Patagonia's lake district — Swiss chocolate, Andean trout, and cerulean mountain water
San Carlos de Bariloche sits on the southern shore of Lake Nahuel Huapi in Argentine Patagonia — a lakeside city of German and Swiss immigrant architecture backed by the Andes and surrounded by some of the most spectacular mountain scenery in South America. The chocolate shops that line the centro are a legacy of German and Swiss settlers; the trout from the glacial lakes is among the finest freshwater fish on the continent; and the curanto (slow-cooked lamb, sausage, and potato in a stone pit) is a genuine Patagonian ritual.
The Nahuel Huapi basin was inhabited by the Mapuche people for centuries before European contact — their name for the lake means 'Island of the Jaguar' in Mapudungun. The Jesuit missionary Nicolás Mascardi established a mission here in 1670, though it was later destroyed. Modern Bariloche was founded in 1902 by German, Swiss, and Chilean immigrants who were attracted by the Andean landscape's resemblance to their home countries and established timber and cattle industries. The city's Central Civic Centre, built in 1940 in a distinctive Patagonian-Andean style blending Alpine timber architectu…