Since Steph loves getting up super early in the morning we booked a 6:30am ticket out of Ushuaia to Punta Arenas in Chile. The truth was you could only get tickets for the bus on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays and due to a ferry crossing partway through the trip an overnight ticket for the 10-12 hour bus ride, which would have been preferable, was not possible. We debated showing up 10 minutes after the recommended time to be at the station, but luckily we didn’t since Argentinian buses are much more prompt that the Indian transport we had become accustomed to and it left 8 minutes ahead of schedule. The border crossing went smoothly and a pod of black and white dolphins escorted us for part of our ferry crossing.
watching dolphins from the ferry
We arrived in Punta Arenas with plenty of time to explore the city, which to our relief, was not windy at all. The guide book pointed out that during the really windy season ropes would be tied between lamp post for pedestrians to hold onto as winds could reach well over 100km an hour. The city had a beautiful mixture of old and new architecture and an extremely interesting graveyard which made up for us missing the one in Buenos Aires.
walking the beautiful city
No town is complete without a Cyber Sushi Laundry Club…
exploring the cemetary
The real highlight of Punta Arenas was the opportunity to visit Isla Magdalena, a 30km boat ride from the city and home to a colony of 150,000 penguins. The island was one of three visited by Drake and his hungry men who made meals out of at least 3000 of the birds.
We opted for an afternoon tour, because there was no way we were getting up at 6:30 again, and grabbed colectivo #15 (colectivos are cab shares running specific routes throughout the city) to the port where we boarded a large ferry. We thought we were signing up for an actual tour and came unprepared to entertain ourselves for the 2 hour ride to the island on a massive ferry with hundreds of other people, but the ride was worth it once we arrived at the small island.
Making the trip to Isla Magdalena
We were given an hour to walk around as we pleased (well within the roped off path) with the tuxedoed birds who could care less about the boundaries. Besides for the penguins the walk to the island’s lighthouse was quite pleasant and the shades of blue reflecting off the surrounding ocean dotted with the occasional fishing ship completed the scene. It might not have been Antarctica, but it certainly felt like the end of the world to us. Enjoy the pics!
Love Birds
Room for one last passenger?