Ushuaia, Argentina
After four flights and about 24 hours of travel from Rio, I finally touched down in Ushuaia. The southernmost city in the world. The end of the earth. And honestly, the perfect place to collapse after the chaos of Carnaval.
The first couple of days were blissfully uneventful. We wandered around town shopping for warm clothes (turns out the gear you packed for Brazilian summer doesn’t quite cut it this far south), ate out way too much, and I squeezed in a few runs and gym sessions to work off the damage done in Rio. Nothing wrong with a slow start when you’ve earned it.
One afternoon we decided to trek up to Martial Glacier, which sits just above the town with views out over the Beagle Channel. The sensible thing would have been to wear proper hiking boots. I wore trainers. Got as far up as I could before common sense kicked in, and the views were well worth the questionable footwear choices. The glacier itself is retreating pretty fast apparently, so I’m glad we got up there when we did.
The social highlight of Ushuaia was Louise’s “second birthday.” His actual birthday fell on January 31st, which happened to be the very first day of the gap tour, so nobody really knew each other well enough to celebrate properly. So we gave him a do-over. The group chipped in for presents — a microfiber towel, moisturizer, M&Ms, a bookmark, and a card. All the essentials for a bloke on the road. We went out for a flash dinner at Kaupe, which sits up on a hill overlooking the harbour. Proper nice restaurant, the kind of place where you feel slightly underdressed no matter what you’re wearing.
After dinner we kicked on at Dublin, an Irish bar (because of course there’s an Irish bar at the bottom of the world), then made our way to Bautico nightclub. It turned into a massive night. The kind where you piece together the details over breakfast the next morning.
Which made the national park tour the following day particularly brutal. Tierra del Fuego National Park is genuinely beautiful — forests, coastline, the famous “End of the World” post office — but I experienced most of it through half-closed eyes and a mild sense of regret. Still ticked the box though.
The morning after, we were up at the crack of dawn for a 7am bus to Puerto Natales. Leaving the end of the world behind and heading into Patagonia. The warm clothes were about to get a proper workout.
