January 30 - Things I’ve learned about Chile that I found interesting

I remember things better when I write them down and in the last several days from my various drivers and guides, I’ve learned things about this country that I don’t want to forget. So here goes. This stuff may be of no interest to anyone else, so don’t spend the time reading if that’s the case.

I’ve learned that the average Chilean earns the equivalent of about $800 per month. Everyone has to pay at least 7% into the national health system. I was told that the national health system is good if you are suffering from something on a list of catastrophic diseases the government has developed.  If you have one of those, your care, medicine etc. are covered completely. If whatever ails you isn’t on that list, you’re in trouble.  There are long waiting times to be seen or treated.  If you want to participate in a private health system, it costs 23% more of your income, but there are still difficulties because many of the doctors work for both systems.

I was told by several of the Chileans I encountered that the public education system is pretty bad, so many families try to send their children to private schools.  A mediocre, but still superior to a public one, school costs around $600 per month. Given the average income I can see a family would be stretching to afford this.  Chile also has a subsidized housing system.  For lower income people the government will subsidize housing costs anywhere from 10 to 90 percent.  While that sounds pretty good the average size of a house may be only 45 meters; that’s a little over 400 square feet.  The average Chilean family has 2.8 children.  I can’t help thinking that makes for tight quarters.

The housing situation became a problem when Covid arrived.  In Chile the country was locked down for nearly 18 months.  According to my guide yesterday lockdown in Chile meant that people were allowed to go out of their homes for two hours a day every day to do exercise of some kind, masked and not in groups.  They were allowed out for two hours  per week to shop for food and other necessaries.  Aside from that, if they were caught outside they were subject to fines and/or arrest.  Ingrid told me that the enforced lockdowns in small spaces created a lot of domestic difficulties among families. The incidence of spousal and child abuse increased dramatically apparently.

When Al and I visited Santiago 18 years ago, we rode the Metro and wandered around downtown in the district where the main square, cathedral, museums and central market are and felt totally safe and most everywhere was spotless.  All my guides on this trip told me that in the cities it's dirty and there are gangs of "delinquents," as they put it, who prey on everyone, not just tourists.  They all attributed this to an exploding immigrant population.  Evidently Chile has lots of people moving here from Venezuela and other South American countries suffering political unrest

Okay, those are some of the things I was told and want to remember.  They actually make me happy that I’m a citizen of the USA.  Oh, one more thing.  The current president of Chile, Gabriel Boric, is only in his mid-30’s, has never had a job outside of government, is extremely far left ideologically  as several people told me, and as Ingrid (my guide in Puerto Montt) said “he has no idea what he’s doing.”  In Chile the president serves for 4 years and can’t run again immediately.  She said he has two more years to go before, as she put it, “the next president will have to figure out how to straighten up the mess.”  Some of this sounds strangely familiar. 

January 30 - Castro, Chiloé Island, Chile

We’re in the land (waters) of spotty internet connection.  I’ve been unable to upload yesterday’s report and will probably wind up be being behind for a while.

While it’s fresh in my mind I’ll write about today. We anchored this morning off the city of Castro, the capital of the island of Chiloé.  Castro is a small city of approximately 42,000 residents and the third oldest continuously occupied city in Chile. Unlike the place we spent yesterday, the population is mainly Spanish and a mixture of indigenous and Spanish.  Most of the people I saw on my little visit ashore had dark hair and browner complexions.  I didn’t book a tour here.  There weren’t too many offered but they included things like horseback riding, hiking, and kayaking, none of which are my cup of tea anymore.

I tried to get a taxi for a little island tour, but apparently there are only a couple on the island and they were otherwise occupied.  Instead I took the shuttle bus up a pretty steep hill to the main square.  The place has a couple of distinctive features, notably many of the houses and small shops near the water are built on stilts; I assume that’s protection for high seas.  Many are also brightly painted which reminded me of a few places in the Caribbean and a couple of places I’ve seen such a colorful palette in Scandinavia.

