Pedro and Maria Motorcycle South America!: Rio Grande to Ushuaia, 130 miles

Mission accomplished. We’ve ridden our motorbike from San Jose California to Ushuaia, the southernmost city in the world. Its half as far to Antartica as it is to Buenos Aires from here. It’s been 3 months and 2 weeks since we left, and we’ve covered 13,000 miles. It hasn’t always been comfortable, but it has been an adventure.

Well rested, we tackled our last day of riding south. Valerie was very gracious making sure we had our coffee and breakfast. The hostel gave us a warm send-off and we rolled out of the backyard into the frigid morning. The drive itself was easy and beautiful. It was totally paved (our map had us anticipating partial dirt) and there was no real wind to complain about. The scrub gave way to steep mountains covered in snow and trees. We wound around lakes and past the ocean before descending down to Ushuaia. When we arrived at the welcome sign a gratifying sense of accomplishment came over both of us and we fooled around taking more than a few fotos.

Ushuaia is a nice town. Cruise ships bound for Antartica stop here and loads of tourists come in and out like the tide. The city itself is pleasant and unique. There are loads of hotels and campgrounds, great restaurants (we had a king crab omlette and the compulsory bife de chorizo for lunch, expensive but delicious). Did I mention its cold?

We will be camping tonight. Don’t ask me how I got Amie to agree to camp in the artic circle, but I did, and we are in the tent right now as I type and it is frickin cold, but I’m loving it. We were at the grocery store yesterday and they had camping gear, including a twin bed sized inflatable mattress for $29 (including pump). I got the dimensions from our tent and they are made for eachother. With this find we are camping in comfort! Except for the temperature that is.

There are other bikers here, lots of them as a matter of fact. There are a couple in the campground with us as well. We got to know them while using the industrial kitchen that is available to us. Amie whipped up what was intended to be a vegtebale soup or stew of some sort, but because I put in too much rice, it turned into a risotto dish. It wasn’t the best, but it wasn’t bad either. It was nice enjoying a home cooked meal.

We’ve got about a month left to get to Santiago. If we can get on the ferry we will have more time to see cool things in central chile rather than the painful route we’ve already done all over again. Stay tuned for our adventures at Torres del Paine, Moreno Glacier, and the lake districts of Argentina and Chile… one more month of moto adventuring in South America.

Brr!