Tierra del fuego or where the world ends
In the darkness of a moonless February night some five hundred years ago Fernando Magellan saw a mysterious sea-shore, lit by thousands of fires. For the Iberian sea-farers whose fleet had just left the confines of the known world in a quest for a way outside the geographical maps the sight must have resembled scenes of Dante’s Inferno. It was as if the land in front of them was burning. Before they could understand what had caused these fires (a very prosaic cause by the way) the European pioneers named the new land Tierra del Fuego or Land of Fire-undoubtedly one of the most figurative and imagination inspiring names on the globe.
Statistically, the main island of Tierra del Fuego is the largest island in South America. It is divided in two almost equal halves: the Argentinean one and the Chilean one. Otherwise, the southern end of the globe is a huge archipelago, almost as big as Hungary, whose most islands are uninhabited. However, Magellan’s sailors were lucky enough to come across local inhabitants—Indians of the Yamana and Alakaluf tribes who were universal users of fire. Being rather primitive they did not have clothes but wore just a piece of cover in front. To survive in the harsh subpolar climate they used to light fires everywhere, all the time. Even in their canoes, which they used for moving around in search for food, they had a fireplace.
As the waterways were difficult to navigate and the climatic conditions so adverse the Indians of the Land of Fire did not share the fate of their brothers in the more inviting northern parts of the continent. They were by-passed both by the conquistadors and the Jesuits. However, the good luck did not last forever. After the decline of the Spanish Empire the newly founded independent states of Argentina and Chile quickly turned their attention to Tierra del Fuego in the quest for territorial expansion and national self-confirmation. Sometimes because of imported diseases, sometimes by means of firearms the local population decreased substantially in the second half of the 19th century, when the so-called assimilation of the difficult to access territory ended. Neither the newly arrived British missionaries, nor the stream of criminals and other people with a dark past (after the Argentinean government turned the Land of Fire into a kind of Gulag) helped the growth of the Indian population.
These days you’ll hardly be able to see local colour in Ushuaia, the main city in the Argentinean part of Tierra del Fuego, the way you see it in Cuzco for example. That’s why you’ll have to content yourself with the many-faced diversity of the stream of tourists, coming here for the southern summer. In the last ten to fifteen years Ushuaia developed into a favourite center for adventure tourism, profiting by its geographical situation as Fin del Mundo (the end of the world) and La Puerta de Antartida (the gate to Antarctica). Antarctic voyages are extremely popular lately and every season fleets of cruise ships with thousands of fans of polar exoticism set off from Ushuaia for the frozen continent. This is, of course, a big boost for the local economy although the crowds and luxury spoil the mythical image of Antarctica as the last inaccessible spot on Earth.
In contrast to the Argentineans who spend a lot of money and enthusiasm on tourism, their neighbors, the Chileans, whom they don’t love very much, don’t care at all about this economic sector on the Land of Fire. When you arrive in Puerto Williams on the second largest island of the archipelago, the Navarino Island, which belongs completely to Chile, you can’t but be surprised by the impressive landscape and at the same time the indifference of the locals to the enormous potential of the island. The Chilean government thinks perhaps a solid naval force presence on these “islands of discord” would be preferable. Only 25 years ago Chile and Argentina were on the verge of war because of three uninhabited islands at the entrance to the Beagle Channel. Machine-gun bunkers on the eastern coast of Navarino still remind the visitors of this border conflict.
Leaving Puerto Williams by boat we sail into a maze of fiords and narrow straits. This is where the southrenmost end of the Andes, the Cordillera Darwin, rises. Although not very high—only 2400 m above sea level—this mountain range is frozen allover and some glaciers go even straight into the sea. The cargo ship we are travelling by doesn’t offer many amenities. We sleep on plank-beds as in a floating cabin and have our meals together with the crew. To make up for this the feeling of adventure is genuine. You add the surrealistic ice formations we have all around us as well as the awe-inspiring rocky relief, and you’ll have an unforgettable experience.
