Thought I would also summarize a little
bit about the foods, the tours and the B&B I have stayed in
Ushuaia, also includes some hyperlinks and pictures for my fellow
travelers.
Restaurants
I don’t eat extravagantly everyday,
but I try to have a good meal once in a while, and try something
local if possible. Overall the meals costs between US$10-30. For
tipping, I don’t think it is required, but I do 10% anyway. Unlike
Peru, the foods and coffee culture in Argentina is at a different
level, and can be expensive. I went to Tante Sara Cafe twice, for
dinner and for lunch. My first dinner in Ushuaia was chicken and
spinach ravioli in Bolognese sauce dish. The ravioli and the sauce
were actually charged separately. I guess as with most pasta dishes,
it is gonna be like that. The ravioli was good, but not excellent.
With water and tips, it came to be around AR$160 (equivalent to
US$20).
Anyhow, the flat bread called flat
meditarraneo from the same restaurant I had for lunch was really
good, also with agua sin gas, it came up to be around AR$110 (US$15).
On the second night, I went to Küar 1900 where I had a king crab
risotto, which was fantastico. It cost about AR$190 (US$24). On the
third day, I had lunch at a restaurant called Banana’s, I had their
menu del dia, which included an onion creamy soup of some kind, a
risotto and a coffee or tea afterwards, The menu set was AR$80
(US$10), I also had a local orange soda. So, in total, it was about
AR$110 (US$15).
In general, I think drinks are more
expensive, water (with or without gas) in restaurant cost about AR$20
(US$2.5). So, I tend to go to a supermarket to get some drinks and
snacks on the first day I get to a town. They don’t have any good
choice of apple, only “tranny” apple, very old and ugly one. I
got banana instead. Hope there are better apples in the other towns.
Tanta Sara Cafe+Bar
Address: San Martin 701 y Fadul,
Ushuaia
Telephone: +542901423912
Küar 1900
Address: San Martin 471, Ushuaia
Telephone: +54290115518530
Website: http://www.kuaronline.com/
Banana’s
Address: San Martin 273, Ushuaia
Telephone: +542901424021
Accommodation
The B&B I stayed is called Valle
Frio Ushuaia, run by two brothers, very nice gentlemen and helpful.
It is about 5 blocks up a small hill from the city center/port. It is
not fancy nancy type of B&B, but it is clean and is pretty
charming in its own way. If you have a tour in the morning and need
to get to the port, it takes about 5-10 mins to walk to the port from
the B&B. Not bad at all. They do safe in the room and very nicely
prepared, a power adapter or splitter whatever you call, that will
work for US plug. I think that is very considerate of them to do
that. Hotel and B&B in Ushuaia in general are not cheap,
especially in peak season, mostly over US$200. This one is in the
lower range for the B&B category. I think they charged me US$80 a
night. I would totally recommend it.
Valle Frio Ushuaia
Address: Bouchard No 310, Ushuaia 9410,
Argentina
Telephone: +542901423610
Website:
http://www.vallefrioushuaia.com/
Tours
Two of three tours (National Park + End
of the World Train tour and Navigation in the Beagle Channel tour) I
have joined are pretty standard, the penguin tour is only run by one
travel agency. I booked all of them from Pira Tours, they are
responsive from their website and in email exchange, which I like. I
did book my tours ahead of time, but when I got here, I could see
that even if you did not book any tours, it should be easy enough to
find some tours the day before. When I was in the states, they seemed
to have trouble letting me to pay the tours online with my credit
card. I noticed a few Tripadvisor comments about the same issue. But
they did reserve the tours for me and I came to pay in person the day
before with cash (or credit card). They do accept American dollars as
well. At the time when I am traveling, it is actually better to pay
in dollars. Depending on the exchange rate, one can consider doing
that. They do have two locations, one on San Martin street, the other
one by the port you cannot miss it. For tipping, apparently it is
also not required. But for the first tour to the National Park, I
think the guide did a fantastic job, so I did give him AR$50 tip
(which is equivalent to US$6). For the two tours, it were a bigger
tour, and the guides were very impersonal, so I didn’t give any
tips, nor did I see anyone did.
Pira Tours
Address: San Martin 847, Ushuaia
Telephone: +5402901435557
Website: http://www.piratour.com.ar/
