Night runs, glaciers and day hikes (day 9-15)
Day 9 - 15 (23rd - 29th January)
Argentina: Ushuaia
After breakfast I set off for the 30 min walk into town and met the other nine seafarers waiting to board the rib and head out to the lighthouse. We contoured the coast a little once clear of the harbour filled with cruise liners and expedition boats picking up supplies and letting their captives out to splurge in the tourist traps. We found a flock of albatross and petrel resting in the water and went in for a closer look. Without any comparative birds nearby they just look like big seagulls, but they are absolutely huge with the adults having 2.5-3m wingspan, they have to run on the water when they're taking off because their wings are so big the tips hit the water at the maximal and minimal of their stroke. The boat re-orientated itself toward the lighthouse and set off across the calm waters with everyone else sheltering in the cabin from the wind as I hugged the front of the hull with my ears flapping like a puppy in the sunshine.
Faro Les Eclaireurs is on a tiny island in the Beagle Channel and home to a small harem of sea lions who arrange most of their day around chilling out in the sun, smelling ripe. We spent a bit of time there just watching them bask before going off to another island which had a large colony of cormorants on it, and learned that the nests are made from scavanged twings and substrate, glued together with excrement. The boat took us to a small island which is shared by a few nautically-able people and had a shack with BBQ and boardwalk there beside the shallow landing which would be a really nice little spot for a summers day on the beach away from the world. We walked to the highest point on the island which was about 20m above sea level, and looked toward the snow-capped mountains of Chile to the south. There was a plant native to Tierra Del Fuego (and a few other regions) known as a Bolax which is a sort of moss that adds an extra layer each year, and can be hundreds of years old. It's leaves are densely bunched together so much so that you can stand on it and be forgiven for thinking its a thin layer on top of a rock, but it can grow to over a foot think and easily support the weight of a stout chap.
Aboard the boat again we headed back to port completing the 19 mile trip across the channel, then I found a cafe for lunch after browsing some of the shops on the high-street. There was a tourist info centre which had the contact details for an Antarctic expedition agent so I took the number and gave Lorena a message through WhatsApp (which is how almost all businesses seem to conduct themselves in Argentina, and felt a little casual to me having come from the UK), explaining that I was currently in Ushuaia and interested in finding out more about what expeditions are available and if there are any last-minute deals. She responded with a list of the current options planned during the summer expedition season (which runs from late Oct to late March), and included one option of a 'basecamp' expedition on a slightly smaller boat, featuring mountaineering, camping, kayaking, a photography workshop and zodiac excursions around the Antarctic Penninsula, departing at the end of Feb and was 40% cheaper than list price.
I headed back to the hostel and spent a bit of time talking to Colum about it, he had been doing a bit of digging through a different agent and seen the same offers coming up with the basecamp expedition. Both of us were stalling over the price and the timing of it - these things don't come for free, and it was a month away which was an inconvenience as it was too long to wait in one place and too soon to give much opportunity of distant travel before returning. I wanted to do something more active that evening and was interested in squeezing in the 15 mile (25km) hike in before sunset up to visit Laguna del Caminante and Lago Superior, but fancied it as a trail run. I had to wait an hour for my Garmin InReach and phone to charge, then ordererd an uber to the start of the trail, with the route plugged into my watch and Tomtom aware of my activity from afar.
The trail continued up a valley past meadows of yellow flowers and vibrant grass before entering some knarly woodlands, crossing streams and muddy bogs as I hopped over on fallen logs, bridges and submerged boulders. An hour in to the run with just over 2 hours until sunset, a group returning from a day hike questioned whether I knew what time it was and suggested I shouldn't be heading out solo at that time - I thanked them for the concern and carried on climbing. I got to Lago Superior which was 9 miles and 2000ft from my starting point after just under 2 hours. I set up the drone and got some footage from the top of the lakes but started to get chilly standing still in the company of glaciers across the valley. I headed back down to the fork in the trail which had led away from the main route to the lakes, and begun the final ascent to the saddle at 2,700ft above sea level. I got there just after sunset at 21:50, and checked the distance. I had 5 miles to go, it was almost all down hill through the valley over boulders then into some woods at the bottom. I had carried a 500ml soft flask with me and refilled it twice from streams, and a few cereal bars in lieu of dinner, but couldn't stop anymore as I was entering dusk and had forgotten to pack my headtorch, which was an error.