The bus dropped us off next to the largest church in town, the Iglesia de San Francisco.  From the outside it looked like many other large churches, but inside it was truly unique.  Everything inside is made of or covered with wood. The walls, columns, altars, pews, and even the dome are all clad in a reddish wood which I’m thinking is probably a native red wood tree.  I didn’t have a guide and I can’t cheat by looking on the net, so it’s just a guess on my part.  Anyway, the rich color gave a warmth to the interior that I haven’t often felt in a fairly large church. I think I read that this church was built in the early part of the 20th century to replace an older one which burned. If it also was mainly wood I can see how it would go up in flames in a heartbeat.

There was a tiny museum off to one side which had some very ornate vestments on display and some old missals and hymnals.  No admission fee was required but I put something in the collection box anyway.  Next door separated by a little garden was a row of little shops.  In an earlier time they must have been parish offices or classrooms.  Now they were occupied by local women selling knitted caps and scarves and mittens.  The ladies were all busily knitting.  There was also a table selling local homey.  I forgot to mention in yesterday’s report that our guide Ingrid told us that in this part of Chile beekeeping is a big business and they are famous for their honey.  I wanted to buy a little jar of honey and a brightly colored scarf, but I have no Chilean pesos and they didn’t take dollars or credit cards.  Oh well, maybe next time. The little garden had lush green grass and beautiful hydrangeas growing along the perimeter.  They were some of the prettiest and biggest ones I’ve ever seen.

Across the street from the church was the main square.  It was bustling with people.  There were a few balloon vendors, one dressed like a very colorful pig.  His balloons were cute little pigs.  I tried to get  a picture but there were too many people and too much going on.

Sorry this didn't turn out and I can't figure out how to get rid of it in the post.

After a little while a shuttle came and I decided to ride back down to catch a tender.  It was a cute little place and worth going ashore. Out where we’re anchored I forgot to mention that there are all kinds of aqua farms.  In fact, all along the shoreline there is one after the other.  I asked someone if they knew what was being raised and I was told that the two principal things are salmon and mussels. The salmon are in penned areas which I can clearly see and the mussels are grown on lines with buoys floating on the surface.  From my veranda I can see thousands of them.

A couple of photos of aquafarms. If you click on them you can see that the water is full of little floats, each marking a line of mussels

Well, that’s all for now.  Tonight I’m dining at a table hosted by Iggy, the leader of the expedition team on the ship.  He has apparently been working in Antarctica for more than 20 years so it should be pretty interesting.  More later.

January 29 - Puerto Montt, Chile

We've had no internet for two days so I've been MIA.  Hopefully I can get this uploaded. I don't know if photos will work.

Before I forget, two countries beginning with A but not ending in A are Afghanistan and Azerbaijan.

I’m going to sound repetitive, but I had another fabulous day.  We arrived at Puerto Montt around 9:30 AM and by 10 AM the tenders were overboard to take us ashore. It was foggy and looked overcast, but I think it was really more like the marine layer you see in the mornings in places like San Diego, because as the day wore on the fog disappeared and we had bright sunshine and Carolina blue skies.

This is how the day started, not very auspicious

Later in the day we had this view of Mt. Osorno

My tour today took me to places I’ve visited before, but the scenery is so lovely I wanted to see them again.  Our bus headed inland and we arrived at the city of Puerto Varas, also known as the city of roses, on the shore of Lake Llanquehué, the second largest lake in South America. I should recount a little of the history of this area. When the Spanish conquered most of South America they basically stopped settling south of the city of Valdivia in Chile on the Pacific side of the continent.  Where I am today is about 3° latitude south of Valdivia (I think that’s about 200 miles, but I’m not sure) because the area was considered not worth much and it had many volcanoes. This area is all part of Patagonia and I’ll tell you about that another day.

A little square in Puerto Varas by the lake

Anyway, after Chile gained its independence from Spain around 1850 the Chilean government decided it wanted to settle this area of the country.  It had a German advisor who advised  that the region would be good for cattle and sheep farming and dairy production. He was charged with the task of recruiting German families to be pioneers of a sort to build an economy here.  It took him a couple of years to find families who met specific criteria and were willing to make such a dramatic move.  Not just anyone was accepted to immigrate.

