Farellones Chile
Farellones Chile is a mountain village and a small ski area that is part of the
Tres Valles (Three Valleys). Villa Farellones is a great place to stay that enables easy access to the nearby ski resorts of El Colorado, La Parva and Valle Nevado.
Pros and Cons of Farellones
Pros:
- Farellones is the place to stay if you want to ski at more than one of the Tres Valles ski resorts. It’s in a handy location and affords flexibility to access all the ski resorts via road (especially considering it’s not possible to get well priced inter-resort lift tickets to ski between the resorts).
- It has a better range of lodging styles compared to the other parts of Tres Valles.
- The lodgings are generally less expensive and provide better value for money, especially for those travelling alone or in pairs, and there is lodging available for those travelling on a shoestring.
- The duration and start-day of your stay can be flexible, unlike La Parva and Valle Nevado where a week-long stay or mini week stay is generally required.
- The village is delightfully anti-resort and it feels like you can experience some of the “real Chile”.
- Farellones Chile has better nightlife relative to La Parva, Valle Nevado and El Colorado
Cons:
- For anyone other than beginners or tubing aficionados, the Farellones ski area will serve no great purpose other than as an access route to get to and from El Colorado.
- There is somewhat limited infrastructure with respect to shops and other supporting services.
Pro or Con Depending on Your Perspective:
- Farellones is very popular with beginners and families due to the gentle slopes and the tubing, although it’s generally not well suited to international visitors who don’t speak fluent Spanish because the ski school lessons are not in English and there’s no child care.
Farellones Ski Area
The Farellones ski area is only small and is considered by many to be part of
El Colorado rather than a stand-alone ski resort, because both areas are accessed off the one lift ticket.
The Farellones ski resort itself has a miniscule vertical drop of 190 metres (2,390 – 2,580 metres) and it only consists of a handful of surface lifts, a couple of beginner runs that drop down from El Colorado, and a novice slope adjacent to a tubing area.
Whilst Farellones and El Colorado are interconnected via the slopes with
La Parva and
Valle Nevado, most visitors travel to these resorts via road because the cost of a dual lift ticket is nearly as much as two separate lift tickets. See the
Farellones travel page for more information on getting to and from the nearby ski resorts.
Where is Farellones Chile?
The village is located 51km/32 miles northeast of central Santiago, and only 36km/22 miles from Las Condes area of Santiago. Farellones sits below the village of
El Colorado which is 5km by road, whilst the village is 4.5km from
La Parva, and 15km from
Valle Nevado (by road).
The road from Santiago up to the Tres Valles ski areas is paved, but the drive can be a little challenging considering the many switchbacks. There are also restrictions at certain times regarding one-way traffic. If you don’t want to rent a car and self-drive, transfers can be organised with your lodging.
Villa Farellones
The village is distinctly different to Valle Nevado which feels very much like a resort and is predominantly made up of high rise hotels. La Parva and El Colorado also feel a bit “resorty”. Conversely Farellones is more traditional with lots of wooden lodges and cabins. It’s characteristically rural and there are even a few chickens running around. In essence it feels like what you’d expect of the “real Chile”.
Farellones Lodging
The village pretty much covers the full gamut of lodging options, unlike
La Parva that just has apartment accommodation,
El Colorado that has apartment style hotels, and
Valle Nevado that has big hotels and apartments (and one option for budget style accommodation even though it’s not cheap).
Farellones lodging includes hotels, lodges, apartments, houses, and hostel style backpackers that are very reasonably priced. See the
Farellones lodging page for more information.