Bottom of the Continent

After leaving The Falklands for an 1.5 day sail to the bottom of the world, the ship floated around for several hours at Cape Horn to give us a good opportunity to take photos. Then we sailed for Ushuaia in the Beagle Strait and arrived there on Monday AM. Who would have guessed 10 years ago that I would be at the southern most point of the continent. I am so blessed to have this opportunity.

Here is Ushuaia. I simply can't compare it to anything I've ever seen but maybe it looks somewhat like the Alaskan coast--beautiful!

And here's Ushuaia looking to the west front the main pier.

There were hugely tall peaks east of the city.

BTW, La Quiaca is located high in the mountains on the Bolivia border.

Tied up at the pier was this Nation Geographic Explorer ship. It was on it's way to Antarctica--a very expensive trip--over $5000 for a week.

Here's the two ships together. You may want to refer back to this photo to get an idea of the size of the glacier in the Beagle Channel compared to these ships.

We didn't take a tour of the area offered by the cruise ship; instead we walked to the end of the pier and hired a tour from among the many guides crowded around pier entrance. For $20US we drove in a van with 10 other people to the Natl. Park west of town, then to the glacier above town. There was a lovely golf course under the mountain on the way to Tierra del Fuego NP.

I had to look at the map to make sure this was a river and not a lake.

There was a campground close to where the river narrowed below the closest mountain.

The most southern point of the continent to use your VISA card.

This is the glacier positioned in a valley directly above Ushuaia.

We sailed from Ushuaia at 4 PM to have plenty of daylight to see the glaciers in the Beagle Channel on our way to Punta Arenas, Chile.