And so the area shows a great deal of German influence. There are buildings with roof structures like those you see in Bavaria; there is a German school.  Many of the people have German names and are fair.  My guide today was Ingrid, a fifth-generation descendant of those settlers.  The area is very lush and green with lots of pastureland.  The area is also very geologically active.  Overlooking the Lake is the Mt. Fuji of Chile, Mt. Osorno.  Nearby is Mt. Calbuco. The former is active but hasn’t erupted for many years, but Calbuco had a major eruption in 2015. The locals call it the Bad Boy of the mountains.

Mt. Calbuco, the Bad Boy mountain which had a major eruption in 2015

We had an early lunch and time to walk around Puerto Varas before traveling to our next stop, the Emerald Lake.  The lake’s formal name is Todos los Santos (All Saints Lake) but because of its beautiful green color the former name seems appropriate.  We took a boat ride so we could see the surrounding mountains and forest.  These are all of course part of the Andes.  Next we took a five-minute bus ride to Petrohué, the name of the river flowing down from the mountains with rapids and waterfalls. The area around both the lake and the river is a national park.  Today was a Sunday and since it’s summer there are school vacations so every place we stopped there were lots of families enjoying the sunny day and the glorious scenery.  The lakes which have very cold water had plenty of people swimming in them.  After about an hour to walk on the trail leading to the river and views of the rapids, it was time to board the bus and head back to Puerto Montt.

Cruising on the Emerald Lake. It doesn't look very green here, but trust me it was.

It was a little after 6 PM by the time we arrived and tendered back to the ship.  I was pooped (I walked over four miles on sometimes very uneven paths) so I ditched my dinner plans and sat on my veranda for a little while before getting cleaned up and having a late light dinner.  Speaking of light, it stays light very late here, 9:30ish).  When we left Puerto Montt we sailed down a sound or bay which is very pretty. On our port side were the magnificent Andes and on our starboard a peninsula and then a series of small islands.  Since we were in protected waters it was smooth sailing.  We don’t have far to go to our next stop, Castro on the island of Chiloé.

So, for now Buenos Noches. 

Ignore the figure in the foreground. I wanted to show the falls in the background.

January 28 - Heading south off the coast of Chile

Today is a sea day as we sail off the coast of Chile on a heading of 179.1°, so almost due south. The air is cool, around 60° and there’s a pretty brisk breeze of 21.5 mph out of the south. Because of the combination of course and wind direction we aren’t experiencing a lot of movement on the ship.

This morning after breakfast I went to the “Meet your Expedition Team” event.  I’m truly impressed. We have a couple of marine biologists, two geologists, some ornithologists, and a variety of other scientific disciplines.  The team numbers about 20.  A couple of them will lead kayaking tours around Antarctica and South Georgia; others will accompany the zodiac groups ashore.  I’m going nowhere near a kayak.  The last time I tried that Al and I tipped over and couldn’t get back in.  I’m not going to risk that in these frigid waters.  Actually, if I’m honest, the biggest reason is that I don’t want to have to be hauled back in like the great white whale.

At noon it was time for Trivia, so naturally I had to join a team.  I’m on one called the Travel Warriors and we placed respectably in the middle.  Trivia is cumulative for this leg of the cruise so no prizes were awarded.  (Darn, I really did want a fake leather passport holder!) The lounge was full though.  There were 12 teams of 10 each.  We have about 420 passengers onboard so nearly one third are playing.

After lunch I went to a talk by one of the geologists on the expedition team.  She was on my last cruise over Thanksgiving and I enjoyed her talks then.  Today she gave us, and I’m passing on to you, a geology lesson. Along the western coast of South America two tectonic plates meet. The plate which forms the continent is fittingly named the South American plate. To the west under the Pacific is the Nazca Plate. Where the two plates meet there is a subduction zone, which in this case means that the Nazca Plate is being driven down while the other one is moving up creating the Andes Mountains.  On the ocean side a deep trench is formed which is named the Peru-Chile Trench or the Atacama Trench.  It has depths of up to 26,000 feet. On the continent the Andes have mountains over the height of 20,000 feet with the highest being Mt. Aconcagua, which is nearly 23,000 feet tall.  I find some symmetry there with such highs and lows. 

