The Ka

As I said before, we rented a car in Ushuaia. It contributed to the unfolding of a really perfect day. In our Ford Ka, we drove out to the Parque Nacional Tierra del Fuego where we hiked around, skipped stones, and met an overly precocious (and gullible) little boy with a stupid name who had already been to

Antarctica

. The little boy admired The Doc’s stone skipping abilities, which may or may not be as good as my brother’s skills, and tried to convince his father to compete. What the little boy didn’t realize was that his father was already superior to The Doc in one way, not stone skipping of course, but he had taken his family to

Antarctica

.

We want to go to

Antarctica

now, apparently it is gorgeous, and whales can be seen every which way you look. For now, I will have to settle for having made it nearly to the bottom of the world.  

After the longest short walk of the day, during which we saw woodpeckers that actually sound remarkably like Woody, we enjoyed a delicious picnic lunch by the side of an incredibly placid lake. We experimented with rock size in relation to sound. Does it make a cooler sound/effect to throw handfuls of itty bitty rocks into the lake, or is it preferable to throw good sized pebbles? I say itty bitty rocks, but I am itty bitty and certainly biased.

We spent the rest of the afternoon driving from spot to spot, and wandering around a little. We didn’t much feel like doing any crazy hiking, so it was convenient. We observed a flock of tourists from

Buenos   Aires

. I noticed that I could barely understand them as they sound way too Italian. Its one thing to add a bunch of shh sound to Spanish, it is pretty even, but to completely change the accentuation of the language? -- Huge headache. It didn’t bother The Good Doctor so much, as he doesn’t understand Spanish either way. Ha Ha. I am the nicest girlfriend.

We played on the beach in the park for a while. We conducted a grandiose South American damming project, which re-diverted a stream that flowed into the Beagle Channel. It seemed wrong, but not as wrong as stealing two rocks for The Doc’s father. He requested rocks from

Tierra del Fuego

, and we felt compelled to comply, even though it means hauling those rocks all over hell and back. We left the park just before sunset, in hopes of finding a neat spot to watch the sun set over the water. We didn’t make it, but the drive out into the hinterland of

Tierra del Fuego

was stunning. The colors of the sky, and the colors those colors cast on the landscape (especially upon the craggy mountains) were fantastic. The Doc took some decent pictures of it, but I don’t think any photo could capture quite how magical it was.

We drove the Ford Ka around until it got to be dark enough for star gazing. We pulled off to the side of the road and looked up in awe, but in time we decided it wasn’t a very comfortable place to stay. For fear of being hit, we didn’t feel comfortable turning the hazards off. The hazards had the inconvenient side effect of luring helpful Argentines who then demanded that we explain that we are only crazy gringos who are in awe of stars we’ve never seen before. Finally, we decided that we had to move to a safer place. We were only allowed to drive 300 kilometers, so we had to head in the direction of home. After several semi-panic attacks on The Doc’s part, the clouds were ominously gathering overhead, I saw the perfect place to pull off. We tucked ourselves away on a little driveway, abandoned during the non-ski season, and protected from the traffic of the highway. We looked out at the stars through the windows of the Ka for a few moments, and then set to preparing picnic number two. We had bought a very intriguing, but terrifying bottle of sparkling red wine. It was pretty much the worst thing either of us had ever tasted. We drank half the bottle, and promptly poured the remainder out on the side of the road. Roads need to get their drink on too. Dinner was much tastier. After the meal we experienced several moments of dismay, realizing that the clouds had indeed covered our marvelous view of the sky. We decided to stick it out though because we were convinced that the fates had shown us the perfect place. In a few minutes, the clouds moved, the stars returned, and we grabbed the star map that I had printed and the flashlight, and stepped into the cool air outside. We spent the evening locating this and that constellation. I don’t think I have ever had a better night of star gazing. I saw more Milky Way than ever before. I am such a city kid.

At about 2-am, although we had not had our fill, we decided it was time to head back to the hostel. We had to return the car at 10-am the following morning. Yuck. So, we drove back, a drive not quite as breathtaking as the drive out, but equally marvelous. We arrived in the early morning hours, crawled into our bunks, and slept like rocks until it was time to wake up and return the Ka.

Comments

[amelia]

hola
what's your new phone number?