Off-Roading in Tierra del Fuego

Unexpected exploration became writing inspiration

When the tour guide showed up at Harberton to drive me back to Ushuaia, as promised, at first I was just relieved to have a ride. I was tired after three days of absorbing as much of the setting as I could and trying to figure out how to ask penetrating questions when talking to the descendants of the family on whom my novel is based. I was also anxious to actually get settled in Ushuaia before the start of my first week working remotely.

But the driver had other ideas.

“Puerto Almanza is a really picturesque little town. It has the best seafood in the region and some great views,” he said as we came to a joint in the road.

Ahead of us, the left branch traced the northern edge of the Beagle Channel, and, on the right, the main road led to the highway that would take us back to Ushuaia.

“Do you want to see it? It’s not far away.”

I wasn’t sure how relevant the great seafood was, at the moment, since it was too late for lunch and too early for dinner. I’d told my host family in Ushuaia that I would join them for dinner, since I fully expected to be back before then.

But I could appreciate a unique, picturesque little fishing town on the edge of the Beagle Channel even without sampling its seafood. When else was I going to get to visit such a place?

“Sure, let’s go,” I said.

In the tiny fishing town of Puerto Almanza, the driver/tour guide pointed to various points of interest, but I was more curious about the machine guns on the side of the road. Across the Beagle Channel, Chile's city of Puerto Williams is easily visible.

Puerto Almanza was pretty—and smaller than I expected. Could it really be called a town when the population hovered around 100 people? Within ten minutes, we’d seen all there was to see: a single strip of houses on one side of the road, two itty-bitty restaurants, a one-room school, a fishing dock, and rusted machine guns left over from when Chile and Argentina almost went to war in 1978. Puerto Almanza faces Chile’s main city in the region, Puerto Williams, which means it’s an important spot for Argentinian national defense.

When the road ended at an Argentinian naval station, we turned around to return to the fork in the road, and headed toward the highway that would take us back to Ushuaia.

I didn’t know then that was only the first detour.