Llywindatravels 2025

Today’s tour guide, Andres, pointed out that everyone in Ushuaia has many names. They are all Fuegians, Patagonians, and Ushuaians, as well as Argentine. We didn’t begin to see the size of the city until our tour bus picked up passengers from several areas that most visitors don’t see. There are two parallel main streets, but Ushuaia stretches along the Beagle Channel for 5 km, perhaps more, and up into the hills around the bay. Very little of this is visible from the downtown area, and the true size of the city is not easily recognized.

The downtown waterfront features a sunken ship and a pier for cruise and container ships:

Ushuaia faces the Beagle Channel and the mountains on Navarino Island, Chile, as well as those in the Darwin Range to the west of the city and the mountains that encircle the area. These are stark and beautiful, but Ushuaia itself grew up haphazardly, with little thought for a role in tourism. As a result, powerlines and communications towers mar the view from almost every intersection. There are some attractive, small houses and hotels, but also buildings in disrepair on the opposite street corner. I don’t begin to understand the big picture. There are parts of the city that have an interesting, distinctive look, but it’s not much of a tourist destination. There is about a half day of strolling and shopping to be done and then you need to head for the hills, literally, whether to hike or ski. Otherwise, there’s a whole lot of cafe-sitting in your future. Hotel construction will squeeze out most residential housing in the central part of the city in the near future, similar to cities from Santa Fe to San Francisco.

The excursion to the national park focused on visiting the end of the Panamerican Highway, and seeing the shore of the Beagle Channel. The end of the highway is nicely marked, even though it is a parking lot.

We saw black-necked swans:

And we were reminded again that this is the end of the world:

The scenery is indeed majestic:

The trip is not without its humorous elements. We passed on the ride recreated along the line of the steam train that took the early 20th c. convicts to work every day, and we were not allowed to walk on the archaeological shell mound, though I just wanted to see what was in the excavated area…..Jonathan pouted about something–the rain? (It stopped.)

The weather was much colder than the past few days, not warmer than 50 F and probably colder. There was intermittent rain, as well. It makes the previous two days of temperatures in the 60s F seem balmy. I wore all my clothes and was fine, but I did need everything (long underwear, t shirt, collared shirt, padded vest, scarf, jacket, hat, gloves, socks, boots).

We happened past a sign that announced Carnival parades on Feb. 16 and 17. On the 17th, Tuesday, Mardi Gras, the big day, the parade went along the sea front, from 4-6 pm. Groups performed and kids from 4-18 squirted each other with foam. The more cynical sold the foam:

The enthusiastic performed (Great costumes!):

Families and small children formed the audience.

Today was our great adventure, visiting a colony of penguiuns on Martillo Island. We rode a bus for 90 minutes, then we were divided into two groups, about 12 each. Ours visited the museum and then the coffee shop at Estancia Harberton, the oldest settlement in the region. After that we rode for a few minutes in a covered zodiac to Martillo Island, where there were a zillion penguins, just hanging out. We saw Magellanic (black & white), King (cream colored chest) and Gentoo (red feet and beak) penguins.

They came over to the zodiac, “Are you my mother?” “Do you have fish?”

We love them. They make us laugh.

They didn’t run away. They were very, very cute.

This one is in a nest.

These two were asleep (their eyes are shut). These are Magellanic penguins. They aren’t very steady on their feet, so they like to lie down. (Don’t we all?)

The hour was up and we had to return to the estancia and then to Ushuaia. We saw some interesting things on the way, including trees that show the direction of prevailing winds:

The mountains were impressive, too.

Feb. 16, 2015

We got up at 5:00am to make our way to the Ezeiza airport and onto the plane to Ushuaia that left at 8:10 am. We flew for over 3 hours and were still in Argentina when we swooped down over the ocean and could see huge mountains:

The rather ordinary city with the very unusual name–Ushuaia (Oo-shoe-why-ya)–is surrounded by snow capped mountains up to 2300 m high and yet it is at sea level, so there’s no gasping for air. The scenery is spectacular, except perhaps right in town.

Tour boats pull in and out every few days on their way to Antarctica or to Punta Arenas, Chile.

