The end of the world.

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We've made it. Many months ago I was sitting in an internet cafe in what is supposed to be the remotest place on the planet (Easter Island) and now I´m as far south as you can get without being in Antartica. I´m getting a message that I'm destined not to be at the centre of things.

Actually, it's been a tough few days getting here. The bus trip from El Calafate to Rio Gallegos was pretty boring, except some annoying git in a cafeteria helped remind me that discrimination is not a purely anglo trait. He repeatedly ignored me trying to get something to eat (in favour of South American clients) for about 20 minutes until I gave up and got into a bad mood instead. When you're tired it's the little things that can really get to you.

We stopped the night in Rio Gallegos, the highlight of which was leaving the next day. It's flat and it has more dog food stores than coffee shops (thought that still allowed for there being a lot of coffee shops).

Christie wouldn't even let me sit down by the muddy river and watch the tide go in and out (It's supposed to be a 15 meter variance which I found mildly intriguing). I thought we were saved when I found an all-you-can-eat Chinese restaurant, but the food was so bad that I only ate one plate despite not getting any lunch due to the previously mentioned racist git. In the end we spent most of the time watching cable TV in our hotel ... Actually saw an Adam Sandler movie I'd never seen before.

The trip from Rio Gallegos to Ushuaia is only 600km and mainly on bitumen roads, but we were told it takes 12 hours. We couldn't believe this until we realised we had to factor in border crossings. More stamps in the passport as we went into and out of Chile on the same day. Unfortunatley it usually takes at least 30 minutes, usually an hour, to get a bus load of people through a border post ... then you drive 5 minutes down the road and do it all again.

If Thursday was my turn to be grumpy, then on Friday it was Christie´s (the jury is out on which of us was the grumpier on our respective days). The ferry crossing across to Terra Del Fuego was delayed by 6 hours due to high wind (who could have guessed that might happen?) so we ended up getting into Ushuai around 2am, making it an 18 hour bus trip or something god awful. Thankfully we quickly found our hostel, and crawled into bed.

But now we're here and I like Ushuai. There's snow settled on the mountain slopes and forests nearly all the way down to see level and the mountain backdrop is awesome ... it was even snowing on me as I stood on our balcony this morning ... this is the closest I've come to a White Christmas.

We spent yesterday (Saturday) looking around town, relaxing and reading (Hostel Antartica has the best book exchange I've seen for ages ... although this is probably because you have to pay about $US5 to exchange a book on top of the book you provide, and many of the books aren't even worth $US5 to start with). Christie was a little sleep deprived so she drew dibs on being grumpy again in the afternoon.

Unfortunately, she woke up this morning (if you can be said to wake up after having no sleep all night) feeling really sick (she actually fainted earlier this morning), so I've left her to sleep whilst I kill time. We plan to spend 2 or 3 more days here and then head back up to Puenta Arenas ... by bus of course 😊

I know at times it may not sound like it, but belive it or not, I am still loving this trip.

I´ve uploaded a heap of photos today for the last few blogs ... now I best go check up on little Christie and maybe even go see some sights of Ushuai.

See ya.

JKD.

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Photos

Lighthouse
This one's for Christie's dad ... she took three photos of this lighthouse and this is the straightest one. Must have been the wind (hiccup).