Day 08 - 14/Jan/24 - Ushuaia, Argentina

 It was a nice day to wake up sort of leisurely as we weren't scheduled to arrive until around 11am. Since we were just here, we didn't get up to see Glacier Alley, but I did see the French Glacier which is the last of the large glaciers in the Beagle channel.  We were introduced to the Antarctica Expedition team members and Adrian Corvino presented a nice talk on the geology and regions of Antarctica.  We approached the dock with a pretty strong southerly wind.  There was the Azamara Quest along with three other expedition style ships already in port.  We got the last major berth on the end of the left side of the dock.  The Captain and crew skillfully slipped us into position and we were soon tied up.   

Since we didn't have a shore excursion, we enjoyed a quick lunch before heading off the ship.  Our plan for today was to walk to the prison  which is now a museum.  It was definitely cold and blustery, but it was a nice walk there.  The museum, Maritime Museum of Ushuaia, utilizes the former prison which was constructed starting in 1902 and finally closed in 1947 largely because of the brutality against the inmates and overcrowding.   Over the years the prisioners were used essentially as slave labor to construct the infrastructure of the region.  The prison was laid out by an Italian architect, and its design was one like 1/2 of a wagon wheel with five spokes radiating out from a central hub which was a bakery.  It was built for 380 prisoners, but held as many as 600 at a time.

Today one spoke houses a prison exhibition, a second houses unrestored cells, a third has an art gallery, a fourth has a gift shop and native people exhibit, and the fifth has a pavilion which was not in use when we were there.  At the entry attached on the entry end of the Prison Museum is an extensive two story Maritime Museum featuring dozens of scale models of ships associated with the region.  Also, there were dozens of colorful penguin statutes scattered throughout the museum.  There must have been a decorating contest.  Most exhibits were curated in Spanish and English.  We spent a couple of hours there before beginning our walk around the town.  As it was a Sunday, a number of shops were closed, but we found a supermarket and purchased some snacks which we enjoyed sitting in a local park.

The main shopping street in downtown is quite vibrant.  We walked the full length of the street out to the Falklands War memorial and the Ushuaia sign and took a few photos.  There's even a Hard Rock Cafe as well as a number of high end stores.  We retraced our way back to the port area doing a bunch of shopping in craft markets.  At the port area we found the end of the world sign for a photo before walking back to the Oosterdam.  At the sign, we chatted with a couple who was doing a land tour and had just visited Iguazu Falls and they highly recommend it, although the flood damage to the Argentinian side was quite extensive.  They recommended a 3 day visit.

Back on board, we had a light dinner before watching the 3 hour long movie, Oppenheimer. It was a good movie, but challenging to keep straight with all of the flashbacks.

Tomorrow the scenic cruising of Cape Horn starts at 6am, but I doubt we'll attempt to get up at that hour.  Watching the bow camera from bed seems like a good idea.