You typically read about Patagonia in its extremes – how far south, how remote, how windswept and desolate. The Tierra del Fuego is the extreme of Patagonia as the southernmost tip of the Americas and is 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. A chance to explore and feel what it must have been like for the first explorers, like Magellan and Captain Fitzroy, as they passed through this otherworldly place.
Many only arrive in Ushuaia as their departure point for the Antarctic, yet find this little-known spot to the highlight of their trip. To get the best of it, go for a combination of taking a tour company to 4×4 the nearby national park, hike Lake Esmerelda and take the ferry to explore the Beagle Channel. We found the combo of tour / independent travel the right mix.