Buenos Aires

The night prior to Buenos Aires we had our second Ensemble Cocktail party and everyone attended - this time I chose the Explorers Lounge for the party so we weren’t so crowded; it was perfect. I asked almost everyone for a quick description of the Antarctic and I got two consistent responses: “indescribable” and “awesome.” That pretty much sums up how I feel about it. Everyone agreed that they could have spent several more days in the area before heading out.

We arrived in port to gray and rainy skies, but the rain soon stopped and we headed into the city. We were planning to taxi directly to the Recolleto area to do some photography in the cemetery where Eva Perone is buried but the line for the taxies was quite long so we ended up taking the H Stern shuttle bus to their jewelry shop in the Marriott Plaza Hotel and then taxiing over from there. This cemetery is fascinating as it is made up of beautiful above ground mausoleums - each corner you turn seems to be better than the last.

Eva’s mausoleum is actually one of the least impressive, but it is always marked with many fresh flowers and, of course, with many people crowding around to see it. After about an hour of wandering around, the rain started again and we put on our little plastic ponchos… almost everyone else left so we had the whole place almost to ourselves. Now I admit that blue skies would have made prettier pictures, but I took bunches anyway and I didn’t have to wait for anyone to get out of my picture! The cemetery dates from about 1830, but the earliest date we could find was about 1840. Some of the mausoleums are well cared for and others are falling into ruin. Most have windows in the doors so you can look inside. These are family plots and probably hold many coffins both above and below the ground. They have a tiny stairway going to the underground area inside each structure. Many also have stained glass windows or cupolas made of glass. One of the pictures here shows the interior of one mausoleum where the door was open.

The rain continued sometimes a little bit and sometimes harder so we decided to have lunch in a nearby Irish Pub to see if it might stop. When we came out it was raining even harder so we found a taxi and headed back to the ship.

This was an overnight port so when we awoke the next morning to beautiful blue skies we headed back out. This time we just wanted to wander around the city a bit so we again rode the H Stern shuttle and spent about 3 hours looking in the shops on Calle Florida; the main shopping area. Jim bought a new belt but I can tell you from the size and number of the shopping bags being carried back onto the ship, we were in the minority in not buying much. Even though we had been here in December, I still feel that I have just barely scratched the surface of this fascinating city. There was a folkloric show late in the afternoon in the showroom and then in the evening we headed to Monte Video.

Port Stanley, Falkland Islands

We made it! This is a commonly missed stop on these cruises as the weather is often too bad to anchor or even to get there. Both Amsterdam and Veendam missed it recently so we are feeling very lucky. This was my last chance for penguins so we had booked an excursion. I had wanted either one that went to King penguins or Rockhopper penguins but both were full so we were on one to Bluff Cove for Gentoo penguins. Now the excursion involved the tender, a small bus and then 4x4 Land Rovers and warned that is was not for those with back or neck problems, but I couldn’t miss my last opportunity for penguins up close and personal so I did it. It was a rough ride, but I survived it and am not a whole lot worse for it today! There were several thousand Gentoo penguins on a nice stretch of beach on a private farm AND 5 King Penguins!!! So I got my King penguin pictures after all. They are bigger than the Gentoo and have the distinct yellow around their upper chest - really beautiful - and then to make it even better one had a new chick hatched just the day before. They were a long way off but with my zoom I shot a ton of pictures. I hope you can see the adult feeding the chick between her feet.

I thought the Falklands were very interesting. They are very flat; the highest hills are only about 2,000 feet. There are no trees except in the town where people have planted them. It has a very different kind of beauty similar to how I picture areas on Scotland. Port Stanley looks very British or Irish and of course, the people speak a very British English. When we got back on the ship we found that we had been there at an interesting time for another reason. Apparently the President of Argentina had signed a new proclamation that morning claiming all the area including the Falklands and stating that any ships sailing in that area must have some sort of a special Argentinean permit. We don’t have this permit so we shall see what happens when we arrive there in a couple days.

Later in the evening we had dinner in the Pinnacle with the Ice Pilot, Captain Pat Toomey and had a great meal as well as getting to hear some more of his stories. He was a great addition to this cruise as he took the time to do pre and post Antarctic lectures. He has been at sea for his whole adult life and his wife often accompanies him.

Now we have two sea days before Buenos Aires. I’m sitting in the showroom writing this as they are giving Tango lessons. There are at least 40 couples (probably more) taking the lesson. The instructor is a really cute young man who is a member of the Pampas Devils who will be dancing on the ship for a couple nights. It’s times like this I wish my bones were in better shape as I used to love to Tango even though I needed someone that was a really good dancer to lead.

