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Wednesday, 13.03.2002: Ushuaia
We had a lovely lie-in and met with the others at around 11-15am. We got on a local bus with lots of school kids and had a late breakfast in town, did Internet, had a stroll through the town, then lunch and at 2-30pm we met up with the others at the harbour. We decided not to go on a boat trip and went to get a taxi to the ski lift to walk to the glacier. Nice and peaceful! We had a great view onto Ushuaia.
On top of Ushuaia
Back in town we met the others who had enjoyed the boat trip on the Beagle Channel and were now on the shopping trail. A lot of people on the trip had not come prepared at all and were busy buying Ushuaia out of thermal underwear, warm jackets, gloves and hats ... So what on Earth had they brought with them in their backpacks??? Estelle ended up buying two left hand gloves!!! Mind you it did go below freezing overnight and we were camping!!! We did wonder why we seemed to have more stuff than everyone else - now we know why!
One day we want to go back to Ushuaia as it's a really nice place - even though Kirsten got laughed at when she asked in the tourist info place if there was a Chinese or Indian restaurant!! Well there are loads of Italian places so it shouldn't have been such a funny thing to ask! We had to be back at the campsite by 8pm for pizzas and meeting.
Thursday, 14.03.2002: Ushuaia
At 9am we got on a bus to the National Park. We got dropped of at a lake at 9-45am and had a fantastic view onto the snowy mountains across the lake. The weather was absolutely superb - blue sky and sunshine! We did an 8km walk around the lake, had fantastic reflections on the lake, saw many wood packers and the leaves were covered in frost. Found some nice stops for snacks and lunch and did a little side track to a beautiful green lake before meeting up with the rest of the group at the hut around 3pm.
Hike in Ushuaia National Park
Afterwards we got a free ride into town, had coffee and cake and later on a great meal at the Marco Polo restaurant. Back at camp we had another nice evening around the hot oven with wine and lots of talk.
Friday, 15.03.2002: Ushuaia - Punta Arenas
Left Ushuaia at 6am in the dark. Stopped for a quick photo just outside of Ushuaia. We had a great sunrise. Chris slipped on the road barrier and did a terrifying nosedive, cutting his hands. Fortunately he didn´t break his camera.
Shortly afterwards we stopped for another shot - a beautiful valley in the morning clouds. It was so cold on the truck, that we had ice flowers on the inside of the windows.
We got a puncture and Helen ended up directing the traffic to make sure Prue didn't get her legs squashed - she was underneath the truck trying to get the spare tyre out whilst Darrell was getting the punctured one off.
We crossed the Magellan Straight again and Myles and Chris did another quiz with us.
Leaving Ushuaia
Got to Punta Arenas at 5-45pm and had 1 1/2 hours for the Zona Franca, the duty free area. We were booked into a nice family hostel, the whole place just for our group. Very nice hosts!
Half the group went to a great Chinese restaurant for dinner. Yummy!
