In a trip with very few plans, Tierra del Fuego was always a plan. We wanted to cross the Straights of Magellan, see the Beagle Channel and turn around in Ushuaia. It was Ithaka for us.
To get there is not straightforward. From Argentinian Patagonia to Argentinian Tierra del Fuego you must first cross into Chile – the border crossings between these two neighbours are mostly effortless but it does mean surrendering all your fresh fruits and veggies, having to argue in Spanish to keep the honey and a trip to the Aduana (customs) counter to temporarily import the car, temporarily this time means for about 3 hours.
Next is crossing the Straights on a vehicle ferry – its only a 30 minute crossing with three ferries running so there is only a small wait – and then a rather bad gravel road to the next border post and the reverse border procedure. As a reward for your efforts you arrive in San Sebastian, a small hamlet home to the world’s smallest and southern-most oil refinery and very little else.
The Andes run east/west in Tierra del Fuego, the northern half is dry and empty and even more gripping than Patagonia. The estancias are huge, the skies endless and the fields covered with summer flowers. Between Rio Grande and Ushuaia the landscape slowly turn into beechwood forests and lakes . It is here that we first encountered the peat lands. These spongelike, colourful marshy marvels soon became one of our “fin del mundo” favourites. The southern part of the island is wooded and water rich and mountainous.
Ushuaia sits beautifully on the Beagle with the steep, snow-covered and dramatic Andes behind it. It is geared for the huge amount of tourists it receives but to us it had good coffee and doughnuts on offer and not a lot else. It was in Tolhuin that we found our Tierra del Fuego. Named for the Selk’nam word meaning ‘like a heart,’ Tolhuin is a lake town nestled in the centre of Tierra del Fuego. Here we found all our favourite things; a cosy cabin in the forest, a outstanding panaderia, exotic birds and fabulous hosts with a love of nature and the island.
The travelled to the Chilean side through a tiny border post (we were the first customers for the week and the week before there were only two) and a spectacular route. We crossed the steppe and drove through forests and along the coast of Bahia Unutil to reach Porvenir, the capital of the Chilean province of Tierra del Fuego, Porvenir is a tidy, small
and windy town that has that “end of the world” feeling that we hoped to get in Ushuaia, I guess. It tells stories an of affluent past (there was a gold rush in the early 1900 followed by a thriving wool industry and the Straights was a busy shipping route before the Panama Channel was opened), of ship wrecks, a harsh climate and remote life. Just like it should.
Vamos a ver 