It Was an Eventful First Day of the Year. Only 364 days left until ...

We Begin Moving North on Monday, Until Then ... let's make the first day of the year productive

We awoke on January 1st right where we planned, in Tierra del Fuego, Patagonia.  At this point, we are still in Argentina, with plans to travel to Chile as soon as Monday the 2nd.

We had some time to spend, and after a large breakfast with lots of coffee we set out.  The night before was a late night, we made it to midnight and welcomed the New Year at the end of the world. 

Tickets were purchased for our very first travel leg, not counting the flights to get here.  It's a bus ride on Monday to Rio Grande, Argentina, about 250 kilometers from Ushuaia where we have spent the last couple days. 

In the meantime, we went on an excursion, a long boat ride on the Beagle Channel, the body of water that separates the end of the world from the islands off the coast.  

Our destination in this first week is Punta Arenas, Chile, where we will have a car at our disposal for the next month.  Long story (told later), but we are planning to rent cars for much of the trip.  But little did we know that this time of year it is harder to get where you're going than we thought.

So the boat ride - a large catamaran - took us to several stops.  The first was "Bird Island" - a small island full of ... birds.  There were a whole bunch of birds, such as the Imperial Cormorant, and the enormous Albatross, and other feathered creatures.  It was cool.

Then next we went to "Sea Lion Island" - it was full of ... you guessed it:  Sea Lions! They are large beasts, the males are up to three meters long (nine feet) and weigh up to 1,000 lbs.  

I don't mean to make light of this.  To be clear, it was a rather spectacular setting, with huge snow capped peaks rising from the Chilean side of the Channel. As the day went on, the skies cleared and the sun came out and it was a great way to start the year. 

After the animal and bird islands, we passed a noteworthy lighthouse on a rock in the ocean.  It was an impressive setting, shown in the picture at the top of this blog post.  It is said to be the southern most lighthouse in the world. 

Eventually we made our way to the high point of the boat journey - Penguin Island.  It was full of ... sorry ... couldn't help it.  We got real close and stayed there a while.  Penguins are so unique and rather hilarious.  There were a lot of 'em. 

The trip also included a shipwreck (one of my favorite travel features!) and several more historic locations.  We returned late in the evening, around 9:30, but at this latitude in the Southern Hemisphere, it was still sunlight.

In fact, this picture below is the sun going down - taken through the lens of my sunglasses, which gives it the brownish tint.  

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One last note of some relevance:  As we walked down to the dock to catch the boat today, we encountered a scene from the night before.  Some unfortunate chap had maybe too much to drink and smashed into another car, a truck in this case.  As you can see in the background of the picture below, it drove the truck into a building.  A not-so-Happy New Year for someone.