Emerald Lagoon & Glarcia Martial (Land of Fire)

Today we set off for a great trek at 9:30 am. We were picked up by Rosario, an Uber driver who had given us her WhatsApp number yesterday (in case we had any questions or needed a ride). We wanted to look at Laguna Esmeralda. It took about 2 hours to walk from the parking lot to the Laguna. They were fascinating from the start. As soon as we walked through the first part of the forest, we noticed the "hairy" trees. Sure, it wasn't hair, but it looked like it. This forest reminded us of “Lord of the Rings”. It looked really mystical. Once we had passed through the forest, there was a passage with steppe grasses. I have no idea if they're called that. Here we noticed the dead, broken trees. This passage was reminiscent of a Wild West film. You had a great view of the surrounding mountains. A stream now lay next to us all the way to the lagoon. The rippling water sounded calming. You were in another world.

What was a bit annoying was the muddy path. You had to be extremely careful not to slip or get caught on roots. The last hour was uphill, over rocky and rooted paths. The stream was getting bigger and we knew the lagoon had to be very close. One last bit uphill and then we made it: the lagoon was in front of us. It was gorgeous, this blue or was it turquoise, oh it doesn't matter. The sight of the turquoise-blue water was WORLD! We climbed a few more rocks and had a great view of the lagoon. We ate something there on the rock. Some birds flew over to us and wanted to steal crumbs. They kept sitting on our shoes and watching us, which was funny.

We stayed at the lagoon for quite a while. Three guys even jumped into the icy water. We wanted to, but “unfortunately” we forgot our bath towel. Such crap ;-)!!!

We had to walk back the same way. Our shoes and pants may have ended up looking dirty. Everything was full of moddi.

After the trek we had a delicious meal. Well fortified, we then wanted to go to the Martial Glacier, as from there you should have a fantastic view over Ushuaia and the Beagle Channel. First we took an Uber to the parking lot where the climb begins. We were surprised that there were two people in the Uber. The passenger explained to us that he was protecting his friend. But not in front of us, grin ;). No, the taxi drivers would probably be very aggressive and sometimes aggressive towards the Uber drivers :-( . Uber has been allowed in Ushuaia for two months, but the taxi drivers don't accept that. Wow, we found that really harsh.

So now things were looking up. We walked up a ski slope (without snow). Unfortunately there was no longer a ski lift ;-). But the effort was rewarded. We kept turning around and had an amazing view of the bay. Ushuaia became smaller and smaller the closer we got to the glacier. Both views were great, both down into the bay and up to the glacier. When we were pretty high up, we enjoyed the view for a while and then zig-zagged back down. Both were very tiring.

As a reward, we spent almost 30 minutes in the whirlpool at our hotel. The wellness area is simply fantastic.

We had a bit of stress today booking the flights to our next destination: suddenly there were no flights available for two days and the prices shot up :-( As we found out from Rosario, Aeorolinas Argentinas is on strike and several flights are cancelled Ushuaia were canceled... they probably have a close cooperation with Lufthansa :-)

Tomorrow we're going to Tierra del Fuego National Park.

Many greetings from Patagonia / Tierra del Fuego from the two of us.