Record heat baked southern South America earlier this week as temperatures soared to 90 degrees, the hottest, southernmost temperature on record.

Monday, temperatures near the southern tip of South America reached the upper 80s and lower 90s, the hottest it has ever been so far south on Earth.

Porvenir, Chile (53.25 degrees south latitude), recorded a high of 91 degrees (32.5 degrees Celsius) Monday, while Rio Grande, Argentina (53.80 degrees south latitude), observed a high of 87 degrees (30.8 degrees Celsius), according to Etienne Kapikian, a forecaster at Météo-France.

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To give you an idea of how far south these locations are, think about this:

The southern tip of South America is just over 600 miles from the northernmost tip of Antarctica. That's roughly the distance from Atlanta to Miami, a nine-hour drive.

(MORE: The Last Four Years Have Been Earth's Warmest on Record)

All weather in the Southern Hemisphere is opposite to that in the Northern Hemisphere. Low-pressure systems spin clockwise south of the equator rather than the counterclockwise rotation we see in the Northern Hemisphere.

Temperatures also behave the opposite way. Temperatures tend to increase as you as you travel southward, closer to the equator, in the Northern Hemisphere. But in the Southern Hemisphere, where it's currently summer, temperatures typically decrease as you move southward since you're getting farther away from the equator.