Our Stay In Ushuaia, Argentina Continues

We've named Ushuaia the "I want to go to Antarctica" capital. As many as six cruise ships of various sizes and types line the dock at one time. Passengers crowd the streets, recognizable by the matching parkas with the ship's logo on their sleeve. Add to that the 10 - 15 charter sailboats taking passengers, and the ever increasing individual yachts going to Antarctica. Antarctica has been a life long dream of Mark's but we discovered too late that we needed a permit and the U.S. permit process can take almost a year. The U.S., New Zealand and Britain take the Antarctic Treaty very seriously, requiring permission from many agencies, while other treaty signature countries issue a permit via email after answering a couple of questions. Many of the individual yachts are fiberglass boats, ill-equipped to deal with serious conditions that can arise, trivializing the seriousness of the undertaking. But most return, no problems, having a fantastic experience.

We have been in Ushuaia over a month and most of the boats that arrived here for Christmas have continued on, either north, through the Chilean channels, or to the Falklands. It's difficult to sit while others continue on, but there are two good reasons to remain here.

1. The predominately strong northerly winds in Jan, Feb and March make the trip to Puerto Montt a long and difficult three to four month voyage. By late April the winds begin to diminish, the fall weather is cooler, the skies clearer, and the trip north reduced to a two to three month voyage. Our plan has been from the beginning to remain in the South until late April before starting the voyage North.

2. Mark was offered a job as a relief skipper on a 97 ft. private expedition yacht for three weeks beginning the end of February. The skipper and wife are taking a much needed vacation while the boat is in Valdivia, Chile for maintenance. Basically it's a babysitting job but if the boat needs to be moved Mark is qualified to do so. We will make our way overland and meet the boat in Chacabuco, Chile on February 14th and travel with them to Puerto Montt and on to Valdivia. We will fly back to Ushuaia on March 17th.

We've taken advantage of our time here and took a one week bus trip to Punta Arenas, Puerto Natales and Parque Nacional Torres del Paine, all in Chile. We began with a 12 hour bus ride to Punta Arenas, crossing the narrowest point in the Straits of Magellan on an open car ferry, a 15 minute crossing. Punta Arenas has always conjured up images of research vessels leaving for Antarctica, and continues in this role today. We found the town to be very pleasant, though at times overflowing with cruise ship passengers. After one night we continued the next afternoon to Puerto Natales through lovely green rolling hills with productive sheep estancias, much different from the immense barren estancias of western Patagonia where you'll see maybe a couple of sheep every 10 km.

Puerto Natales comes alive for three months a year serving as the base for trips into Parque Nacional Torres del Paine, Chile's most famous park. There is a constant flow of tourists and travelers preparing to hike the "W", a 5 day trek in the park. Torres del Paine is a massif that rises out of the flat pampa and is crowned with spectacular granite towers. We debated spending a couple of nights in the park and doing a one day portion of the "W", but decided in the end to only visit for a day. The cost of renting equipment, camping fees, park entrance fee and transportation roundtrip to the Park was more that we were prepared to pay. Plus Mark was having an "ankle attack" and Nancy's knees were "acting up", so a strenuous hike was not to be. The day we visited the Park we had winds gusts so strong we had to grab something or hunker down to keep from getting blown over. After carefully checking the weather forecasts and picking what we thought was a good day, the peaks were shrouded in clouds, allowing only occasional glimpses of the peaks. Still worth the visit.

Upon our return from Valdivia in mid-March, we will leave Ushuaia for Chilean waters, and make a trip around Cape Horn, usually a two to three day trip out of Puerto Williams. We might take another trip around Isla Gordon, via Brazo Noroeste and Sudoeste, an area of scenic fjords and glaciers, then back to Ushuaia to fuel and restock fresh stores before starting the trip north.