Before writing about Ushuaia, I should just mention that it is now actually 10am Friday morning and we are approaching the Antarctic Circle and still heading directly south. I took a reading this morning and our latitude was -63.5 deg. In just over one hour we will be in Bahia Dallman, a bay on the North Western side of the Antarctic Peninsular.

Its foggy and raining. Hopefully the conditions will improve as the day progresses as we have an incredible programme of areas to visit and things to see over the next three days. I’ll be writing about those later.

So back to Wednesday: Ushuaia is a resort town in Argentina. It’s located on the Tierra del Fuego archipelago, the southernmost tip of South America, nicknamed the “End of the World.” The windswept town, perched on a steep hill, is surrounded by the Martial Mountains and the Beagle Channel.

My adventure today was to walk on a glacier, or so I, and all the others in my party thought.

We were taken to a small caffe about 15 mins from the harbour at the base of a large mountain for a coffee before we set out.

In the caffe a young geologist gave us a talk on the tectonic plates and rock formations that influenced the geology of the region. Interesting, but a little over the top for those that just wanted to get their feet on the ice flow.

We soon set out on a path that steadily and continually climbed upwards.

It is many years since I did any serious hill walking so I didn’t try to keep up with those who were determined to demonstrate their fitness. One of the staff from our ship was bringing up the rear, so I tagged along with them (or rather they with me)

Then the snow started to fall quite heavily. Still I plodded on but gradually overtaking some of the party members as their endurance faded.

Conditions began to deteriorate, the packed snow under foot had turned to ice and was very slippery. Several more turned back deciding they had had enough.

A few of us carried on, having come this far, we were determined to achieve whatever the goal was supposed to be, although that wasn’t very clear.

I met another lady who was progressing at my speed and we eventually reached the turning point where our guide was waiting. The guide said: “get together, I’ll take your photo”, thinking we were a couple. For simplicity, we just went along with the idea.

We were later informed that we had climbed 800 metres with the purpose of getting a view of a glacier that unfortunately was out of sight on this occasion due to the snowy conditions.

As far as walking on a glacier was concerned, it appears that something was lost in the translation of the activity description. Never mind though, I’m sure the exercise did me good except that my legs are still so stiff I’m struggling to walk two days later.

Back to the present: The captain has just announced that land is in sight. We are now entering Bahia Dallman on the Antarctic Peninsular. It’s still raining but visibility is improving. I’m going for a look.