The cast iron-coloured sea is corrugated with waves as our Zodiac boat returns to the cruise ship. As we bounce over a particularly large chop, I am splatted with sea spray, and the floor of the rigid inflatable boat (RIB) starts to slosh. “It’s just water,” our smiling helmsman shouts over the sound of the protesting engine as another wave thwacks him. “Welcome to Patagonia.”
This five-day Australis cruise through the fjords of Tierra del Fuego, at the southern tip of Chile, charts a course from Punta Arenas, to the Argentine port of Ushuaia. I’ve cruised the Norwegian fjords three times, but this is unlike any itinerary I have experienced there. Not only is this part of the world more remote, but it feels wilder and more unpredictable.
“There are four seasons an hour,” a crew member tells me when I get back from the drenching Zodiac ride. The sky had been lapis blue when we set out.
The scenery of Patagonia’s fjords is not as green as Norway’s, nor is it as vertiginous – although there are serrated mountain ridges and snow-slicked peaks to be seen. And while Norwegian itineraries tend to delve into brightly painted fishing ports, such as Bergen and Stavanger, Chilean sailings take you away from human habitation. This voyage is also a taster of Antarctic expedition cruises, without the long and often turbulent crossing of the Drake Passage. It also costs a fraction of the price of most Antarctic cruises.
One Zodiac excursion brings me to Ainsworth Bay, an inlet fed by the meltwater of the Marinelli Glacier in Alberto de Agostini National Park. On a hike up the moss-mottled headland, my guide picks wild Patagonian parrilla berries for me to try, which – while race car red – taste more like tart green gooseberries.
Once at the top, I see endless wilderness – scree-sided mountains swatched at the top with snow, thickets of wind-bent Nothofagus (southern beech) trees, and deep blue fjord waters.
At Tucker Islets, there is habitation – but not human. These sub-Antarctic islands are home to more than 4,000 mating pairs of Magellanic penguins. I spot my first one in the water – seemingly racing beside our RIB.
Its body is sea-slicked and streamlined, like a little black bullet beside the boat. When we get closer to the islands, I see dozens of them. Less graceful on land, clumsy and off kilter, as they waddle through the tall grass and across the lichen-lacquered rocks.
While most of Tierra del Fuego is uninhabited, there is the spectre of human life here. For 6,000 years, this part of the world was roamed by Yaghan nomadic hunter-gatherers, but the population was devastated by infectious diseases introduced by Europeans in the 19th century.
I find out more about this period of history during a trip by Zodiac to Wulaia Cove, where there is a small museum and the remains of wigwams, canoe runways and fish traps used by the Yaghan. I shiver beneath three layers of thermals as my guide tells me that the Yaghans were mostly unclothed, smearing themselves in seal oil to keep warm.
One thing that the Chilean fjords do have in common with Norway is glaciers – although there are more of them at this southern edge of the Earth. An excursion takes me to Pia Glacier, which is opaline and 100 metres tall in places. You don’t just see it, you hear it; the ice is slowly retreating, so it creaks and, every now and again, releases an orchestral boom from its bowels.
I see another five glaciers in quick succession during a scenic sail down Glacier Alley in the Beagle Channel. “Each one has a different personality,” says on-board lecturer Javier Jara as we glide past these sculptural structures with names like Alemania, Romanche and Francia – a nod to Germany, France, and a French expedition frigate from the 19th century.
There’s no Wi-Fi on this cruise – once we leave Punta Arenas, we spend five days offline. This untethering from technology is so welcome to me. Instead of staring at my screens, I spend hours gazing out of the ship’s floor-to-ceiling windows, catching glimpses of toninas (Patagonian dolphins), seals and the quick flick of a humpback fluke, as agile sooty shearwater seabirds carve up the air above.
While there is no connectivity, there are all of the other home comforts on board the 200-passenger Ventus Australis. Three-course meals are served for both lunch and dinner, with menus featuring dishes such as slow-braised beef in Carménère, and hake with Patagonian king crab. In the bar, calafate sours – a take on the pisco sour made with Patagonian calafate berries – are delicious. Cabins, meanwhile, come with picture windows, plump beds and elegant leather-and-wood interiors.
In Ushuaia, the soothing grey, blue and green scenery I have become so used to is replaced by tutti frutti-coloured wooden buildings, brightly painted crab shacks and street art.
There is a static charge of excitement in the world’s most southerly city, as people return from, or prepare to embark on, journeys to the end of the Earth.
I am loving it, until my phone catches signal. As the trill of messages and emails begins, I wish I was back in the waterlogged RIB, being mithered by the waves rather than responsibilities.
How to do it
Australis Cruises’ four-night Fjords of Tierra del Fuego voyage between Punta Arenas and Ushuaia costs from $1,955pp (£1,447pp) for travel between September 2026 and April 2027. The price includes full board accommodation, open bar at set times, shore excursions and on-board activities.
Fly to Santiago and back from Buenos Aires; Iberia, Latam and KLM/Air France serve both from the UK with one stop, while British Airways flies direct to Santiago.
