Tierra del Fuego National Park

We spent yesterday at the apartment catching up on posts, getting the washing done, doing life admin, watching movies, and relaxing. Mark cooked steak, sautéed potatoes, and salad for dinner. It was a good day. I know we should probably have been dashing about sightseeing, but sometimes on a trip like this, you just need a day off!!

This morning, after breakfast, we went in search of an ATM as we'd had a message telling us we had to pay the National Park entrance fee on today's excursion in cash in Argentine pesos. The machine we found would only dispense a maximum of 2000 pesos (£2!) and wanted to charge 12,700 pesos (£12.70!) for the privilege! How does that work? We messaged the tour operator to ask for advice and they suggested that we go to their office in town to change some US dollars. We would then start the tour there, rather than be picked up from the apartment. We had little option but to do what they said and make the 25-minute walk downtown. In doing all this, we had no time to have something else to eat or to organise a packed lunch as we'd planned.

The tour we had booked was to visit Tierra del Fuego National Park and to ride on 'the train to the end of the world'. It was expensive at over £100 each plus £30 each for the national park entrance fee, but we were motivated by the fact that we have stood on the southern tips of the Indian sub-continent and the African continent (for free!), and we wanted to do the same in South America. We decided not to do any of the very expensive boat trips to see penguins as we got so close to them in South Africa last year - again, mostly for free!

At the tour operator's office, we changed US$100. The currency denominations have not kept up with Argentina's hyperinflation, so I got my money in a thick wad of 1000 and 2000 peso notes!

We then had a short wait until the minibus arrived to pick us up. Several of our group were already on it!

We drove to the entrance to Tierra del Fuego National Park where we had to pay our admission charge. After all the shenanigans this morning, it turned out that we could pay by card!! Anyway, we paid with a pile of pesos and continued our drive into the park.

Our first stop was at Ensenada Zaratiegui, with views across to Ile Redonda in the Beagle Channel. It is also the site of the second most southerly post office in the world (the most southerly is in Antarctica). Unfortunately, it was closed! We spent 20 minutes there taking photos before moving on.Baca selengkapnya