The Andes are relatively new so they are still very jagged and rugged because they haven’t been worn down by wind and water.  There are estimated to be around 150  volcanoes along the Andes chain, some of them very active.  My tour tomorrow from Puerto Montt will take me near one of those so I’ll tell you more then.  One of the most interesting things about the talk was a series of slides she showed of  close ups of different things around the ship, like countertops and floors.  She explained that these were mainly igneous rocks (like the Andes are made of) and in some of the slides she pointed out fossils of spiral shelled creatures or other things in the granite we were looking at.  It has given me a greater interest in paying attention to granite and marble floors and counters.  Who knew (not I) that those nice designs were sometimes fossil cross-sections.   

Tonight I went first to a cocktail party with the captain and his chief staff  members and then I dined with the Future Cruise Consultant.  We had a table of six and they were all delightful. There were two British ladies, a New Yorker, an Aussie woman who lives in Houston and a gentlemen from Harrisburg, PA. Our host is from Holland, as is our captain.  We had interesting conversations about all sorts of things. The Australian woman had suffered something which is one of my greatest fears – she shipped her luggage with a company called Luggage Forward and it didn’t arrive!  Tonight was a formal night and she had managed to piece together  a rather bohemian outfit that really didn’t look out of place. 

Well that’s it for tonight.  I’ll give you a pretty easy trivia question from today’s game.  Can you name two countries whose names begin with A but don’t end in A?

January 27 – Oh What a Night (and Day)!

I’m on board and I’ve had another great day.  My driver for the last two days Adolfo had been sent to do an all-day tour so today I had Rodrigo to drive me to San Antonio to catch the ship.  As usual I sat up front and it was an interesting ride to say the least.  Rodrigo is Chilean, 52 and spent a few years in the Chilean army.  Somehow, I’m not exactly sure how, he spent two years in Afghanistan working with a K-9 soldier doing bomb detection assignments.  He showed me pictures of him with his dog, a video of them standing by a Blackhawk at Bagram, and a letter of commendation from a Colonel.  I don’t know exactly how or why he was there, but I really think he was.  As we were talking he asked me if I liked the singers Elvis and Neil Armstrong. That caught me off guard and I said’ Rodrigo, I think Neil Armstrong was an astronaut.” He said he always gets confused and it was that black singer with the raspy voice. Aha, he meant Louis Armstrong.  I told him I liked both of them. So he  got his phone out again and showed me videos of him singing two Elvis songs and the Armstrong song What a Wonderful world. Honestly, if I hadn’t been looking at the videos I could have believed that I was hearing the real thing; he was that good. I told him he was missing his calling being a driver and tour guide.

The drive went very fast because I was thoroughly entertained.  Check-in was easy and I was on the Quest in no time. My cabin was ready so I plopped my purse and carryon down and headed for lunch in the Colonnade. As I sat there a couple I met at the hotel in Santiago came by and joined me. They are a delightful couple, Sam and Alexandra, who live part-time in Alaska and part-time in Nebraska. Sam runs a mining company in the former and is a UNC grad. We had a leisurely lunch, and just a little wine, and then it was time to go and see if my suitcases had arrived.

They had and I found a place for everything.  My bright orange Seabourn parka for Antarctica and my boots also came.  On one of the sea days I’ll have to get someone to take my picture so you can laugh at how I look.  Around 5 PM we were sailing so I went up to the pool area where the singers and dancers introduced themselves and sang a couple of songs.  The highlight was meeting Arty.  Arty the penguin has been waiting for three years to go down to Antarctica to say hello to his family and he’s finally on his way.

