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Getting there is half the fun

We left the jungle before sunrise, standing up in the back of a quarter-ton pickup with seven people and their luggage, plus a bed frame, six bags of aguaje fruit, a stack of unfinished lumber, and a live chicken in a plastic bag tied to the side of the truck that clucked mournfully with every [...]

Puerto Williams

This is it – this is as far south as civilization gets until that big, white, cold continent.  Puerto Williams is situated on the northern shore of Isla Navarino, across the Beagle Channel from Ushuaia, Argentina.  Home to 2,200 inhabitants, it’s bigger than McMurdo Station in Antarctica, with more stray dogs and less to do.  I [...]

rollin’…rollin’…rollin’ on a river

I went a little bit photo-crazy on the Navimag cruise. I couldn’t help myself – everywhere, everywhere, islands like floating mountains, cliffs sparkling with countless ribbons of water, blinding white and blue glaciers hanging from black peaks, rainbows, dolphins, sunsets…my friends laughed at me because I would bolt my lunch and dinner and then race back [...]

don’t forget to tip your bag-boy

I had never in my life started a slow-clap.  The first time would have to be on a bus in the middle of Chile. You’ve seen this phenomenon in movies.  There’s some powerful, unconventional, emotional performance.  The audience is quiet, stunned, uncertain of how to respond, until one person stirs, putting his hands together once…twice…and then a [...]

Recent Events That Have Helped Me To Remember Why It’s Exciting To Live In Freaking Antarctica

#1 – Driving in Condition 2 weather! *Condition 2: “weather conditions when any one or all of these conditions exist – wind speed is greater than 48 knots (55mph), temperature is below -75 F (-59C), visibility is less than 1/4 mile” (condition 3 is the designation for normal weather; condition 1 is the most extreme). [...]