Nov 24th: Saturday
Apparently our alarm clock was set with the wrong time. So we were woken up at 4:30am from the guy at the hostel with, “Hey, your cab is downstairs waiting for you.” Crap. we hadn’t packed, or found a place to stay in Ushuaia. I was going to do that in the morning before the cab was supposed to arrive.
We crammed all our stuff into our bags, and ran downstairs to meet our ride to the airport. Thankfully, the airport was only a 10 minute drive away (different one that where we came in). But of course there would be one last hitch. To get out of the hostel, you have to buzz an intercom and say that you’re leaving. This is because there’s two doors to get outside, and they’re both controlled by a guy two floors above that can’t see anything. We have to say that we’re leaving so he knows which order to buzz the doors. Well, apparently the guy missed the second buzzer. We were stuck between the two doors and there’s no intercom. We banged on the doors, and I even contemplated kicking one off it’s hinges. What a stupid system. Before breaking the door and running away, I figured I’d try to jimmy the door open with a piece of wire I yanked out from the ceiling (hope it wasn’t to anything important). I was able to feed the wire around the locking mechanism, and with one swift pull the front door popped open. Freedom! On to the airport.
We showed up with time to spare. Checked our bags, and headed through security to our gate. Apparently, security for domestic flights within Argentina is pretty lax. Reminded me of what it was like to fly in the US before 9-11. We were waved through by the one guy working the metal detector. I don’t think he even looked up at the x-ray machine. We sat around the gate for a little but and then boarded the plane when it was time.
Our flight was a little over three and a half hours long with one stop in some little city that seemed to be in the middle of absolutely nothing. While descending we hit some pretty heavy turbulence. Felt as if we were in a boat more than an airplane. The lady that was sitting next to Nicole had a look of, “Uh oh… this looks like it’s the one.” on her face. The pilot made a quick hard bank and then things smoothed out for the landing. There must have been some serious cross winds or something coming off the Atlantic. Nicole wants me to mention that there were some "big" rabbits running around around the nothingness next to the runway.
It was somewhere about an hour to get to Ushuaia. For those that don’t know of the city (I didn’t until I bought the ticket), it’s the most southern city in the world and only a couple hundred mile to Antarctica. A lot of the cruises to Antarctica leave from there. Other than to say that I’ve been as far south as you can get, I also wanted to see some penguins. There’s a tour / charter that you can do go out and check them out. I was really excited about this part.
First thing I noticed once I got out of the airport was the view. It was spectacular. I’ve never see anything like it in the world. The second thing I noticed was how cold it was. When the sun is on you, it’s not that bad. Jeans and a hoodie would do. When the sun was gone / shade, it got pretty cold. At one point I was wearing long underwear, jeans, t-shirt, hoodie, jacket, winter hat, and gloves. A little different from laying on the beach in Rio a couple days ago.
While on the plane, the lady that sat next to Nicole told her that her friends rented out rooms and she would give us their number if we needed a place to stay. Sounded good, so we took it. The only problem was that all the phones in the airport were broken. We had to take a cab to the city center where there was a tourist information center. When we got there, they gave us a list of all the hotels and hostels in the area. The hotels were so cheap, that we chose one that was only a couple blocks away. It was somewhere around $60 a night. And we needed a break from the hostel life. The hotel was awesome. They also had free breakfast all day long which consisted of toast and cake. Free cake 24/7! Yes! Our view from the room was nice too. It overlooked the bay.
After dropping off our bags, we headed down the street to where all the tour guides were to try and get on the penguin excursion. The guy at the information center told us about how there’s one tour you can do where you actually get off the boat and get to walk on the island with all the penguins. Hell yeah! Unfortunately, the tour was already full for today, so we booked ourselves for the afternoon tour tomorrow. We then headed back uphill to find some lunch. We found a place that looked perfect. They had a giant sign painted on the side of their building stating “great service to tourists since 1912″. We both ordered some pasta (made fresh right there) and a bottle of wine. After lunch we had some dessert. Nicole got a homemade flan, and I had a crazy thing (The Don Pablo). It was neapolitan ice cream with walnuts in a glass of whisky. Sounded good. Not too much. The dairy seemed to curdle in the whiskey. I ate all the ice cream and left most of the whiskey. Then Nicole did the unthinkable. She dared me to down the rest of the melted ice cream whiskey walnut concoction. There was about a "full half-glass left" (Nicole’s words). I would like to tell you that I was smart enough not to do this, but after a bottle of wine, I’m not exactly up to par in the brains department. I knew it was going to be rough, but I totally forgot that there were nuts in it. Not really something you want to be surprised by while shooting liquor. I had to use all my shaolin skills just to keep it down. Although I was in agreement that if I did hurl, I would be allowed to do so on Nicole.
We left the restaurant and walked around town to look through all the souvenir shops, and there were a lot of them. On the main street, it was either a souvenir shop or a cafe.
I think these guys put nyc to shame. They had everything you could think of with either "Ushuaia" or a penguin on it. It was a tad sickening. Nicole bought a couple little things, and I bought her a neck scarf thing.
The sun looked like it was going down, and Nicole wanted to go back to the hotel to grab something. When we go there, she said she wasn’t feeling so well and wanted to take a nap. I wasn’t ready to sleep, so I went back out to take a couple pictures around town.
When I returned to the hotel room it was somewhere around 6pm and Nicole was out cold. I was pretty tired from the night before and I was beginning to think that my allergies her in Ushuaia weren’t actually allergies. I think I was sick. Crap. Pretty exhausted myself, I laid down and took a nap.
When I woke up, I felt like death and needed water so bad I would have drank toilet water. I was sick for sure. This sucked. I felt like I had the flu and I was supposed to go see penguins tomorrow. I had no idea what time it was, but I could see a little light breaking through the clouds, so I figured the sun had just set and it was about 8pm or 8:30pm. Nicole and I left to find water and some Tylenol Flu. Luckily there was a little 7-11 type place only a block away. I got my water and sucked it down. Now I felt a little better. Still mildly death-like though. This is also where I saw the news about the Antarctic cruise ship that sank. It was front-page news on all the papers in the store. Everyone survived. They just had to sit in a life raft for 3 hours. What a story those people have!
The bodega guy also told us about a pharmacy that would be open just down the street. In South America, nothing is really over-the-counter. All drugs must be asked for and retrieved by a pharmacist. You just don’t need a prescription for the over-the-counter stuff. They didn’t have Tylenol, but they had something else that did the same thing. I have no idea what they were. They didn’t even come in a box. It was 12 pills in the aluminum foil wrapper thing. I didn’t care. Popped the pill and headed back to the hotel to pass out. Before I fell asleep, I had some cake, and got the low-down on the crash from Nicole. I also took a couple night photos from the window. Two amazing things happened. 1, I was already feeling better. Not a little better, but totally better. These unknown pills are miracle drugs! 2, it was a little after midnight! We’d only been gone about 30 minutes or so. That was my first experience with the sun not really setting. Guess that’s what happens when you’re this close to the pole. Crazy.
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