Antarctica, The Final Frontier

Paso de la Oveja

Before getting on the cruise, Jen and I spent 3 days backpacking in the Tierra del Fuego National Park just north of Ushuaia. The trip involved 2 days of muddy rainy swamp hopping and one spectacular day walking over the "Sheep´s Pass."

We bought a semi-fancy $50 tent in Ushuaia, finding it more economical than continually renting gear. Fortunately, we didn't opt for the $13 supermarket tent special, since we ended up spending 2 nights in steady wind and rain and would have been soaked. In fact, the rain was so bad that our campsite on the second night was completely blocked off by a raging stream. We had to make do on a crummy waterlogged spot further up the hill.


The only other really notable point of this trip was breakfast on the last morning - hot polenta with cocoa powder and peach jam. I can't recommend this dish, as you can see from Jen's face. It had the color and consistency of baby poo, and tasted, um, disgusting. But it kept us warm going over the pass and held us for several hours before lunch.

Aboard the Marco Polo

I'll let Jen fill you in on the details of the trip. Suffice to say that I've seen enough penguins for a lifetime, ate more food than humanly possible (including some good pinoy food last night - thanks to the all pinoy crew), watched six crappy movies on cable (three in a row yesterday), spied five humpback whales *right* off the ship's bow (and many more from a distance), improved my table tennis game, and witnessed some truly incredible landscapes. The photos don't capture the feeling of a glassy pale blue ocean, studded with twisty icebergs and glaciers all the way to the horizon. Definitely worth the trip. However, I am psyched to be back on land and ready to end the sloth.

Now we're headed north to Bariloche, a ski town in the Lake District, where we'll do more trekking.