Jan 31 At Sea

While at sea today we had another cooking demonstration by French Master Chef Jean-Jacques Dietrich and Executive Chef Wolfgang Maier.  They prepared Mignonette of Beef with Endive “Meuiniere” (Beef Tenderloin) and Salad de Coquille St Jacque (Assorted Greens with Sautéed Scallops).   It is so much fun to watch them work together, as they have slightly different styles, that clash a little, but that they play off of with humor.

Later we had an enrichment lecture by Terry Bishop on the 1982 Falkland Island conflict.   While the islands have been in British control for about 150 years, the Argentineans have claimed ownership.   In 1982 the Argentineans invaded, and the British responded by invading and retaking the islands.  Today, the islands have about 2,500 inhabitants, protected by about 1,000 British troops.

This evening we watched a beautiful sunset and then went to hear Grammy Award winning Sharon Stanley, a vocalist from the Glen Miller Band.

 

Tomorrow we visit Port Stanley in the Falkland Islands.

As we get closer to the Falklands the sea is calming again.  As we head east and north the days are getting shorter already one hour shorter than yesterday.

Jan 30 Ushuaia, Argentina

We had a delightful day in Ushuaia today.   Ushuaia is called the end of the world, as the southern most town in the world.  It is surrounded by mountains (photos).

We were on an organized tour that started with a catamaran  (photo)trip into the harbor where we saw the most photographed light house in South America (photo).

The boat then went by an area with sea lions and Upland geese, flightless ducks that skim across the water furiously beating their wings.

But the colony of cormorants were particularly interesting (where’s Waldo?).

We took a ride on the tiny end of the world train.   The Argentineans' wanted to develop this isolated area, so they placed their maximum security penal colony here around 1914.   It is so isolated that even if you escaped, you would never get off the island, and would die of exposure.   The prisoners built the wooden railed railroad in to the woods to harvest trees for furniture, building material, firewood to heat the prison, and to generate electricity for the town.  The stumps are still visible, the taller stumps were cut during the harsh winter months.  The controversial prison was closed in 1947 by the Perrons.

Jan 28th Kayaking the Strait of Magellan

Last evening we ate in the Italian Restaurant on board the ship.    I had a herb roasted free range chicken and Nancy had pasta with lobster sauce and shrimp.  (Where do you think that chicken roamed about on the ship???)  For desert (photos), I had what they called a Lasagna Chocolata, and Nancy had the Cannolli<sp?>.

Last evening we went to a show with a husband and wife Magician/Comedy Team and also Jamie Michael Stewart.    Jamie Michael Stewart sings, VERY well.   One of the songs he is famous for was the love boat song from the TV Program.

This morning we landed in Punta Arenas, Chile.   Punta Arenas claims to be the southern most city in the world, as it has a population of 120,000.  Tomorrow we visit Ushuaia, Argentina, which is farther south, but only has a population of 50,000.  So it is the southern most town in the world.

In Punta Arenas we went kayaking in the Strait of Magellan.  It was a small group of us, eight, including one of the crew from the ship.    There were about five staff from the tour group.   We did real well kayaking east, but the return leg was against a 20+ mile an hour wind, and we eventually needed a tow.   It was fun, and the people were so nice…   During the off season the person who runs the kayak company is a cartographer.    They gave us a very nice drink to warm us up after the trip, and now all I want to do is sleep.  We will be getting additional photos of the kayaking in a few days. 

I, Roger, am writing this while I wait to use the washer/dryer (they are very busy).   Nancy was off getting a manicure….   Isn’t it the way….  (As it should be :)  Terry bishop presented an entertaining lecture called Round the Horn: Success and failure.  He talked about the discovery of Cape Horn and various attempts to sail around it.

After the lecture and  dinner we sat in the lounge and watched the ship sail through the Beagle channel.   Over a 20 minute period the weather shifted from  torrential rain to sun six times.    Apparently that is fairly typical weather here.  We did see some glaciers, and you can also see a rainbow in the picture.

Tomorrow (today as we launch this blog) may be the day with the most day light of the trip.   Sun rise occurred at 5:50am and will set at 9:41pm.   Even though the sun set last night was at 9:41pm, it was still light enough to read a paper outside at 10:40pm.   Not sure when it became light this morning, but probably about 5am.

