February 5, 2006
Day 130

I made it a point to watch the Super Bowl tonight. I hadn't watched any football in months, but I still didn't want to miss the big one. I knew I'd have my work cut out for me though due to a worldwide apathy toward the game. When I told John of my plans, he thought I wanted to watch a basketball game. I asked a Dutch guy if he was interested in checking it out and he said, "Sure, that's baseball, right?"

Craig, an Australian friend of John's who would be on the cruise with us, didn't know anything about the game, but he was willing to learn. We walked around town to a few places before finding an Irish bar that was willing to play it. More Americans were in the bar than I had seen on my entire trip. I could tell they hadn't been traveling for very long. "Oh my God, it is in Spanish!" exclaimed one of them. Isn't that usually how it is when you're in a Spanish-speaking country?

I thought the game was boring, but I still had a few laughs with the old American cruisers. Even though we were from the same country and spoke the same language, I still had a hard time explaining to them how I could travel for so long without being filthy rich. I think it was a wise decision not to tell them that I haven't even spent as much money in four months on the road than they did for their two-week cruise.

February 4, 2006
Day 129

I felt a little better today, so I decided to go for a little walk. I took a look at a map of the area and noticed that the "Lighthouse at the End of the World" was happily hanging out near the shore a short distance from town. Not wanting to miss out on seeing any of the "End of the World" stuff that seems to cover the entire town of Ushuaia, I went to have a look.

Ushuaia is a lot bigger than it appears at first sight. I walked over an hour before I was finally on the outskirts of town. After another hour of walking around the Beagle Channel, the road ended. I kept looking for the lighthouse along the way, but I couldn't see it. At the end of the road, I scoped out the surrounding area, and at last spotted what I believed to be the lighthouse, but it was so far away that I could barely see it. I guess you need to take a boat into the channel to see it up close. Yet another reason to ask about stuff before going off on my own.

It was raining the rest of the afternoon, which I have found out over the last week is typical Ushuaia weather. Not wanting to risk bringing my illness back, I didn't do much the rest of the day other than relax and think about my upcoming Antarctic excursion.

February 3, 2006
Day 128

I wanted to make sure I was healthy before heading to Antarctica, so today I just chilled out for the most part. I had breakfast at my hostel for about three hours, napped for a few more, and spent most of the rest of the day on the Internet. The only productive thing I did was to practice my nighttime photography a bit. It's too bad I still felt sick today because it was the first warm, sunny day without wind that I've experienced in Ushuaia. Assuming that I feel better tomorrow, I'll probably do some sort of day walk around the area.

February 2, 2006
Day 127

I woke up this morning to the pitter-patter of a downpour splashing against the tent. None of us wanted to take down camp while it was raining so hard, so we waited for an hour or so for it to pass. Luckily, the rain completely stopped for half an hour, and we were still somewhat dry when we left.

We walked for a few hours, but the weather only got worse. At the top of the pass we had to cross, it was cold, windy and snowy. When we dropped down below the tree line, the rain and wind subsided, but the ground got extremely muddy. I don't have proper boots for trekking, so my shoes quickly became waterlogged. When we reached the highway where we planned to hitch a ride to another part of the national park, I decided to call it quits. I was feeling run-down and thought I might be getting a cold, exactly what I didn't want on my trip to Antarctica, so I walked back to Ushuaia.

My decision to go back turned out to be a wise one. After taking a nice shower, I slept all afternoon. I got up for a few hours for dinner, then went to bed early. A cold was definitely coming on, and sleeping in a cold, windy, muddy tent would only have made it worse. In the next few days, I might do some walks around town if I feel better, but otherwise I'll just plan to relax and meet John and Craig on Sunday night or Monday morning back at the hostel.

February 1, 2006
Day 126

We still had a few days before our cruise to Antarctica, so John, Craig, an Australian who has done some treks with John before, and I decided to go on a multi-day trek in the area. We walked for several hours today through the national park near Ushuaia. The terrain was somewhat muddy, but of course beautiful. We camped near a lagoon where there were absolutely no other tourists. It was a little cold at night, but not too bad.

My only plan for the next few days is to get back to Ushuaia for the Super Bowl. "What's that, some kind of basketball game?" John questioned me when I told him of my plans. I don't think he was kidding. I guess that tells you how popular American football is in the rest of the world.

