Friday evening (6pm Brasilia time)
May 4th, 2007
GPS: S54 47.494, W068 18.944
Ushuaia, Tierra del Fuego, Argentina
End of the world

I lied last night when I said that we were all going to lay down for some sleep.  I wanted to, but nobody listens to me.  Ever.  

Rob did a bit of a cool thing last night.  He took the info we collected from our GPS units on the flight down here, and threw it into GoogleEarth.  If you have Google Earth installed, and go to <!-- m --><a href="http://noblequest.org/route/NobleQuest-Flight_South.kml">http://noblequest.org/route/NobleQuest-Flight_South.kml</a><!-- m --> , you'll be able to see just where we've been, on planes.

Dad got a bug in his butt about going out for a bit on the town, and dragged us all along with him.  Drivers here in South America are slightly less crazy when traffic is lighter, but not by much.  Additionally, between siesta-time and closing early, there are many places here that don't seem to want to do much business.  We got kicked out of a restaurant 'cause they were closing early, and had a hard time finding another place open that didn't look like it would kill us.

Anyways, managed to find a place that had a decent fajita (but only ½ litro cervesas) and let you make your own chip dip – they'd bring out a bunch of plain chips, a bowl of sour cream w/ chives, and a bucket full of different sauces.  Neat-o idea, but I detest sour cream &amp; onion.

Feeling a bit lethargic from dinner, the closest place open was a casino across the street.  We're pretty sure it had a cover charge, 'cause we all bought these tickets for $2AR ($1AR==$0.33USD).  Neither Rob nor I are very good gamblers, so he and I sat behind Justin and Sean.  Justin's got a pretty good eye for the blackjack – he ended up coming out $80AR ahead, while dad was quite a bit in the hole, but wouldn't tell me just how much he'd lost.

I made everyone leave about that time, and we came back to the hotel and this time we did go to sleep.

Whenever I've stayed at a hotel in the US or Canada, and they've advertised 'continental breakfast', it's pretty much been doughnuts, coffee &amp; cereal.  That's what I thought we'd be getting here.  I guess we ARE on a different continent.

Fresh-baked bread &amp; croissants, fresh-squeezed orange juice, the best strawberry jam i've ever tasted.  Everything was amazing, and the coffee kicked butt.  There was also this pink milk-like drink that we all figured was strawberry milk, but it turned out to be more like a strawberry yoghurt drink (think yop).  Which tasted really bad at first, 'cause we'd be expecting strawberry milk, and it tastes nothing like that.  Once we figured out what kind of taste to expect, everything went much smoother.

After breakfast, we headed out on the road to drive the mountain pass we'll be taking in a couple days on our motorcycles.  We left at about 10:30am, and all the way to the top of the pass the roads were absolutely the worst roads we could imagine.  Icy, covered in snow with steep hills and sudden turns.  We felt pretty sick about the whole thing.  However, we hit the top of the pass after about half an hour of lousy roads.  On the other side of the pass, where the sun had been shining for little more than an hour and a half, the roads were completely clear of ice &amp; snow, and were merely wet.  

Apparently the sun was also melting the cliff face.  I've seen the signs before, when driving through mountains: 'Watch for falling rock', but I've never actually seen 'falling rock'.  Seconds after we crested the pass, and started down the now-clear road, several large (fist-size &amp; two-fist-size) rocks smashed into the road immediately in front of us.  Dad, with his puma-like reflexes, immediately slammed on the brakes, perhaps to catch the rocks on the roof of the car, thereby saving the road any more divots.

We turned around about that point, thinking that at least we only had twenty or so kilometres of lousy road in front of us.  Which would be difficult, but we could beat it.  In the forty minutes or so that we'd been driving, the road on the side of the mountain still in shadow had undergone an amazing transformation.  I guess a combination of the large amount of heavy traffic (many large trucks, buses &amp; semi-trailers – all with chained-up tires) that streamed along that road, and the rising temperatures pretty much melted all the snow &amp; ice off the road, leaving it largely clear with only a few patches of snow, and no ice.  

We decided that our plan to leave would have to be shifted to later in the day, probably about 2-3pm in the afternoon, to take advantage of the melting snow and ice that would have been so perilous earlier in the morning.

After we got back into town, we found the house of our consigning agent here in Ushuaia.  I guess a consigning agent is the guy what takes care of receiving shipped goods.  His name is Osvaldo, and the only address we had for him was his home address.  Once we arrived at his house, his wife (who spoke only German and Spanish) told us that he'd be home in about an hour or so, and to come back then.  This is about 12pm.  So, off shopping we went.  At least, we tried to.  Remember I commented earlier on what a really awesome great idea siesta time is, in a location with a daily temperature high of about five degrees?  Instead, we spent some time trying to get onto the pier at Puerto Ushuaia, but it's locked down tighter than an airport (seriously – there's a metal detector you have to go through IF they let you onto the pier).  Then, some pictures of 'BIENVENIDO A USHUAIA' signs, and some farting around with the GPSs.

Finally, we headed back to Osvaldo's house.  Neither he nor his wife speak english, but he has two daughters that do, which was incredibly helpful.  The language barrier has been a constant frustration.  

Osvaldo had some terrifying news – the ship our bikes are on is not due into Ushuaia until the NINTH OF MAY.  Our bikes were supposed to have arrived the 23rd of April.  They were then delayed until the 30th, and again until the 6th of May, which was the last date we had.  Sean had even talked to Mai YESTERDAY at our shipping agent back in Calgary, and she'd confirmed an arrival date of the sixth.    However, he reassured us that it's entirely possible that we'll get the bikes off the ship and through customs the same day, and Osvaldo asked us to come back tomorrow to discuss how we can expedite the procedure so that we don't lose any more time.

In a foul mood, we decided to go for a walk down San Martin street, and do some shopping and grab some food.  However, this stupid siesta business kicked in again.

Almost every store we tried to go to was closed, including some restaurants.  Another store that we went into, later in the day, kicked us out 'cause siesta time wasn't yet over.  I don't get this business strategy.  Surely some business would realize that it's beneficial to stay open during this time?  Yes, some business were open, and those were the businesses that we spent our money at.  Still, I'd estimate that eight out of ten stores were closed for business, for four hours, in the middle of the day.  

We found an open restaurant.  I had the BEST fettuccine alfredo i've ever had, except the stuff I make myself.  I got nearly a pound of fresh-grated parmesan cheese in a little bowl to toss in myself.  Frackin' yummy.

We talked our schedule over during lunch, and realized that, while very inconvenient, the two extra days we're going to lose are days that we can afford to lose – we'd planned in some leeway time in the beginning.  However, we have flights booked across the Panama Canal, and dad's going to see if we can get those pushed back a day or two.  The consensus from the discussion over lunch is that we're still in no trouble to get this trip done, but it's going to be tight.  We're going to have to push our schedule over the length of South America – riding from sunup to sundown, and stopping when we have to, instead of when it's convenient (camping some nights instead of staying in hotels).

As it stands, now, our bikes will arrive on Wednesday, and we'll be on the road the afternoon of Thursday.  Gosh!

After lunch, we poked around and got some (small) souvenirs, at which time I was ready to go home.  I've never been much of a shopper.  However, Sean &amp; Justin sure are, and they stayed behind while Rob and I went back to the hotel.  I'm supposed to pick them up in an hour, but I may just make them take a cab.  Stupid shopping.

Ryan Noble,
Ushuaia, Argentina