There are few places on earth that have avoided inclusion in McLuhan's prophetic global village, that haven't been spanned by the ubiquitous golden arches, or that have escaped the fine mesh of the Internet or World Wide Web linking one place instantaneously to all others, no matter how remote. A place that is a world unto itself - out of the loop and barely mapped. One far too vast and independent to be shrunk-to-fit on a silicon chip.

And then you discover the steppe-riddled, glacier-draped finger of South America in the land of the improbable. It is home to the earth's most extreme temperatures, some of its rarest animals, and one of the most solitary corners of human habitation. Ten hours from takeoff in Miami, the first stop is Santiago, Chile, where you change to a smaller jet (a good sign) and fly to Punta Arenas, the southernmost city in the world. Nearly at the tip of Cape Horn, you are met by a van with a cracked windshield (an excellent indicator) and ride for six hours, sometimes over gravel roads, into Chile's Region XII - "The Province of Last Hope," better known as Patagonia. In darkness you reach your destination, Torres del Paine National Park. Here you stagger into the hotel Salto Chico, one of Chile's Explora hotels, and fall magically into a deep sleep.

Nuzzling deeper into eiderdown, you slowly turn your head toward the undraped window and there, framed, is the very essence of Patagonia. The Towers of Paine, ten-thousand-foot granite walls, loom with irregularity and glow pink in the path of the rising sun, with all of these hues and shapes mirrored flawlessly in a glacial lake below. A soul-souring sight, and one never before taken in from so plush a perch.

From that first look out the window or initial step out the door, so breathtakingly wild and unbounded are the surroundings that all the while you are inside, you're filled with a wondrous sense of disbelief that it (or you) could really be there. It's as if this six-million-dollar full-service lodge suddenly dropped into place, all-of-a-piece, like an errant spaceship. Its design, decor, staff, and cuisine are all "four-star," but an elite ranking is not what the hotel is about. Chilean architects German del Sol and Jose Cruz left their egos in Santiago. For years, in all seasons, they wandered the land, observing the diversity of forms, the play of light, the mercurial weather.

Then, when the Park Service held a design contest for a new lodge, del Sol and Cruz soared above the submissions by giving structure to the elusive essence that makes up the land itself. Instead of a building diminishing its natural environs, Patagonia is heightened by Salto Chico's synchronistic viewpoint.
It is architecture as subtle amplifier, not the clarion bleat of humankind attempting to "better" nature. Burrowed into the side of a hill overlooking Lago Pehoe, it lies virtually in the shadow of the Torres del Paine. For miles and miles in either direction, all is wilderness.

If some find this luxury in the middle of the earth's wild places a bit offbeat, bear in mind that when Amundsen was mounting his assault on the South Pole in the great race with Scott, his men were treated to Scandinavian saunas as they wintered on the ice. Scott's men sat huddled in wooden cabins, relying on their British stiff upper lips to keep them warm. Amundsen won. Scott died. There is a lesson in that.

The good life is evident in the meals, the wine, the amenities, and the rooms. All thirty have views of the panorama outside. The private baths offer as much water as any explorer could want, all of it flowing from Italian faucets. The bed linens come from Barcelona, the china from England, the slate floors from Bolivia, the furniture from New York or local artisans. Some rooms have their own spas. Again, this is all in a Chilean national park, four hundred kilometers from the nearest city, in a region that was not mapped until the 1930's.

Laced with dozens of trails through varied terrain, Torres del Paine National Park is a trekker's paradise, and the lodge is ideally positioned to deliver you to the trailhead of your choice for one of five excursions offered each day (there are sixteen in all, none beyond the abilities of a reasonably fit urban warrior). Motorboats or minivans deliver you dry and fresh to your destination for the day, which might range from hiking to riding horseback to pedaling a mountain bike. Nor will you go hungry.

When Scott and Amundsen came down this way, they stowed food at intervals, creating great mounds from supplies buried under the snow. Here, fresh comestibles are brought along by a bilingual guide.

Our first adventure began with a hike to see a hanging mountainside glacier. Giovanna Raineri, our knowledgeable and enthusiastic guide, took us through fresh territory where the wildlife matched the exotic locale. We marveled at a herd of graceful guanacos (a relative of the llama), a flock of nandus (wild ostrich), and flamboyant pink flamingos that lined the shores of cerulean lakes. A rare pygmy owl atop a bush only five feet away watched us openly before giving a shrug of its diminutive shoulders and flying on.

After crossing a plank bridge that swayed precariously above a raging stream, we worked our way up to the ice field - a colossal, crinkled mass that gleamed sapphire blue under the sun. As we rested on a high promontory, Giovanna explained how glaciers carved the land forms that we were walking through. "Since it's so warm," she said quietly, "the glacier may reveal the beat of its heart." Moments later we understood her cryptic statement. The massive ice sculpture shifted its palpable grip and rumbled inexorably down the mountain, deep booms thundering and echoing off its walls. The experience remained with us a few hours later when we found ourselves back at the hotel dining on exquisite Chilean salmon and king crab, accompanied by a bottle of Don Melcher, ranked as one of the hundred best wines in the world.

On the second day our group - guests from Switzerland, Canada, and Japan - was driven to a sheep estancia on the border of the park. Led by a leather-skinned gaucho who looked as if he had been born in the saddle, we headed out across the Patagonian plains. No constricting single-file trail to follow, we were free to fan out, to ride as slowly or quickly as we desired. It was impossible to lose sight of one another, for the barren plains were so wide open and the light so illuminating that every object, especially animate, jumped out in bold relief. A constant wind blew, scented with salt and ice. Antarctica lay only a few hundred miles across the southern sea.

Exclamations in several languages broke the stillness as an immense shadow, a dark chevron, enveloped us and the acres of surrounding land. We looked up to see the fabled Andean condor, its twelve-foot wing span fully unfurled as it soared toward the distant glaciers.

After four hours our sure-footed mounts forded a "liquid ice" river to return us to the ranch, where again our adventure ended with a superb meal - this time a quincho (feast) of succulent lamb roasted slowly over an open-pit fire. Still under the spell of the surreal landscape, I ate alone. I reflected on the words of Charles Darwin, written in 1839 after his voyage around the world in the "Beagle," during which he formulated his theory of evolution. "I find the plains of Patagonia frequently cross before my eyes. Why then - and the case is not peculiar to myself - have these arid wastes taken so firm possession in my mind?"

The allure of Patagonia lies not so much in what is here as in what is not. As the last of the earth's frontiers are vanishing under the assault of civilization, it is here that the spirit is free to roam, expanding its wings like the condor.

But civilization does have its advantages, and, stiff from the rigors of horseback riding, we were grateful for the services of the hotel's expert massage therapists (from Finland, no less!). Then we once again left our exotic mothership to explore the splendid national park. As we climbed up into its heart, shafts of brilliant sunlight poured through the leaden sky, highlighting in turn the grinding glaciers, towering granite horns, and cascading waterfalls with vivid rainbows flaring mid-sky. At the end of the earth, the birth of the world continues.