I continued down the side of the valley losing height fairly slowly, but now had a view of the trail disapppearing off into the distance ahead of me, counting down the remaining miles as darkness crept in. I begun to stumble a little on the boulder/loose stone path in the fading light as it cut back on itself for a sharp decent before the woods. I entered the last section with 1.6 miles remaining at 22:30, and the trees stole any semblance of light I was relying on. I had a sudden realisation that I also knew nothing of the fauna in this region, and was without phone signal in dense woods after dark without a headtorch unaware of what was watching me pass by. I had enough battery on my phone and some music downloaded, so started playing dance tunes aloud, singing along at the top of my voice and narrating my route through the dark around twisted tree roots, bogs and muddy crossings, hoping that the noise I was making would disrupt anything long before I got to it - I didn't want an unplanned introduction to the natives in the Land of Fire. After what felt like a very slow and tricky half an hour I was 'out of the woods' (literally) and making the final half mile stretch down the hillside as the trail turned into a gravel track, and eventually met a road at the edge of a little community. Relieved and happy at how varied the trail had been, I phoned an uber and waited for the blob to get closer on the 2D map.
I got back to the hostel at 23:30, met Franco in the kitchen who offered me his final slices of pizza as I waited a little for the legs to stop twitching, then got a shower and head back to the room. Colum had waited up to make sure I had come back safely. Although I hadn't requested for him to do so, I was very grateful to have had him conscious of where I was and what I had been aiming to do, he had walked the route a couple of days before and knew of my plan - he was my greatest support if things had not gone well.
I had earned a rest the next day so started digging into the Antarctic Expedition info more thoroughly. I read everything I could about the boat, the schedule, the activities and what they entailed, spoke to Colum about his view and we were both leaning closer to the decision. I don't know of anyone else that had been to Antarctica, I was at ground zero for the majority of expeditions to the continent, I could afford it, it would be an amazing experience, the offer was good, the excursions and activities would add a lot of value to the experience rather than just sitting in a jacuzzi sipping champagne looking at the ice (which some of the other excursions offered, for £16,000). I rung the parents to sanity check what I was thinking, that it was a now or possibly never opportunity, I had nothing to lose really, everything to gain, and the money wasn't going to ground me. The offer I had been given was for 13 days (12 nights) of floating with all board and activities included (providing I had some specialist equipment for the mountaineering). My parents encouraged it, saw it as an amazing opportunity to pursue and reasoned that so long as I had no hesitations about the trip or time it would take, I should go for it. I phoned Lorena and commited, and to my pleasure was offered an even better rate in a multi-occupancy room which took the price down further again. I figured I would spend almost all of my time outside the room so the number of bodies in the same place at night made little difference. It was booked, Antarctica on the 25th Feb - 9th March. Insane.
There was a lot of paperwork to fill out, conformation of insurance policies, my preferences for excursions, medical information, personal details, so I spent the rest of the afternoon chewing through all of that as time was of the essence for it. I would need to rent some crampon-ready expedition boots for the mountaineering portion, and I would need to work out travel logistics of leaving Ushuaia then getting back here from whereever else I ended up, a few days before the trip, to make sure I didn't miss the boat for a delayed flight etc.
The following day I wanted to head up to Laguna Esmerelda after breakfast and had learned that there were 3 buses in the morning and 3 in the evening, but that if I wanted to climb past the lake and up to the glacier beyond (which was a rock scramble on a less-well-trodden route), I needed to get a wriggle on. Elena had travelled down from Buenos Aires the previous day and was interested in coming for the walk too, as well as a Swiss girl Simone, and an Argentinian from Cordoba, Antonella. With the four of us lined up for it we could get a taxi and avoid the restriction of bus times, and still save money - so after some faffing (on their part not mine, Jax!) we all bundled into an uber and set off to the trail head 40 minutes out of town.
The start of the walk had a rich turquoise lake dammed by beavers which then led through some woods alongside a river up to Lake Esmerelda 3 miles later. It had been a fairly steady 90 minute climb up the 1,000ft but I was keen to get to the glacier at the top, so made an arrangement with the others to meet at the car park at the bottom 2hr30 later, as I strapped the bag more securely to me and set off around the lake. Fairly shortly afterwards, I was running through twisted woods and begun a 1:1 ascent up a boulder choke at the head of the valley. Stopping to refill my water in the glacial stream, I continued until I was crawling up sections of rock slab on all fours, which brought me face to face with Ojo Del Albino Glacier. I sat for a while taking it in the launched the drone for some closer footage/photographs of it and the ice caves where it met the pool of meltwater, before checking my watch and seeing that I had 90 minutes to cover the 5.5 miles back down to the car park and meet the others.