The photo album for this entry is here.

January 31, 2006
Day 125

Today I went to the Maritime Museum in Ushuaia. Built out of an old prison, there was an atrium at the center with around five wings jutting out from the sides. Each cell contained its own exhibit.

One wing was dedicated to the old prison. I learned about criminals such as the Short Man With Big Ears, who killed dozens of children and set fire to numerous buildings. He spent some time in prison for the killings, but the authorities figured he was just a lunatic and let him go. When the killings started soon thereafter, they put him away for good at Ushuaia.

Another wing was dedicated to the old ships of the area. They had models of the first ships to sail through the Straights of Magellan, the Beagle Channel, and Cape Horn, all of which near Tierra del Fuego. Magellan's voyage was the most impressive to me. He set sail in 1520 with 265 men to look for a passage to Asia. He had no idea what type of terrain he would encounter, but eventually Magellan's crew became the first to sail all the way around the world. Magellan himself was killed during the voyage and only 18 of his men made it back to Portugal alive.

Another section was appropriately all about Antarctica. It included exhibits about the first men to make it to the south pole successively. There was also an exhibit about Shackleton's voyage. His crew got stranded in the ice during a terrible storm in the Antarctic Sea. He left with a few of his men in a tiny boat to make the 800 mile journey to the closest inhabited island. After they got to the island, they spent six months traversing the brutal terrain until they reached civilization. Amazingly, the people who were left behind in Antarctica for the winter all survived.

The final wing I walked through was for Salvador Dali, the famous surrealist. He was most famous for his paintings of melting watches, but he made a lot of other crazy works, too. The main exhibit on display was two paintings of Jesus that were places against mirrors such that when you looked at them from a short distance, Jesus appeared to be three-dimensional. Another painting was of his wife walking away naked, but when looked at from a distance of ten meters, it looked like Abraham Lincoln. Dali confirmed his strangeness when he said, "The only difference between myself and a lunatic is that I'm not a lunatic."

The museum was easily one of the best ones I've visited in South America. It was brilliantly laid out in the old prison, and the explanation for every exhibit was written in both Spanish and English. I spent six hours there until they rudely decided to close at 8:00.

My other big news today is that I'm for sure going to Antarctica. I just paid for it today. It was pretty funny when the tour agent warned me about the cruise. She told me that they have some formal dinners, so I'll have to bring my suit along. I hope my mud-stained t-shirt and zipper-off pants count or I might be relegated to playing the banjo at the bottom of the ship like on Titanic.

The cruise will go from Ushuaia to a few Antarctic islands, then to the Antarctic peninsula, followed by the Falkland Islands, one of the remotest, least visited places on Earth. Afterward, I'll have two days to "relax and reflect on my adventure" before being dropped off in Buenos Aires. I wasn't planning to go to Buenos Aires yet, but it's a small sacrifice to get to see Antarctica.

Don't worry, the offer to visit me in Buenos Aires still stands. I'll probably just stay there for a few days and start heading south again. I'll stay in the Argentina-ish region for a couple months before heading back to Buenos Aires in April.

The photo album for this entry is here.

January 30, 2006
Day 124

This afternoon, after a morning of relaxation, I took a nap. Suddenly, John shook me awake. "We're going!" he exclaimed. "Come on, we only have half an hour." I knew what he meant right away: Antarctica. Earlier he had told me that he was going to search for tickets, but I didn't expect much.

There are only two ways to go Antarctica as a tourist: On a cruise or on an expedition. Going on an expedition requires you to be rich and crazy, and I'm not rich, so a cruise was my only option. I've never been on a cruise before, and they're probably not my favorite way to travel, but I figured it was worth a shot to try to get a last minute cruise deal as long as I was in Ushuaia.

It turned out that John had gone to ten different tour agencies in town, and the cheapest offer he could find was for nearly $4000. Frustrated, he was about to give up when he poked his head into one last tour agency. They had some cancellations, making a few places available for the cruise that leaves in a week, and they were offering a great deal for people who were already in Ushuaia. We ran to the office so they could enter my name into the computer in time. Now all I have to do is wait until tomorrow for a confirmation from the US and I'll be all set. While I was at the tour agency, I met a few other backpackers who signed up, so it should be a lot of fun if I can go.