Back in Ushuaia we go first to a restaurant of the type “eat as much as you can” for a fixed price. In this case the price is 6 dollars. While we devour portion after portion of the never-ending food supply we are discussing why restaurants of this type can’t thrive at home. Purely and simply because the Bulgarians will ruin them on the second week…
The numerous travel and transport agencies along the main street of Ushuaia don’t look endangered by bankruptcy. The next day with a bus of one of them we start our journey westwards along the coast of Beagle Channel. Here is the National park Tierra del Fuego. It would be interesting to know why its founders have given the special statute just to this area. In our opinion the whole southern coast of the Land of Fire deserves to be proclaimed a National park. We are travelling along big lakes situated in old forests of lenga trees, a southern variety of birch, whose trunks, deformed by the elements and the weather, are covered with feathery lichen hanging down like monstrous beards. And above the belt of trees there is a string of rocky peaks and steep glaciers. The place is ideal for a day’s march up in the mountain or for an easy walk along the rusty-red peat-bogs and the dam-like construction of the “escaped’ North American beavers, who settled here.
After we’ve seen what there was in the west, it’s time to explore the eastern part of the coast, which isn’t less attractive. Just in front of the Ushuaia Bay some rocks are rising out of the sea bearing the name Isla de los Lobos or The Island of the Wolves. There are no “land” wolves in the Southern Hemisphere but there are sea wolves. The sea wolves have thick mane-like fur around their neck. This is the reason why they were called “lobo marino” by the Spanish sailors. Several pedigree specimens were sprawling on the cliffs, white with guano, paying no attention to the heated row between some seals.
Our next stop is Estancia Harberton. Here is the oldest preserved building in European style on Tierra del Fuego built by a British missionary around 1860. On the beach we come across a noisy “pinguineria”—this is how they call in Spanish the colonies of Magellan’s penguins. These species are smaller than the Emperor Penguin in Antarctica but it doesn’t mean they are less capricious and funny.
Our time is over and we have to decide how to cross from Tierra del Fuego to the continent. There is a bus leaving from Ushuaia to “Porvenir” on the west coast of the island, a Chilean territory, and from there, every second day, there is a ferry crossing the well-known Strait of Magellan on its way to Punta Arenas. Before we left we had no idea the northern half of Tierra del Fuego was so much different than the southern one. While in the south the landscape is rich, and kindly disposed to the artistic ambitions of the camera, in the north the climate changes abruptly and along with it also the nature. The frequent rainfall gives way to dry western winds that have turned the area into a scorched steppe. Here and there you can see orange swamps and vast marshy lakes in which, chased by the dry wind, white waterless clouds are running.
After a twelve-hour journey on the bumpy roads under the opaque azure of the prairie sky we arrive exhausted in Porvenir. However, as we have an hour until the ferry departs, luckily leaving the same night, we decide to take a walk around the town. The guide books say that the settlement was founded at the end of the 19th century when Tierra del Fuego became the site of a short-lived mini gold rush. The initiator was a Romanian adventurer by the name of Julius Popper. After graduating in mining at no less than the Sorbonne University, he set off for the wide world in the search of gold. He didn’t succeed in Siberia nor Canada, but in Tierra del Fuego he would obtain one kilogram of gold per day. Most of the gold-diggers who came with him came from Southeastern Europe. This is why we are not very much surprised when the name of one of the side streets turns out to be Macedonia. Bulgarians have obviously tested themselves also at the end of the world.
Without hurrying, the ferry leaves the stone pier of the sheltered harbor, which is strewn with half-rotten fishing boats, and turns to the west. The night is setting in and the lights of the receding Porvenir are flickering with a reddish gleam like countless fires. It looks like 1520– the Magellan’s Land of Fire. In the pulsating inky-coloured water overboard, the elegant backs of a pod of playful dolphins accompanying our ship shine in the night.