The Long Crossing to San Sebastián
The drive from Cerro Sombrero southeast to the Complejo Fronterizo San Sebastián is the longest stretch of the day — around 120 kilometres of Fuegian steppe on Ruta 257. The landscape here is wide and treeless, the road largely unpopulated, the sky enormous. You are on the Chilean half of Isla Grande de Tierra del Fuego, a land divided at the 68th meridian by the 1881 Treaty between Argentina and Chile. Sheep estancias appear at intervals along the route, some dating to the late 19th century when the land was subdivided among a handful of powerful families. The Selk'nam people who once populated this northern plain were effectively wiped out in the same period, through disease, displacement, and a bounty system that paid settlers per kill.
The Chilean border post at San Sebastián is reached in the mid-afternoon. Exit formalities here are straightforward — stamp out at Chilean immigration, cancel any vehicle permit. Then drive the 14 kilometres of no-man's-land to the Argentine checkpoint, a slightly absurd arrangement necessitated by the fact that the two countries never agreed to co-locate their facilities.