Yo, moi-même and I

I am at the very bottom, the very tip of the world and it seems a good place to start. I feel as if my journey has just begun. I left America almost 6 months ago, but this is where I feel it all begins. There is nowhere to go but north, and so I do.

I am absolutely deliriously happy to be on my own and I feel as if I came to the end of the world to find what I needed. I hiked in Parque Nacional Tierra del Fuego, near Ushuaia, chatting to myself the whole way. I saw two people in three hours, and I hiked along the water and through grasslands that looked like scenes from The Neverending Story. When I came to the swamp of sadness, where Atreyu´s horse dies, I re-claimed it the swamp of happiness and I came back to my hostel with mud up to my knees and soaked through with snow and mist.

After Ushuaia I spent 20 hours going to El Calafate, crossing the border into Chile twice and getting a little tipsy on box wine in the bus station with a new friend. I continued on to El Chalten, a pueblo out in the middle of Patagonia - only 23 years old with no banks, dial-up internet and the pristine and free Parque Nacional Los Glaciares. I hiked to Lago Torre, where ice chunks from the glacier float in the lake. I cried on the trail because it is just so beautiful. In five years, this new little town will be overrun with tourists and paved roads.

I am shockingly low on money and I have the entire South American continent to cross with two and a half months until I touch US soil. I´ve never been so happy. I´ve never felt so lucky to be here, to be doing what I am doing.