Antarctica Day 3 and next

Antarctica Day 3

Today was expedition cruising at its best - the Captain has been reminding us, our itinerary is totally based on weather and ice conditions. This morning we were supposed to enter the Antarctica Sound (Iceberg Alley) and see Paulette Island. Our approach to the Sound was blocked by pack ice that had not been reported. It was a huge area of sea ice and some icebergs that the winds had blown up from the southwest. After looking around for a while the Captain decided to head straight for Elephant Island. There was an expedition ship on the north side of the ice and we were on the south… There were 12 miles of ice between the two ships and both were looking for a channel to get through - neither found one. We finally doubled back to where we had started in the very early morning hours and then headed northeast. We had lost so much time that now there was no time to go to Elephant Island and we are headed straight for Port Stanley in the Falklands (plan D). We passed a number of huge icebergs but less and less of the small ones as we went north; by bedtime, there were none to be seen. For the many times that I’ve said I find the sea endless fascinating, I have to admit I miss the icebergs!  Especially the ones with penguins on them.

At Sea Heading to the Falklands

We left Antarctica at about 1:00 this morning and woke up to gray, foggy skies but again we have smooth passage in the Drake.

This morning was the Penguin Races; I had my penguin all dressed up in my sparkly necklace… we didn’t win the race but she was the best dressed penguin! Jim played in the Texas Hold’em tournament and was the 3rd out - good thing we aren’t gamblers.

We had lunch at the table with our Ice Pilot, Captain Pat Toomey. We had eaten lunch at his table a few days ago and he is really interesting… we are taking him to the Pinnacle tomorrow night as he will disembark in Buenos Aires. He gave a talk this afternoon describing what we actually did and the routes we ended up taking. He had done one just after Ushuaia detailing Plan A, the best possible itinerary and the one we would do if everything was perfect.

All in all it was a quiet day after the excitement of the Antarctic and it was nice not to be wearing the extra clothes and going in and out on the freezing decks for pictures. It’s still freezing out there, but I don’t have to go out.
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Antarctica Day 2

The day stayed very cold but there were patches of sun that would peak through the clouds giving us some very interesting lighting for photography. We went by many icebergs of all sizes; bergy bits, growlers to huge tabular icebergs and ones with the wonderful shapes and caves. We saw whales, seals, penguins and many types of birds.

We made it into Paradise Bay and saw the Chilean Base and the Argentinean Almirante Brown Base where we landed before. There was an expedition ship doing landings at Almirante Brown and you can see the people up on the hill. This is the hill that Jim and most of the others in our group climbed and then slid down on their bottoms - great fun for adults that don’t do that kind of stuff much these days. It looks considerably different with much of the snow melted but we could easily see penguins everywhere from the ship.

We cruised for a couple more hours and then reached Cuverville Island at about 12:30 pm. Here the snow and ice had also melted back considerably in the couple months and we could see literally thousands of penguins on the land and in the water around the ship. The Captain was able to get the ship very close here and actually spun the ship around so both sides and the aft could have a nice view. Very soon after we left Cuverville Island the fog descended and you couldn’t see anything… time for lunch and a nap while the ship headed toward Deception Island. I had thought we would be able to go into the caldera of the island, but Prinsendam is too big.

At about 4:00pm the Captain came on the speakers and announced that since the heat and hot water had been out all morning he was giving everyone a free bar for 1 hour prior to dinner; a very nice gesture since the ship did get quite chilly! Jim and I went to Explorers Lounge and had our free cocktail (his usual Jack and I had an Irish Coffee) then headed to the Lido for dinner. At about 7:30 we arrived at Deception Island - the tour guide announced it on the speakers and said “it’s out there, we can see it on radar“… but all we could see was fog. Suddenly the fog lifted enough that we could see the entrance called Neptune’s Bellows - mother nature seems to like Prinsendam. We made a circle around the island and the fog stayed up enough for us to see the whole thing, but not to the top of the hills. Shortly after that we headed to bed.

Antarctica - day 1

Wow, blue skies - you couldn’t ask for a better day. We were slightly delayed in reaching our first scenic cruising location, the approach to Palmer Station, but when we arrived a little after noon it was bright and sunny. About a dozen people from the American base came out to the ship in zodiacs to give presentations and have a meal and nice hot showers. Holland America has an agreement with them and it works well for both parties. It was fun seeing the zodiacs approach the ship and really helped put what we were seeing into size perspective. After seeing the zodiacs up close it really showed how special the Polar Cirkel boats we had on MS Fram were - ours were semi-rigid sided and had actual seats and a rail down the center to hold on to and a rail at the front of the boat that really helped when you were getting in and out. Most people were along the side rails on Deck 4 or on one of the exposed front decks… I’m a wimp, I parked myself on the back deck outside the lido. It was much warmer as I was pretty much out of the wind and much of the time I was in the sun. I really didn’t care that I saw where we have been rather than where we were going. The guy in the hot tub was on the deck below and if I weren’t such a camera nut, I’d have probably been there too… great way to see the Antarctic! After the sun went down at about 9:30 it got really cold really quick so we gave up and went back to the cabin… and missed the golden light. Watching out the window the light was so beautiful on two icebergs that Jim ran upstairs to get it, but pretty much missed it.

