Home » Adventures » Patagonia » Paso de la Oveja
After hiking the entire Sierra Valdivieso Circuit I road walked a few hours to the start of Paso de la Oveja. I did not feel comfortable trying to hitch that stretch since I spoke no Spanish, but still someone who spoke a little broken English gave me a lift unprompted the last couple of kilometers. With my late arrival at the trailhead I only walked for an hour along a muddy 4WD track before camping at a reasonable hour at the border of Parque Nacional Tierra del Fuego.
I was still not back to my efficient and early start times from the CDT, but was at least hiking by 9 a.m. A walk through the woods brought me to the turnoff for Laguna del Caminante. A traverse along a steep cliff side led to this beautiful mountain lake. A steep, muddy slide down brought me to the lake shore and nice campsites among the gnarly lenga trees. Although irresponsibility with human waste detracted from the area’s appeal.
After a siesta at camp I explored further up the Superior Valley. A climb through the narrow, steep valley led to another beautiful mountain lake of Laguna Superior. I did not scale any of the surrounding peaks but just scrambled on some of the lower hills before finally returning back to camp for dinner.
For the first time since I arrived in Ushuaia a sunny, blue sky greeted me when I awoke. Although to offset the good weather it had also snowed a little overnight, with a couple flakes on my tent and snow in the mountains higher up. I walked back to the main trail and had a nice climb to Paso de la Oveja. On the other side lay more scrambling up loose scree before finding the good trail high above the valley floor. This high route eventually led to a steep descent back to the forest floor, where I spent a large amount of energy scrambling over large clumps of downed trees. Progress was slow, but it eventually led out of the valley and across a farmer’s field — I may have taken a wrong turn near the end, but at least no one yelled at me in Spanish.
With the trail complete I then slugged it along the roads to reach my hostel. Figuring out the local bus system would have greatly reduced the walk, but that would have been to difficult without being able to speak with anyone.