Rock hopping down the mountain was a fairly good test of knee strength, and I was grateful for the easier trail from Esmerelda onwards, retracing the steps the others had taken ahead. I was able to catch up a mile from the end and walked the last of the route back with them to the car park, hustled an uber and were back in Ushuaia town where we had a hot choc and some cake (I was advised to get a dulce de leche creation which was amazing) in the same chocolatier Franco had introduced me to, before returning to the hostel for the evening.
The next day I chased up the delivery of my new bag (discovering it would be in Ushuaia within a few days), extended my stay with the hostel to match the number of days I needed to be there for it to arrive, and did some life admin tasks. In the afternoon I set off with Simone to climb up to Glacier Vinciguerra through the same meadows I'd been through a few days ago, before turning off and ascending through woodlands and afternoon sun to reach the lake, accompanied by Orla (our name for her, not necessarily her name) the local puppy who had followed us from the trail head for 4 hours to the glacier melt at the top. On the way back down someone asked whether we'd found the ice cave, which we hadn't, but I had been hunting for it with the drone from the sky waiting to get cold enough to set off again. Simone continued on down the mountain but convinced me to turn back because she figured I would be annoyed if i missed it, which was true. I headed back up to the top and ran around the lake to the glacier and begun lookingfor it which was much harder than I thought it would be. When you're stood in front of a glacier, they're much bigger and harder to navigate than you'd imagine. Eventually I found some deep blue ice disappearing into the glacier cut by melt-water, with a steep narrow drop down one side. Cautiously I snook in, took a few photos and nearly lost my drone to the ice before crawling in to rescue it, then packed up and begun the race back down the trail to Simone somewhere on the hillside.
There was no signal at the trailhead so we started walking back down the track into town and got a hitch from a bus driver who was content to give us a ride without payment because we didn't have the Argentinian public transport cards, which was very kind of him. By the time we were back in Ushuaia it was 22:00 so we found a little cafe for some (very mediocre) pizza, and walked back to the hostel for bed.
I spent the majority of the next day at the hostel looking into the next phase of my travels, accompanied by Marion a french traveller who was sat beside me looking into her next steps too, exchanging ideas and plans. She had found a way of getting 1/3rd price tickets on a 2 day boat trip from Puerto Natales in Chile up to Tortel, which took her close to Marble Cathedral caves on a lake where it's possible to kayak through, and sounded very tempting.
Whilst travelling around Europe by motorbike I learned of the W-Trek, and despite being a bit put off by the unimaginative name, was aware that it was a multi-day hike in Chilean Patagonia, and afforded some incredible views of the national park it was based in, Torres Del Paine. Through conversations with Colum I learned there was a longer harder version called the O-Circut which was so named from the fact it's a circular one-directional loop around the mountain range of Torres Del Paine, and included the route of the W-Trek as the second part of it. It wasn't very straightforward trying to find information on arranging the logistics of it, without subscribing to a travel agent of some description to block book everything for you and pay £2000 for the weeks accommodation and food, but I made some headway into understanding more about the walk. In big handfuls I figured I would spend 10 days or so getting to Puerto Natales, plan and do the walk, then head north to El Calafate to visit Perito Moreno Glacier, do some more hiking in El Chalten then see if I have any more time to get to the Marble Cathedral before coming back down for the expedition.
Simone was intending to head north at the same time as me, and saw herself doing day-trips into the national park to visit bits of the W-Trek but didn't have the confidence or camping kit to tackle the multi-day aspect of it. With similar plans in mind, we booked seats on the bus from Ushuaia to Puerto Natales via Puerto Arenas which gave us both one more day in Ushuaia. The last hike I wanted to do was to take another recommendation from Marion and climb Cerro Guanago which gave views down the Beagle channel above the town. This climb was within the Tierra Del Fuego National Park and as such commanded the daily entry fee of AR$30,000. We got up and into an uber at 07:30, and were able to get to the trail head before the rangers had started their day, taking in the quiet and calm sunny morning over the lake at sea-level. It was a steep ascent from start to the summit at 3,182ft with almost no one else on the mountain but gave far reaching views down the valley in the sunshine, as promised. When we got back to the car park there was no phone signal to order a taxi so started walking the 7km back to the boarder of the national park along the trail, when we came upon a frustrated uber driver who couldn't contact or find his client. He offered to take us instead so we bundled in and set off back to the chocolatier for more cake. It's a good thing I was doing so many hikes because cake was a daily occurrence.
With a few hours of the day left I spent it organising my things after nine days living in Oshovia hostel, and prepped myself for the 15 hour bus journey from Ushuaia toward Puerto Natales.