This morning we are sitting in the very back of the lido watching out the aft windows and running out to the back deck when there are shots… it’s gray and cold. The sun does break through every once in a while and make some marvelous shots. We are in Deception Bay and just passed Almirante Brown Base where we landed before. There was an Expedition ship anchored there and we could see the people up on the hill that Jim climbed and slid down on the snow.

We’ve seen a number of penguins in the water along with several kinds of seals and a number of different birds. The picture at the bottom shows penguins (tiny black dots) on the land taken with my 400 zoom so I am really glad we had the chance to see them up close on Fram!!!

Ushuaia

When we arrived in Ushuaia the skies were sort of mixed, clouds and rain. We waited about a half hour and then walked into town (taking the umbrella). We hadn’t had time to see any of the town when we were there in December so we wandered around a bit and looked in the souvenir shops. Then we stopped in an Irish Pub and had an Irish coffee… tasted really good. We shopped in a couple leather shops and I bought a new belt and a really cute fur jacket that’s also really warm!

The Valentine’s Day ball was held last night after we left Ushuaia even though it was only the 13th. The Captain decided to hold it when the seas would be relatively calm instead of chancing the Drake passage which we would be in tonight. They decorated the Showroom at Sea (yes, it used to be the Queen’s Lounge) with red and pink and white balloons and streamers… it looked really cute.

This morning (Sunday) Jim got up at about 6:00 to see Cape Horn. We were just rounding the Horn as he headed out to get some pictures. I was a bit too lazy to get out of the nice warm bed and I settled for seeing it out the window and on TV from the Bridge Camera. Smooth seas and almost cloudless skies! The picture doesn't look like blue skies, but it really was that way... this cloud just happened to be in the picture. It was beautiful and almost unheard of weather. The Captain was able to completely circle Isla Horne before we turned south to continue on into the Drake Passage on our way to Antarctica. Right now we are having Drake Lake… a far different experience from our southbound passage two months ago! Keep your fingers crossed for us for good weather! I would love to have some blue skies while we are doing the scenic cruising in Antarctica since we had gray skies most of the time on the last trip.

I’ve forgotten to mention that on many of the evenings the waiters are dressed in theme costumes. Last night for the Valentine formal night they had on red vests with red bow ties and today for he Chinese New Year they are in Chinese costumes. The ship decorates for each occasion…some more than others.

Punta Arenas, Chile

Friday we were docked in Punta Arenas. We had booked and early excursion to Magdalena Island to see the penguins - we had to be in the showroom at 7:30 for it. We had a short bus ride to the ferry and then a 90 minute ferry ride out to the island. I’ve never seen a ferry boat quite like this one. It had a vehicle ramp on one side and a long skinny cabin along the other - about the width of a train car. During the ride we went in and out of rain, but had no rain while we were on the island.

Penguins, penguins, penguins… thousands of them. These were Megellan penguins, a variety we hadn’t seen before. They are in the end stage of the molt so some were already in their new feathers and able to go into the water and others were still molting with patches of feathers on their bodies. You could still pick out the young ones even though they are now the same size as the adults, but the feathers they are shedding have a brownish color to them. Instead of making rock nests like the penguins in the Antarctic, these dig burrows into the ground.

Our hour on the island went by much too quickly, but I managed to shoot about 350 pictures. I almost forgot, there is a large lighthouse at the top of the island and many of the people walked up to it. It was lovely… but I spent my time down near the shoreline with my little penguin friends.

Holland America did not give out the Antarctic jackets as they have in the past and a number of the passengers are quite upset as they had planned on them. I had also thought we would be getting them, but realized that we hadn’t been asked for our size request so I purchased a heavy hooded sweater in Ecuador - it’s proved to have been a good purchase!

This morning (Saturday) we passed several big glaciers on our way to Ushuaia. They were spectacular… and would have been even more so if we had had a little bit nicer sky. The subdued light is good to bring out the details of the glacier… but I don’t think you can beat photos with blue skies. We will dock in Ushuaia in a couple hours - it’s trivia time. More later.
Pictires soon - trouble connecting