This blog is being launched from Ushuaia, literally the end of the world!!!   The farthest point south, excluding only Antarctica.

Jan 27/28 Rock and Roll once more

As predicted, we had another night of rock and roll.   It started at 4am Wednesday morning and lasted until 2:30pm.  It was not as bad as the first night, but we still felt like it would be best to just stay in bed. It rained most of the day and was cool.   A visiting Master Chef is on board, Jean-Jacques Dietrich from Johnson and Wales in Rhode Island, and he and the Executive Chef provided a cooking demonstration that was great – Salmon Tartar and Curried White Fish.   It was fun to watch them and see how they interacted.

We hand a very nice dinner in one of the specialty restaurants, the Polo Grill – Nancy had a Lobster bisque and Shrimp Scampi and I had rack of lamb.  We forced ourselves to have desert (photo’s), Nancy had the Chocolate Mouse Burger and I had the warm  brownie ala mode.

 

We endured a few more hours of rough seas in the evening, but then we re-entered the fjords, and it has been calm since.    At 8am we saw the Skoa Glacier in the Amalia fjord (photos).   We then went to a lecture on upcoming cruises, followed by an excellent lecture on Darwin, Fitzroy and the Beagle.

     

We are currently sailing through the Chilean fjords.  The sun is out, and there is land about 1,000 feet off both sides of the ship…   Lots of small waterfalls due to the rain.  The temperatures are in the 40’s and the sun sets tonight at 9:40.

Jan 25/26 Puerto Chacabuco & San Rafael Glacier

On both the 25th and 26th we have been cruising in narrow fjords, with calm water and beautiful scenery (photo).

On Monday the 25th we arrived in the port of Chacabuco (photo).    You know the drill, Google Earth S45 28.236 W72 50.008.  We went on a bus tour about 60KM to Coyhaique, the capital city of the region.   Our tour guide was a woman named Karen.  She is an American, who met her husband, who is from Chile in Idaho.  he is a gaucho (cowboy), but also a plumber and landscaper.  They moved back to Coyhaique, where she teaches English in the public schools.  We visited a small historical museum and some local crafts stalls.   Along the way we crossed the Andes Mountains and saw some pretty waterfalls (photo).  On the way back we stopped for a taste of typical Chilean appetizers and wine at a local restaurant, of course we ended up purchasing four bottles of vino….  I stopped and launched the previous blog on the way back to the ship.

The ship weighed anchor on Monday evening and after a very calm sail (Holly, you would have even liked it) the ship dropped anchor early Tues. morning outside the Laguna San Rafael (Google Earth S46 22.621 W73 44.594) and we took a catamaran (photo) for an hour cruise into the Lagoon to the San Rafael Glacier (photos).    The Glacier is at the foot of a huge ice field, with ice a thousand feet thick that feeds the glacier.   But the Glacier is retreating 600 feet a year, and by 2030 will no longer flow directly into the Lagoon.  After we cruised back to the ship, we spent the rest of the day relaxing on the ship, including walking almost three miles on the track, to wear off the delightful meals that we have enjoyed, healthy of course.

  

We went to one of the evening entertainments, and found that one of the entertainment staff is Margaret Linn who was on the entertainment staff on the Mediterranean Cruise we took in 2006.

Tonight we are starting a two and a half day cruise to Puerto Arenas, via more fjords.   Early tomorrow morning we will have a ten hour period where we will be out in the ocean again, and probably feeling the motion of the ocean.

JAN 23/24 Rock and Roll

Valparaiso is spread over many steep hills.  Funiculars help people negotiate the hills for a mere 20 cents per ride. (photo)

  

We left Valparaiso at about 6pm on the 22nd and immediately encountered 15 to 20 foot swells.  We “enjoyed” these swells all night.  It was close to impossible to walk, and the only place we felt comfortable was in bed.    Between the swells and the Dramamine all we wanted to do was sleep.   It was like being in a rocking bed, only they were getting a little carried away.   Our cabin is up about four decks from the ocean, and about a hundred feet from the bow, but about every third swell we would hit center, and the spray would fly past and above our veranda.  We cruised all day the 23rd, with continued high swells, but not quite as bad as the night before.  

