Day 119: December 11, 2007 Punta Arenas to Ushuaia

  Ushuaia, Argentina
Tuesday, December 11, 2007

Day 119: December 11, 2007 Punta Arenas to Ushuaia, Argentina

We were at the breakfast table by 7:00 and ate quickly, mainly so we go go back to the room and watch the remainder of an interview with Al Gore who was receiving the Nobel Peace Prize today-a very impressive guy.

Punta Delgada

We packed the rest of our bags and checked out. A cab took us the 5 blocks to the Pacheco office. We soon boarded the bus and left on time at 9:00 with a strong tailwind. It was raining as we left Punta Arenas but by the time we got to the ferry crossing at Primera Angostura-Bahía Azul, the sun was out. We went up on the observation deck to view our crossing of the Straits of Magellan but the wind and spray drove everyone back onto the bus, soaked on at least one side. This was my third day in a row of getting soaked.

I was surprised to see that the first part of the road south from Bahía Azul, on Tierra del Fuego, is now paved. It appears that the rest of the road to San Sebastián may also be in the process of being improved because we took a long detour to the west, almost to Bahía Inútil, before heading east to San Sebastián. We stopped in San Sebastián, Chile for lunch at the hostería. It was the first time I had stopped there. The girls and I stood outside in the sun and wind and succeeded in drying ourselves off.

Chilean Migraciones was a breeze; they just stamped our passports without looking at our pictures. The Argentine side was just as easy; they didn't even look at our bags. I walked over to the ACA hostería in San Sebastián, Argentina and said hello to my friend, Aquiles Mansilla, the owner. I had stayed there once for a week in December-January 2000-2001 with Patrick Scott, a former student, for an exploration project. We celebrated New Years with Aquiles and his family. He was surprised to see me. I hadn't been there since 2004. We briefly updated each other with what we were doing and then I returned to the bus.

The sky clouded over and it began raining again as we passed through the ugly city of Río Grande an hour south of San Sebastián. The sun began to peek through again as we crossed the Cordillera Darwin and descended to the Beagle Channel and Ushuaia, arriving at about 8:00. It was windy and cool. We had a little trouble getting a taxi. He took us up to the Hostal del Monte, a place I found on the internet. It is in a neighborhood on the west side of the city, about 2 km from the center. The rooms are very nice and the family running the operation is very friendly, helpful, and attentive. They escaped from Buenos Aires about 20 years ago.

We took a cab into town and had a great dinner at El Moustachio, a place I had eaten twice before. Tired from the long day on the bus, we took a cab back to the hotel and went to bed.