Tracing the shoreline of the icy Ukika River, I follow a trail through an evergreen woodland of southern beech trees studded with clumps of orange fungi the shape and size of golfballs. The branches are miniature ecosystems, blanketed with tiny bryophytes (a group of plants that includes mosses, liverworts and hornworts) and tangled with a straggly lichen known as old man’s beard, which ripples as I pass. Sinuous roots and fallen trunks crisscross the path, while an ominous creaking rings out as the canopy shakes in the ferocious wind. There’s no one else around, but the pneumatic tapping of a Magellanic woodpecker periodically sounds above the din, its striking crimson head hidden from view.
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/travel/article/hike-chile-tierra-del-fuego-end-of-the-world
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