Ted Turner's new investments in Patagonia

A few years ago, multimillionaire Ted Turner bought his first hectares, not so many by the way, in Patagonia. At that moment, he announced that it was the beginning of a dream: La Primavera Estate (Spring) was to be devoted to pleasure and relaxation in the middle of an outstanding, beautiful landscape.

Although they are barely 4,500 hectares, the spot it is set is not contemptible at all. It is one of the privileged accesses to the Traful river, an unbeatable place for the fishing of trouts and salmonidae in general, situated 60 kilometers to the north of Bariloche.

Since he bought this first property, Ted Turner founded a private enterprise in the USA called La Primavera Argentina (The Argentine Spring).

Now, through this company, the businessman has just acquired a very important estate in the Neuquen Province, which name is Collon Cura.

This latest acquisition has a much larger extension than the first one: they are 37,000 hectares situated near Neuquen locality Junin de los Andes, which cost Turner 5.4 million dollars.

The estate, as it happens with many other large land properties owned by the businessman in the USA, will be devoted to the protection of the environment and to the breeding and conservation of local endangered species, like the guanaco and the deer.

These conservationist purposes will surely help to silence the refusal voices that some time ago could be heard when big multimillionaire investors began to choose Patagonia to buy huge land extensions, often with natural wonders included. In this way, lakes and rivers would become private property, denying free access to natural sights that are supposed to be the patrimony of all.

In the framework of current legislation, the most discussed question is the one related to water courses. The law states that, "All navigable water courses that have an outlet are of public domain", so private property has a limit and every citizen has the right to have access to and use them.

The real thing is that these lands are for sale and this is why anyone with the required amount of money can buy them without violating any laws.