Cerro Guanaco

29th Feb

It was cold in the tent last night, even with thermals on inside my sleeping bag. I'm definitely out of practise for camping. However, once the sun came up it soon warmed up and after breakfast we set off on another walk up Cerro Guanaco. The brief description on the park leaflet said that it was 4km each way and took 4hrs each way, seemed a tad slow going, either very steep or they allow people plenty of time. Anyway we had all day so we'd see how we got on. At the foot of the trail again there was a sign warning of a hard walk, not to start late in the day and to be of adequate fitness. It didn't take us 4hours and according to the km marker en route it was further than 4km but the trail was certainly very very steep.
The initial path was through woodland and we followed a stream upwards crossing it a few times on the way. At the top of the stream we reached an area of peat bog in formation that we had to make our way across. I almost made it but succumbed to wet feet by the end. The final pull was following the path as it traversed around a ridge across slatey ground, again very very steep, but at least dry underfoot except the odd area of snow. The top of the mountain was rock and snow covered. I took great delight in leaving footsteps in untouched snow on the summit. The view from the top was amazing and worth the effort. We looked down over Ushuaia and the Beagle channel on one side and back across the lakes of the Tierra del Fuego national park on the other side. We put a few layers of clothing on and then enjoyed lunch admiring the amazing view before descending the way that we'd come.
After having navigated our way across the peat bog again we were about to start descending through the woods next to the stream when we were lucky enough to see a beaver swimming across the pool that it had made by building a dam at the top of the stream. It was great to see as it was the kind of animal that I didn't think I'd get to see, but they are not native to Argentina or Chile and cause a lot of damage and destruction to the native trees and landscapes.
Back at the tent, everything was still intact and we enjoyed another dinner cooked over our camp stove. Actually we were both wishing that we were back on the boat with a 3 course meal and someone else doing the washing up!