich green in the forest along the shore. Soft overcast light works perfectly here since it deepens the blue of the ice and keeps the whites from blowing out, which is lucky because clear, still days are rare this far south. You can easily pair the floating ice low against the glacier and surrounding peaks for depth, or reach for a longer lens to pull the ice face in tight from across the lagoon. The ideal time to explore this shooting location is in the southern summer, from November to April, when the boats run and the trail is open. The weather will probably shift while you are standing there so it's best come prepared for both dry and wet weather. During tourist season the guided boat tours can get fully booked so it's best to plan this shooting adventure in advance of arriving in the national park. (Bernardo O'Higgins National Park, Magallanes, Chile)