Prison at the End of the World

After spending a couple of days hiking around glaciers in El Calafate, Anne, HBomb, O'Canada and Mark got on a plane and went to the End of the World.

When they landed, there were in Ushuaia.

Ushuaia bills itself as "Fin del Mundo" - the end of the world.  It is generally recognized as the southern-most city in the world (there is a town of 2000 people or so in Chile that is actually further south, but it, apparently has not gone through the paperwork of being declared a city, so just go with it).  Currently, Ushuaia is a pretty busy city, not only for tourism, but also because it has a big and active port.

Back in the day, however, Ushuaia was a prison town.  Argentina and Chile were fighting over territory in the southernmost part of South America and both tried to stake their claims by establishing settlements.  Argentina decided to create a penal colony in the cold, harsh island at the end of world to house its worst criminals.  Eventually, this evolved into a prison which housed a bunch of really bad guys, as well as a bunch of political prisoners.

Although some of the prisoners were the worst of the worst, they were allowed a significant amount of freedom, including being taken by train to the forest to cut firewood.  The logic was that this place was so cold and isolated, if they ran away, they would freeze to death before making it back to civilization.  Kind of like the strategy of the Klingons with Rura Penthe, in Star Trek VI..... sorry, totally geeked out there for a second.

HBomb appreciates references to Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country.

Anyway, the prison is now a museum, partially dedicated to prison history, partially dedicated to art and maritime history... there was something about penguins, an exhibit about the "Southern Lights," I think an old car, an exhibit of pre-historic man... frankly, it was a lot of stuff.

There were a few really interesting aspects.  First, one wing of the prison had been left untouched.  Four had been fixed up, decorated, with placards explaining everything, which was nice.  But the one that was left as is, was cold, damp, kind of dark and generally unpleasant.  It was pretty easy to get a sense of how awful this place must have been.

HBomb, of course, caught the vibe first.  He decided that this prison was terrible and threw a temper tantrum in a cell of a political prisoner.  So that wasn't good.

Like any good parent, Mark took the Bomber to the "scared straight" exhibit (at least we think that it what it was - kind of weird regardless).  HBomb was not trying to hear that noise, though.

I'm out of here....

Once he realized what was going on, he made a break for it.  Thankfully, Anne chased him down, and O'Canada made sure he did not escape again...