I had a pretty jam-packed day because after we sailed away there was a cocktail party for us solo travelers.  There were several there.  One of them is a lady from Germany via New Jersey and I can tell she’s going to be fun to be with.  Two of us were invited to dine at a table with the lead female vocalist so we had to scoot.  Sometimes hosted tables don’t work, but this one was delightful.  The food was good and we did a lot of laughing so it was fun. Amber convinced me I should go to the show down in the club which is kind of a nightclub sort of place with a dance floor.  The vocal group did a selection of Frankie Valle songs, hence the name “Oh What a Night.”  One of the male singers has an absolutely fantastic falsetto voice and the show was great.  As has happened on the last few cruises I’ve done, several women got up and danced. The lady who I mentioned earlier, was the leader of the pack.   Well, the music was catchy and I guess I’m losing some inhibitions so I got up and danced.  When the set was finished a woman who had been dancing next to me asked me if I happened to be Sunviking, my Cruise Critic name. I told her I was and I got a big hug.  She’s someone from Australis with whom  I’ve exchanged posts and I had been trying to figure out how to find her on the ship.  I moved over to the table she and her husband were at and we had a lovely chat, and we danced some more.  I knew I would like her because we share common ideas about expectations of cruises and how to engage with people.  I had recommended a hotel we stayed at in Rome and they tried it last summer and loved it.  They’re on until Miami so I’m looking forward to spending more time with them.

Now that I’ve perhaps bored you with the day’s agenda, I’ll say good night for now. I had to write this stuff down in large part to try to remember the names of the lovely people I met.  I’m going to upload a few photos of my cabin.  I know I’ve done it before but you can see what my home for the next 58 days looks like.  And, wonder of wonders for the second day in a row I’ll upload a picture of me, only because I’m holding Arty.  Oh, while Santiago was hot, at the coast it was actually chilly. That’s because the cold Humboldt current is off the coast. When we got out of the port we picked up some nice seas too.  That made dancing a little tricky.  Picture a bunch of women occasionally lurching on the dance floor as the ship did a twizzle, kind of a roll and pitch combined.   I don’t know if these seas are  a sign of things to come in the Drake Passage.

Anyway, hasta mañana!

January 26 - Casablanca, Chile

I had a wonderful day!  This morning Adolfo, my driver from yesterday, picked me up and we headed west toward Valparaiso which is on the coast.  A little geography lesson is probably in order.  Santiago lies in a valley or bowl between the Andes and the coastal mountains which are not nearly as high. When you travel out of the city, you come to the agricultural part of the valley and there lies the area called Casablanca, which is a wine region.  We visited two wineries and had lunch at the first.

On the way we stopped at a little eatery so I could taste a little drink called Chicha.  It’s a fermented drink made from corn and it reminded me a little of grappa.  With it they brought me little samples of two cakes, one made with apricot jam and the other with dulce de leche.

Before I write about the wine we tasted, I’m going to write about some interesting information I learned from the master sommelier who was our guide at the second winery. I thought that the Chilean wine industry must be as old as the Conquistadores but not so.  When the Spanish came here, the wine they brought with them was essentially sacramental wine, not the best.  As they settled here they began cultivating grapes, but the basic rule was that the best vines were not brought here because the best wine had to be produced in Spain. When phylloxera killed most of the grapes in Europe in the 19th century, the Europeans looked to the US and to Chile to help revive the wine industry because vines from those countries were resistant to the disease.  Chile, because of its geography, is actually isolated from the rest of South America and didn’t have a problem.  On the north Chile is desert, to the east its barrier is the Andes, to the south Cape Horn and Antarctica, and of course to the west the Pacific.

So, the Europeans took some of the vines from here and from the US and began grafting to revive vineyards in their countries.  At the same time they began grafting here and began producing some great wines.  They found that in the valley south of Santiago the climate was great for red varietals.  In Casablanca where I was today it is perfect for white wines.  Since it’s near the coast,  during the night  and in the early morning fog rolls in. As the sun burns off the fog the salt and minerals from the ocean go into the soil and add a different character to the grapes.  Anyway, the upshot is that it wasn’t really until the 1960’s and later that quality wine-making really took off.  Strangely, Chilean people don’t drink a lot of wine.  I found that odd because they are Latin people so I would have thought they would be like the Italians, French or Spaniards.  Not so.  The average Chilean drinks less than 12 bottles of wine a year.  As a result, most of the good wines (90 %) are exported.

Enough of the history of wine in Chile.  The first vineyard we visited was Viña Mar.  It was a lovely setting and we walked in two vineyards. Since it’s the equivalent of late July here, the grapes were not even close to being ready to be harvested.  I tasted a sauvignon blanc grape and it was actually pretty sweet despite not being ripe.  This vineyard no longer presses and ages their own wines. They belong to a wine commune and send the grapes there to be pressed and processed.  I asked if the grapes are mixed with ones from other vineyards and the guide said they aren’t.  Then I got to taste three wines. They were good, not great.  I asked the guide if they produced any carménère wine. That’s a varietal only produced here in Chile. He had a carménère from another vineyard and he gave me a sample.  It was spectacular!

