San Sebastián, Argentina

We only had a long day of driving ahead of us today, that included crossing back into Chile, so we didn’t exactly get up at the crack of dawn, although we should have. Before we got going we headed into town and found a mechanic to weld our alternator bracket again. The last weld job didn’t survive the numerous gravel roads we had been traversing getting to different fishing destinations, and we had a long stretch of gravel that was unavoidable once we hit Tierra del Fuego coming up. We figured we better get it fixed now before the whole thing came off and we were left stranded literally in the middle of nowhere. The welding excursion was cheap and quick and we were soon on our way.

Later that afternoon, we crossed the border back into Chile and came to the ferry landing that would carry us and the van over the Strait of Magellan and onto the island of Tierra del Fuego, the land of fire. Named after the many fires that Magellan saw from the natives while exploring the region in the early days, TDF is actually a bleak landscape to the north and then becomes mountainous and glacially influenced as you head further south.

Once on the island and in Chilean territory the road turned into gravel and quickly became slow going. We weren’t going to make the Argentinean border by dark, and we weren’t even sure how long the border stayed open, so we camped out for the night, excited at the prospect of hitting the ‘end of the road’ tomorrow!