We sailed through the Beagle Channel to the most southerly town in the world of Ushuaia, surrounded by snow-capped mountains and looking as beautiful as I remembered it form my first visit in 2009. Along the Beagle Channel to the west of Ushuaia Michel picked up a group of Andean Condors perched by the shoreline on a small island and the views through scopes were very nice indeed! There was also Magellanic Oystercatcher, Kelp Goose, Magellanic Diving Petrels, Magellanic Penguins, even a couple distant Snowy Sheathbills, and a few Chilean Skuas.
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| Ushuaia is surrounded by beautiful mountains |
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| Scenery was pretty spectacular as we sailed to Ushuaia |
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| Ushuaia |
The sailing in to the port was very scenic and as we neared the town we were very fortunate to spot a King Penguin on a rocky beach absolutely dwarfing the Imperial Cormorants and Dolphin Gulls alongside it. With members of the group dispersed and preparing for our next shore excursion our WhatsApp group announcements certainly helped and eventually everyone saw it and enjoyed decent scope views from the front deck. With that excitement boding well for a good day ashore in Tierra del Fuego National Park we met up with our local guide and set off in a minibus into the national park. Our first stop was at a forest trail where we walked for around a kilometre hoping to find Magellanic Woodpecker….. but we didn’t. On return to the minibus we met a Danish birder who had seen a pair of woodpeckers along the same trail but a little further on, so we walked back up the hill and down the other side. Well, we met at least 3 other groups of walkers who had all seen woodpeckers and we staked out the area for a good while, but it was apparent that the birds had moved on. Unbelievable!
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| Tierra del Fuego National Park |
So we walked a different trail, drove to a lake and walked a bit more, drove to another spot and walked some more. All futile! I may well be the only birder to visit here on two separate occasions and dip the woodpecker! I cannot explain our miss except to say we were extremely unlucky.
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| Thorn-tailed Rayadito |
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| A soggy Tufted Tit-Tyrant |
We did see some Chiloe Wigeon, Thorn-tailed Rayadito, White-throated Treerunner, Flightless Steamer-Duck, Upland Goose, Blackish Oystercatchers, Great Grebe, Chilean Elaenia, Tufted Tit-Tyrant, Fire-eyed Diucon, Austral Thrush, Patagonian Sierra-Finch, and even a Culpeo Fox. So we ended our birding at the nearby landfill site and ticked the localised White-throated Caracara, which was a nice way to end our time in Ushuaia.
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| Chile Wigeon |
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| Upland Goose - male |
Back on board Sapphire Princess, the usual procedure of getting a bite to eat and a coffee pre-empted our anticipated departure from port and everyone was on deck. The captain then made an announcement that high winds would delay our departure, so that meant we had some down time to enjoy onboard facilities, visit a few bars onboard and generally relax!
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