This morning (1/24) we entered Gulf of Ancud, and the waves immediately reduced to a tolerable level.  We were late getting into Puerto Montt due to the high seas.  The ship dropped anchor in the bay and we took tenders (lifeboats) to shore.  Lotsa waves made it a challenge to get to shore but the crew was determined not to disappoint eager passengers. For those who want to check out where we docked, Google earth S41 28.773 W72 56.276.

We joined a couple from New York, and hired a cab for five hours, $200.   We drove out of town about 64KM to the Petrohue water falls. 

Above the waterfalls you see the Osorno Volcano.  The area has a number of volcanoes including Osorno and Puntiagudo.  Where the water has cut through the rock you can see that the land clearly was  volcanic.  

After touring the water falls, we drove back along the route and ate in a nice restaurant in Ensenada that sits on the 600 square KM Lake Lanquihue, a popular Chilean vacation destination.  Here is a picture of the volcano over the lake.

  

We then had a scenic tour back to the boat.  On this route we also stopped to visit a group of picturesque llamas.

Nancy and I found an internet cafe to transmit the last blog entry, and I found an ATM and diet coke!!!!

So were back on board, and continuing to sail south.   We will continue be to in the gulfs and fjords, so it looks like it will be smooth sailing for the next four days….

Were going to go eat now and see who is winning the football games.

Will blog more latter, hopefully we can launch this one tomorrow in Puerto Chacabuco. 

(Late entry – as anticipated, it has been smooth sailing over night, hate to say it but too smooth, and we are about to arrive at Puerto Chacabuco.)

Jan 21/22 Getting There

We had an uneventful trip to the Boston Airport and the flight to Miami left on time.   Nancy and I had aisle seats across from each other, and no one sitting next to us in the middle seats.   At Miami we walked around a little bit before our next flight.   The floor of the Miami airport has great brass inlays (photo), and fish sculptures on the walls (photos).    

Our flight from Miami actually left a few minutes early, about 11:45pm, which was fortunate, as it had to go a little further then it’s normal route to avoid an active volcano in Ecuador. The plane was not full so Nancy moved over to the empty three seat center section and I had the two seat side section.  Nancy was able to stretch out across the three seats and slept fairly well,  We arrived in Santiago, Chile on time at 10:10am.   Trivia – South America, even the west coast of South America is east of the East Coast of the US, so Santiago is two hours ahead of Boston.  Attached is a photo of the Andes from the plane.

It was the battle of the lines once we reached Santiago.  First we had to get in line to pay a reciprocal fee (while there is no formal VISA, they charge citizens from countries that require Chilean citizens to pay for a VISA the same amount that their citizens pay).   Then we had to get into a long snaky line to go through immigration. We felt like we were waiting for a ride at Disney. Then we picked up our bags and had to get in line to go through customs.   Once through there were Oceania staff to help direct us to a waiting bus for the 1 1/2 hr. ride to Valpariso, a large and bustling seaport.

We were on the boat and checked in by 1:30pm.    Unfortunately we have learned they cancelled a couple of the tours we wanted to take during the cruise, including the zip line, but are working on alternatives.

For those of you with too much time on your hands, you can find where our ship was docked by entering this into Google Earth:

S33 02.269 W71 37.517  

Time for the lifeboat drill, cheers!

On the ship!!!

So were on the ship!!!   We have a blog all set up to go out,  but the ships internet is not high speed, so we need to wait to hit port.  So our blogs will probably only show up on port days, unless we want to send only brief messages.

Our upcoming cruise

We will be flying to Santiago Chile, where we are picked up by Oceania Cruise Line and driven to Valpariso where we will board our ship, the Insignia. The Insignia is a relatively small ship, with less then 800 passangers.

If you go to this website and click on live views, you can see what is going on from the bridge cam and computer lab cam.

http://www.oceaniacruises.com/ships/insignia/default.aspx


Oceania is an upscale cruise line. Business casual is the standard dress, but they do not have you dress up with suits and ties for dinner or activities. Here is a picture of the pool and track.














Our stateroom has a veranda. This is a picture of this class of stateroom.
The ship has a number of dining rooms, pictured is the grand dining room; they have the Terrace Cafe, which is more casual; Waves Grill/Tapas on the Terace; and two nice small restaurants the Polo Grill and Toscana. The menus are designed by Jaques Pe'pin, so the food is the best we have had at sea.



Of course, after all this great food, we are going to have to spend a lot of time in the exercise room or on the track!!!