After tasting we had lunch upstairs on a terrace of the lovely building.  I was expecting a light lunch but I had some kind of appetizer with a paté, followed by delicious salmon with a side dish of avocado.  I thought that was it, but out came a short rib and potato gratin and finally a chocolate ganache cake and raspberry gelato.  It was all great but way too much food.  I was ready for a siesta, but it was time to go to another vineyard, Villard.

This one was actually much more interesting because they grow and process their own wine. I got to see the whole process.  The vineyard is owned by a French family who emigrated to Australia, but two family members live and operate the Chilean branch.  They produce about 115,000 bottles each year and export 95% of it.  The three wines I tasted were exquisite.  After that I really was wined up so Adolfo and I headed back to Santiago.  We got back to the hotel a little after 6 PM so I had a full day.  I’ll see Adolfo tomorrow because he’s driving me to the ship. 

Alexandra, the sommelier, and Adolfo

January 25 - Santiago, Chile

I made it! The flight was long, long, long!  Just a smidgeon over 9 hours.  Ed, you would not have been happy because the plane was an Airbus 350 and I know you like Boeing better. I think the seats up in Delta One ranked right up there in the top ten most uncomfortable ones.  But, the flight was uneventful; as usual I didn’t sleep and instead watched three movies. That was the one really good thing – they had a huge selection from which to choose.  The woman in the seat next to me was some kind of consultant from Atlanta. Talk about rough! She was arriving this morning (Wednesday), in meetings all day and then returning home on Friday.  I don’t know how these people manage.

Getting through passport control was relatively easy and my driver Adolfo was waiting for me right after I exited.  I sat up front and on the 45 minute ride (it was rush hour traffic) we had an interesting conversation about life and conditions in Chile. He spoke in Spanish, of course, which I find I understand quite well, and I spoke in Spanglish.  He was a delightful senior citizen. And by the time we got to my hotel, we agreed that we face many of the same problems in our two countries.  I think Adolfo will be taking me to the port on Friday and I’m looking forward to the ride.

I’m staying at the same hotel I stayed in both times I was here in the past, the Ritz Carlton.  No surprise that the area around has changed.  When I was last here across the street was a little park. Now there’s an office building.  When I was here with Al we took the Metro around the city and I remember thinking how spotlessly clean everything seemed and  how safe it was.  Adolfo warned me that the city center is now very dirty and there are gangs of “delinquents” who prey on tourists.  That’s really sad if true.  

By the time I checked in I was bushed so I spent the afternoon dozing and generally being lazy.  I went up to the rooftop terrace hoping to get some photos of the Andes which are not far away. Unfortunately tall buildings block the view in every direction and I’m not going to post any of them.  They’re boring; if you’ve seen one cityscape you’ve seen them all. I went to the restaurant here in the hotel and sat with a retired couple who were across the aisle from me on the plane and are going on the first leg of my cruise. I enjoyed talking with them. They’ve traveled a lot, but not on cruises.

Tomorrow I’ve arranged to go to Casablanca which is a big wine area near Santiago.  I’m not exactly sure but I think I’ll visit (and have tastings at) a couple of wineries and have lunch at one of them along the way. I should have some nice photos from those places.  The countryside here is lovely and since it’s mid-summer there should be lots of flowers around.  So for now I’ll say Buenos Noches.

On my way!

The big day has finally arrived.  After three years of trying and being thwarted by events, I’m on my way to Chile to meet my ship, the Seabourn Quest. I think I’ve packed everything I’ll need given the diverse climates I’ll be experiencing.  (My suitcases weigh enough! I can barely lift them.) Packing ranks right up there with flying as two things I dislike most about traveling. Packing to come home from a cruise isn’t bad.  You know that everything in your cabin has to be thrown in your bags. Well, it’s done and if I’ve forgotten anything I didn’t need it anyway.

