Boat trip around the Beagle Channel in the Tierra del Fuego
Summary
The Tierra del Fuego – the southernmost tip of the Americas and as strange as it is alluring. Mountains and volcanoes surround you as you arrive in Ushuaia, the southern most city on earth, and you find yourself in the centre of a big playground of glacial lakes, channels and echoes of past culture of the original Fuegian natives. Make sure if you’re in this part of the world to check out the Beagle Channel from the water – you’ll be surrounded on all sides by the steep slopes of the Tierra del Fuego mountains and to see the seals land penguins living on the islands. It really makes you imagine what it must have been like for Captain Fitzoy and other explorers as they first made their way through this new world
highlights
#1 Seeing the thundering mountains of the Tierra del Fuego surrounding the Beagle Channel and imagining what it must have been like as some of the first explorers to see this distant land
#2 Getting up close with the seals and penguins that live on the islands of the Beagle Channel
#3 A short hike around Bridges Island to learn about some of the local wildlife . . . and for more fantastic views
Travel Tips
- Tours – we were already planning on staying in the Tierra del Fuego for 4/5 days so had already booked the with the tour company Tierra Tourismo. Couldn’t recommend them more and the guides were fantastic. Prices below
- Boat trip on the Beagle Channel. Leaves 9am or 3pm. 4 hours trip total. Boat trip, visit to the light house, sea lion island, bird island and hike on bridges island. USD55 per person + port tax
- Or just do it yourself – that being said, you could easily arrange the Beagle Channel boat trip yourself
- Local restaurants – we were pleasantly surprised at local restaurants and would highly recommend:
- Kaupe
- Kalma
- Paso Garibaldi
- Maria Lola
- Ushuaia itself is actually quite a cool town. We expected either a small village or some big industrialised port and its kind of both, in a nice way! You have a lot of the ferries coming through, but you also have an adventury outpost feel in the main part of town with ski shops, outdoor gear, backpackers and general excitement for those about to head off into the wilderness / Antarctica
- Accommodation – we stayed in the Los Yamanas hotel just outside of town. Wouldn’t overly recommend it
- Books
- I couldn’t more highly recommend This Thing of Darkness by Harry Thompson, one of my favourite books. This charts, in historical fiction-style, the true story of Captain Fitzoy’s journey to chart the Tierra del Fuego, meeting the native Fuegians and bringing the young Charles Darwin with him
- In Patagonia. Bruce Chatwin’s account of his journey through Patagonia to see the windswept landscapes, descendants of Welsh immigrants, forgotten legends and a feeling of adventure in seeing “the uttermost part of the earth”
- Rest of Tierra del Fuego – make sure to check out some of the other things to do and general tips by checking out the Trip to the end of the earth, 4 days in the Tierra del Fuego entry
- Wish I’d seen – some spots, looking back, I wish we’d have taken the time to check out were the Hikes Around Fort Williams on Isla Navarino; and biting the bullet for a cruise over too Antarctica – I wasn’t that fussed before I went, but now can see the awesome appeal
Experiences nearby
The below map shows experiences nearby with a colour that reflect the Overall Score of those experiences
Similar boat trips around the world
Score Detail
Background - how many times have you asked someone what a travel experience was like and the response was "amazing" or "awesome"? That response is nice to know, but it makes it hard to differentiate that experience compared to others. That is exactly what these scores are trying to do - differentiate the experience by giving a score out of 10 based on 6 categories and then giving an overall experience score
This overall experience score is calculated by: take the highest of the "Culture" or "Nature" score (1-10) + "Fun factor" (1-10) + "Avoiding the crowds" (1-10) + highest of the "Unique" or "World Famous score" (1-10). Then convert into a score out of 100
Extra detail - the logic being that I find all of the 6 individual scores important, but I don't want to mark an experience down just because it doesn't cover both "Culture" and "Nature", or because it isn't both "World Famous" and "Unique". Take the examples of Safari in The Serengeti and walking through Rome - they both appeal at opposite ends of the nature / culture spectrum, and you can have a fantastic time without needing to appeal to both sides. So, their overall scores aren't penalized for their lack of one or the other, and I've done the same for "World Famous" vs "Unique". But . . . I do think that the "Fun factor" of an experience is important, irrelevant of other factors, and so is "Avoiding the Crowds" (or where there are crowds that add to the experience). So, both of these scores are standalone