Bienvenido a Argentina

Buenos Aires from the air

After a long, sleepless overnight flight I arrived in Buenos Aires. Since my connection to Ushuaia required me to travel to another airport in the city, I had to take a bus across town, passing through the downtown area. On the outskirts of town near the international EZE airport there were several fields of people playing soccer, several biking pump tracks, and many trees without leaves. The tree skeletons were the first sign I had that it is winter in the southern hemisphere.

Along the walkway near the Aeroparque

Once I got to the Aeroparque, the domestic airport, I found a nice walkway along the coastline with food trucks selling hamburgers and other meaty sandwiches, a nice relief from all the airport food. The climate is quite nice in Buenos Aires even during the winter, you would be fine just walking in a t-shirt. I spent some time walking around before my next flight and taking in some sights before my next flight.

A restaurant and the sadly unaccessable pier near the Aeroparque

The flight south to Ushuaia was uneventful. That is until the very end of the flight. As we were descending into the airport, the plane starting creaking, the wing was bending more than I would say is comforting, a guy in front of me threw up. You could hardly see anything out the window. We were getting close to the runway when the pilot blasted the engines and we pulled up sharply. He later informed us that he couldn't see the runway, and that we would have to fly in a holding pattern until the weather improved or land at an alternate airport. After circling around above the airport a few times we descended again and made the landing. The entire plane erupted in applause, and rightfully so. The lights on the runway were buried in snow. I've never been more grateful to get off a plane and thank the pilots. Landing on an ice runway with skis was less nerve-wracking than this.

Arriving in Ushuaia. Below and to the right of the light is a human, for scale.

I was welcomed by Pancho, my host professor in Ushuaia. After a quick stop we dropped my baggage at the room I'll be living in for a month, and took a fantastic shower since I hadn't been able to for a few days. Pancho and his wife Angie treated me to a muy muy delicioso dinner. They had fine cuts of beef, pork and lamb with sausage, traditional Argentinian offerings. All in all, an excellent introduction to the city at the end of the world.

The office

This morning I was introduced to many different scientists and students working at CADIC (Centro Austral de Investigaciones Científicas) who work and operate labs in archaeology, biology, geology and other sciences. For my scientist friends who may be interested, there is a huge opportunity for collaboration on many different kinds of projects. I was discussing with Pancho different directions I could take my project, whether I wanted to expand spatio-temporally or work with different organisms and field sites. Luckily for me, the samples I'm interested in working with have been radiocarbon dated, their ontogeny identified (juvenile vs. adult individuals) and sexed. The combination of these characteristics along with dietary information gleaned from stable isotope analysis are extremely useful for not only identifying general ecological information, but about life histories of individuals. Not only that, but in a population of seals that lived and were hunted by humans about 6,000 to 5,000 years ago. Also, I'll have access to large collections of animals from various parts of the food web, including mussels at the base to fish and seabirds at the middle and high trophic levels. Ultimately, I will be able to understand what life was like in Tierra del Fuego from both a holistic perspective and a focused perspective (for the seals, at least.)

More importantly, the view from the office

Until next time, adios amigos!