My route today takes me from here to Atlanta with a short layover before my overnight flight to Santiago, Chile. I’m spending a couple of nights there at a hotel Al and I stayed in many years ago when we cruised around Cape Horn. Tomorrow when I arrive I doubt I’ll be fit for anything because I can’t sleep on planes.  On Thursday I think I’ll get the concierge to arrange for a car and driver to take me on a little tour, perhaps out of the city.  Chile is a beautiful country and I remember visiting some lovely places the last time I was there. 

Here's an update.  I’m sitting in the Delta Sky Lounge in Atlanta after an uneventful flight from Richmond.  Instead of one of those little puddle-jumpers my plane was a 757 so it had nice seats up front.  My seat mate was another widow who also decided to travel rather than sit at home.  She just returned before Christmas from a Christmas market river cruise.  It sounded very nice and I think I may have to consider putting that on my list.  My list is getting longer, not shorter, but I guess that’s a good thing. 

No photos today – there’s nothing interesting to see here.  I take that back.  I love people watching so that’s interesting.  This is probably it for today.  Hasta mañana. 

I think it's finally going to happen!

It’s a new year and nearly time for a voyage that has been in the works for nearly three years. My late husband and I had planned an Antarctic cruise in December 2020 to celebrate our 50th anniversary, a little late but close enough.  Events intervened; he passed away and Covid brought the travel world to a halt.  In early 2021 I saw that the same exact cruise was being offered on the same exact dates and I thought it was karma.  I booked it and  felt certain that Al would be with me in spirit.  Once again Covid stepped in and the cruise was canceled.  Then in November, 2021, while I was on my first solo cruise, I saw that the Seabourn Quest (the first Seabourn ship we sailed on) was doing a circumnavigation of South America which included Antarctica and South Georgia.  It was 79 days long and I wasn’t sure I would like to be on a ship or away from home that long.  Then I noticed that I could take a 58-day portion of it beginning in Chile.  It was still long, but that seemed a little better, so I booked it.

Now I’m only three weeks from finally getting to go.  Hooray!  I’m going to spend a couple of nights in Santiago, Chile, and then I’ll be on my way.  Along the way besides spending several days in Antarctica and a couple in both South Georgia and the Falklands, I’ll be making a trip up the Amazon before ending in Miami in late March.  My biggest challenge now is figuring out how to stuff all the clothing I’ll need in my suitcases. I know everyone says to layer, but unfortunately the long underwear and fleece lined things to stay warm in Antarctica don’t translate well to the Amazon region. I’m up to the challenge though, and everything will get stuffed in somewhere.  In the next few days I’m going to get a variety of shots that are recommended particularly for travel in Brazil.  I get to be a pincushion, but once I’ve gotten them I should be good to go.

I’ve been around Cape Horn twice, once with Al and once with Katie.  Both times it was calm which is not always the norm for those waters. On both of those cruises we took a shore excursion involving flights to a Chilean base on one of the South Shetland Islands where we landed on the gravel runway and spent the day visiting the science stations and penguin colony there. The plane was a four-engine prop job seating 38 passengers.  On the trip with Al we had three pilots and a mechanic with us.  I’m not sure what exactly the mechanic could have done if we broke down, but there he was.  When we took off for our return to Punta Arenas, I remember that the pilot told all the guys on the plane to come up to the front  to distribute the weight the way he wanted it.  When the plane lifted off and we looked out the window, we saw that the runway ended in a sheer drop-off with a bay full of icebergs below.  It was spectacular! 

Well, this time I’m going further south, and if the weather cooperates, I’ll actually get to set foot on the Antarctic Peninsula.  Several people I know recommended reading a book about Ernest Shackleton and his Antarctic expedition in 1914-1916. The book they recommended is Endurance by Alfred Lansing.  I just finished it a few days ago and it was one of the most fascinating books I’ve read in a long time.  It was written in the 50’s when some of the expedition members were still alive and the author interviewed them and had access to their journals. If you want to know how people with a will to live find the way to survive in the worst of circumstances, it’s a book well worth reading.

Anyway, I’ll begin my saga in a couple of weeks and hopefully I’ll get lots of good pictures along the way.  Happy New Year everyone