We took the requisite tourist photo:

And then retreated to eat tiny fish followed by fresh king crab–really, really delicious. We had a great conversation with the couple at the next table, Dorota and Kristof, who live in Cologne, Germany. We exchanged stories and they told us about good German wine.

We celebrated our last day in Buenos Aires by sleeping in and taking remedies for that second (or was it third?) glass of champagne. We learned yesterday that the fairs don’t rev up until noon, so around that hour we returned to San Telmo, this time to Plaza Dorrego where the Antiques Fair takes place on Sunday.

It’s a great fair, with booths around the plaza and up the streets. Stores are open as well, and these sell everything from Chinese carvings to vintage Argentine gaucho gear. Gauchos wore wide belts decorated with coins as a show of wealth, and some are very impressive. I did not even ask about prices, but saw a couple almost as lavish as these:

We stopped for our second cup of coffee/lunch in a restaurant that had a pair of tango dancers perform, a lot of fun to watch more dancing. I give them credit for getting up on a tiny stage in a busy restaurant/cafe and doing a good job. We put 50 pesos in their hat.

By 4 pm or so it was time to retreat and pack. Our taxi to the airport comes at 5:30 am…..and we’re having dinner with our hosts Manuel and Maria, at 8:30 pm.

We set out to visit craft fairs today and found that not much goes on anywhere before noon. We started in San Telmo at Parque Lezama. There seems to be controversy over whether the park will be surrounded by a fence after construction that is currently underway. In the meantime the vendors moved down the street. The area was not artesania, but more of a tube socks kind of event, so we moved on to Plaza Italia. Turns out we meant Plaza Francia,, which we never get to. A second cup of coffee in a café near Plaza Italia was followed by a walk down to Plaza Cortazar/Plaza Serrano, where we found tapestry shoes for me and a treasure for someone for next Christmas. There are lots of vendors, of all kinds of things. Downsizing puts a bit of a damper on shopping, however. I’d reach for something and realize it was just like something I used to have…..Great people watching, everywhere.
At 8:15 pm a taxi called and took us to our tango show. We chose El Esquina de Homero Manzi because it proved nearly impossible to select a tango show from the many different recommendations of many people. This one was close to our apartment and no more expensive than any other. Many comments on Trip Advisor describe tango shows as steak and fries with a cheap bottle of wine and a lackluster show for a steep price. Yes, it’s expensive and even our “superior” menu, was limited, but our waiter was attentive because we arrived before the busloads of hotel guests. He whisked out our first course, skipping the appetizer of sherry and empanadita. Jonathan asked where the sherry and empanada were and he replied, “Sherry? You have champagne”! “The empanada”?, Jonathan asked. “You have butter!”, the waiter said. “For what?” responded Jonathan. “For the bread I am about to bring you!” And he did.

About 300 people filled the restaurant. We had great seats near the stage, between a young couple of women from Brazil and an extended family of 16 (all ages) celebrating the (grand) mother’s 80th birthday. The dancers and music were excellent, and though neither of us are connoisseurs of tango singers, we liked the female singer better than the male singer. The show ran from about 10:30 pm-midnight.

It was a highly entertaining Valentine’s Day.

I needed to get my hair cut, and when we were in the “trendy” Palermo neighborhood of Buenos Aires, I found a reasonable looking place and we walked in. The young man spoke English very well and when I asked him how he came to speak so well, he said he worked for several years in Dubai. In fact, he has only been in Argentina for a year and a half, and since we spoke English the entire time, I have no idea how good his Spanish is—my stylist is Syrian. He left Syria 9 years ago when he was about 19, spent a few years in Dubai and moved to Argentina with a woman. (She does not seem to be in the picture now). He has cut hair since he was in his early teens, and though he doesn’t aspire to cut hair indefinitely, he is pretty good at it, and it does allow him to work almost anywhere. He told a couple of terrorist jokes and we asked whether always being called a terrorist bothered him. He said yes, but he goes with the flow and ignores the fact that he looks as Argentine as he does Syrian. His future plans: go to Carnival in Rio de Janeiro, and anything can happen. I wished him good luck—he should be there by now, as Carnival started today.