Travel with Indigo

I left Jacksonville late yesterday–flew to Miami–then to Buenos Aires–and arrived this morning in Ushuaia, Argentina.  That’s approximately 4500 miles to BA and another bunch of miles to Ushuaia in Tierra del Fuego.  Immigration in BA took only about 10 minutes, much less than the last time I was here but then I had to take a car to Aeroparque Jorge Newbery, another airport in BA, for the flight to Ushuaia.  That was about a 45 minute drive but only cost 79 pesos for a private car–not much.  I was able to take an earlier flight to Ushuaia but of course, since it was Aerolineas Argentina, that earlier plane was late but still earlier than my scheduled flight.  On the way to Ushuaia, we flew over the Beagle Channel, a beautiful sight, and there was a lot of turbulence while landing because of the wind.  Marty, I thought of you; you would not have liked it.

Phil and Rick Judge were at the airport to meet him–welcome sights.  Rick is a friend from Elbow Cay who joined Indigo a few days ago and will be with us on the trip around the Horn.  He is an experienced sailor who will be able to stand watches if needed.  Indigo is anchored just off Ushuaia because the dock is home to so many cruise ships and commercial vehicles and is not available to yachts like ours.  The tender trips to and from Indigo and the dock are not bad, though the wind can make it seem colder than it may be.  During our time in Ushuaia, there were always cruise ships, commercial ships, sailboats and military ships in the area, which made for some interesting watching.  When I arrived, the “World” was in port but many others came in and out.

After dropping me off at the boat for a nap and a snack, Phil and Rick went to play golf, believe it or not, at the golf course in the area.  It’s only nine holes but they claimed to have fun, even though it was cold and windy.  Just playing golf at the southernmost golf course is a distinction for real golfers.  I met our newest crew member, Tanya, who will fit right in as our stewardess and was happily reunited with Captain Toby, Chef Geraldine and the two Kyles, one the engineer and one the first mate.

The town of Ushuaia is small and picturesque and very colorful.  It’s a step above the usual cruise ship towns I have seen in that it has good restaurants and nice shops in addition to the expected ones.  It is advertised as the most southern city in the world and has a population of about 55,000, though is this is summer, I don’t see how anyone would want to be here in the winter.  It was founded in the late 19th century on the banks of the Beagle Channel and this part of the world is famous for its spider crabs, huge crabs that are prepared in many different ways.  I tried to sample all of them!   Chile is to the west and to the south and actually Puerto Williams in Chile is the most southern town but as we discovered, it’s not really much of a town.

Today is Tanya’s birthday so we all went to the Dublin Irish pub to celebrate.  Phil has already met the captain (Carlos) and executive officer (Gonzalo) of the Navy ship Castillo and they nicely agreed to allow two of their junior officers to stay on Indigo so the whole crew could go to the pub to celebrate.  We had the best pizza ever and lots of good fellowship.  Gonzalo and several other officers, including Guillermo, who is the equivalent of our Navy Seals, were able to join us and we really enjoyed their company.  During the party, they gave Phil a Navy bosun’s whistle on an incredibly elaborate hand-woven lanyard that one of the guys on the Navy ship had created.  Phil has described how much this meant to him in another entry and we were all impressed by their thoughtfulness and the skill that had gone into creating this gift.  Now if we can just get Phil to quit blowing the thing!  Some of us, including me, left about 11PM but the others stayed until about 2AM.  I can see that I am back in the throes of the South American late night schedule.  I’m glad to be here.