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Published: January 24th 2013
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We will begin with the end of our day, because who would have ever thought – sitting on our balcony in bathing suits toasting a warm day at the bottom of the world? We are about 650 miles north of Antarctica here, but the pictures don’t lie! Speaking of Antarctica, there is a group of very unhappy passengers on this ship. They paid $3,000 EACH (not a misprint) for a 10-hour round-trip to the Chilean portion of Antarctica, to basically say, “Yeh, I have been to Antarctica.” Anyway, as there are no Navaids down there for the pilots, the gravel road the plane lands on was below VFR minimums, so the trip was scrubbed, thus lots of disappointed people. We hiked with one family that just saved itself $18,000 for this single excursion! We saw a few of the research ships alongside the dock this morning loading for their departures (Punta Arenas and Ushuaia are tied with Christchurch, New Zealand, as the most popular departure spot for Antarctica), and we are still not sure about braving 30 – 40-foot seas and gale force winds for 600 miles to get there on a future trip on a 250’ ship.
Four hours
after anchors aweigh we have backtracked through the remote Strait of Magellan and into the Beagle Channel, named after Sir Charles Darwin’s ship “The Beagle.” The snow-capped mountains and the sunset tonight are unbelievable. The Beagle Channel is 150 miles long and about three miles wide at its narrowest point. Due to the tidal requirements at our next port of call, Ushuaia, we are slowing down considerably, and will get a bonus of passing through the “Darwin Range,” AKA “Glacier Alley,” from 800 – 1000 tomorrow morning so everyone if very happy with the Captain this evening since he made the announcement.
Punta Arenas, which is known for its 70 M.P.H. winds and rough seas, was as gentle as a lamb today for whatever reason, but we are extremely grateful, as there were two cruise ships anchored here this morning and we had to “tender” into the docks. It has to be somewhat of a shock to a city of 120,000 people when 5,000 visitors show up on one day! Punta Arenas (Sandy Beach) is a beautiful small city that is isolated from the remainder of South America and Chile. It sits right on the border of Argentina, which
is where we will be beginning tomorrow. We walked the entire urban center of the city, which reminded both of us very much of the North Coast cities in California. Fuel here is also about $7.50 per gallon, but there are a lot of cars on the street. Our tour director on the ship advised us to hit the cemetery….. Yes, the cemetery, and we are so glad he did. It is one of the most interesting places we have visited. Like the cemetery in Halifax, Nova Scotia, which we visited on our last cruise, this one is full of famous people who lost their lives paving the way for everyone else down in this part of the world. The mausoleums are each a work of art, and there is an amazing international mix of folks buried there. We had lunch with a group of Europeans off the other cruise ship and shared small talk and double espressos with them, which was very pleasant. We then spent the afternoon hiking through a Patagonia forest area here, which began with a chair lift ride (on a ski lift built sometime in the 1950’s!) to the highest mountain in the area (1,500
meters), which offered awesome views of the Strait of Magellan, the northern side of Tierra del Fuego, the city of Punta Arenas, and some pretty cool rain squalls moving across the Strait of Magellan. It was also really nice to spend a couple of hours hiking through a quiet forest, listening to the birds and fast-moving creeks as we returned down the mountain. When one spends a month living aboard a cruise ship, you realize when you get back on dry land; you are still weaving like a drunk from the constant motion of the ship, especially in these latitudes. All-in-all, a great day for Steve and Carol!
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