Notes from a boating trip to Beagle Channel, a strait that separates islands in the Tierra del Fuego Archipelago.

I am staying in a bed-n-breakfast in kind of a ghetto part of town — a lot of Ushuaia is rather ghetto; I guess the tourist money hasn’t yet trickled abajo. The main strip has lots of nice shops, and as you go up the mountain (there are flights of steps for going up and up and up to the various levels) it gets more residential, with hosterias and hotels and hostels mixed in with the homes.

The light only came over the mountains around 9:30 or so, and it was still pitch black at 7:45 when I got my wake-up call for my planned boat trip through Beagle Channel. The remise brought me down to the port and I walked out to the overlook to take a couple of photos before the canal trip. We got on the boat around 10 am, with boat guide named Jose, and about 15 of us on a catamaran. I was the only native English speaker there and, pre-coffee, I couldn’t think or speak in Spanish. Joe was showing us how to put the life vests on and I sat there thinking why are you showing us how to do that? — it’s like seatbelts on an airplane — if this little boat sinks we won’t be long in that water before we’re all toast. Beagle Channel water is COLD. Jose told us about the Yamana, the indigenous people in the area who lived naked. He showed us this fire ring they used to keep warm, and how they built huts with sealskins to keep the wind out, and smeared penguin fat on themselves for warmth — ok, why not wear CLOTHES.

We all sat around in the boat, which had a bolted-down table where they served coffee, thank God; hot chocolate and yerba mate with a big basket of cookies. Always with the cookies, these Argentines. We could walk all around the boat and up top, and there was an old-school captain’s wheel and instrument panel and big compass and light. We cruised to the Isla de los Lobos and saw sea lions and seals covering what was really just a giant rock; they smelled god-awful: strong, fishy, manurey, and were making these barking/yakking noises like the worst kind of hangover retching. Some of them were fighting. Some were scratching themselves or just lounging in the sun — they were actually cute despite the awful vomiting noises and the stench; they looked like dogs with big fat noses and whiskers. They moved through the water so gracefully, diving down in a rapid spiral and zooming up to shoot up in the air in a graceful curl like dolphins. No idea why they picked this one particular rock but they were absolutely covering it, big blobs and walking on their flippers, slithering up the rocks more lithely than one would think a big bloblike object walking on flippers would move.

We also passed Isla de los Pajaros but I didn’t see many birds. Maybe the penguins hang out there in season. On the way back Jose broke out some coffee liqueur. We got back and I took off for the center of town, doing some light shopping and just lots and lots of walking. Hamburger at the Invisible Pub which was coooool.

Right now it’s dark and windy and I want to go out later and look at stars … maybe I will before bed.