Taking a walk

I didn't just do tacky touristy things that amused me. I also went to the National Park which is 20 km west of Ushuaia to join in the fun and games.

Typically there's a very well organised system to get there. A series of minibuses waits by the port and when you approach a driver leaps up and shows you a map - you get to choose, according to which trail you'd like to do, where the bus drops you off and picks you up. It's actually slightly wearing, this efficiency. I'm always three steps behind - what trails? oh, um, I don't know. Do I have to decide now? etc.

Anyway our bus fillled up. A very laconic Irishman said to me, "So, taking a walk?" which made me laugh. There's no interesting answer is there? Yes is what I said. I chose the 6.5 km beaches route - and gasped when we pulled up at a small bay right on the Beagle Channel. It was just gorgeous, the sun was shining, the sea a limpid blue, the mountains of Chile in the distance. There was a small creaking pier with the World's Most Southerly Post Office on it (also slightly tedious now, this southernmost tag for everything that happens in Ushuaia), a penguin shaped postbox (natch) and a well marked path which wove up through beech forests, huge spreading trees draped in pale green beardy moss, and right down to little coves on the shore. I wasn't alone - there were several other groups of hikers but really, it was a fantastic stroll. While I waited for my bus at the other end I walked some more, through the park - one of the loveliest campsites I've ever seen, a single tent pitched by the water with a small fire beside it and the mountains behind - and to the marked end of Route 40, an apparently famous road which winds along the spine of the Andes to northern Argentina. Here the road runs out and the world, as we know it, supposedly ends.

I arrived back in town very hungry and headed for La Barra where I tucked into an enormous steak - the size of two hands, yum yum - and a glass of delish Malbec. A perfect day.