Back to Ushuaia

During the night we reach Drake's Passage reputed to be amongst the worst seas in the world. After what we have been through I'm sure we can cope. The captain gave us an update on the weather for the crossing which is looking good. He then wished us 'a nice drake's crossing '. So far so good, could feel the ship roll in the night but it was ok. It will take 2.5 days to get back to Ushuaia. No resting of course. Lectures the first day, cocktail party, gala dinner and and the Latin dancers performing for the last time. Tomorrow a briefing on disembarkation and packing. Not fun, it's always sad. Meanwhile we enjoy what time we have left.

We left the ice and icebergs behind yesterday, we won't be seeing any more whales or penguins but we did see one seal. I didn't expect that, this far from land. Birds are now more common around the ship particularly albatross. They like to follow ships because the water stirs up food and they use the wake for air uplift. 

Great history lecture on the race to the geographic south pole. The presentation was so clever the naturalist used just original photos to tell the story. The race was between Scott (English) and Amundsen, (Norwegian). Amundsen was better prepared and made it just a month before Scott. Hard to imagine why they even wanted to go there given how they had to live and travel. The visit to Wordie House really helped us understand and highlighted how challenging the conditions would have been. The second lecture covered whales and seals.

I am never sure about the formal dinners. the back of my mind I'm even considering maybe going up onto deck 6 and having a more casual evening meal rather than dressing up. That thought however disappears when we are invited to dine at the captain's table. Just four of us, the other couple are people we have befriended during the journey. What is really good about dining with the captain is the quality of the wine. The white wine was from the Loire valley, quite dry and almost no colour but such a depth of flavor. The red wine was a Bordeaux Grand Crue. Excellent of course and a fantastic meal, including lobster and eye fillet.

To finish the day and our trip the evening's entertainment are the Peruvian tango dancers. Rather than hold their last performance in the theater, they perform on deck 3 the main lounge. It was a captivating performance I can't believe how precise their dancing is. At the end everyone is dancing but not us.

We crossed Drake's Passage without incident. The focus of the last day is always the sad part, being given the details of disembarkation and of course packing. We have our final briefing/ recap with the naturalists. It's very informal and usually a lot of fun. We have one naturalist who is from Peru and he plays the pan pipes, flight of the Condor accompanied by The guitar. Just beautiful. Others provide entertainment in other ways and we thank them for their knowledge, insights and humour.

The ship has stopped just off the coast of Chile to refuel. We're only a short distance from Ushuaia and will arrive after dinner tonight, some brave souls go ashore but it's freezing, bed is the better option given we'll be on the first bus to the airport at 8am. The captain and the naturalists are there to see us off and we say our goodbyes.

We have an opportunity to see more of Ushuaia. The guide we had on the bus was really good and gave us not just a good view of the town but also of the history. It is and always has been an inhospitable place and the only way the Argentinian government encouraged people to settle here was to provide economic incentives for example through taxation. At this time of the year, the end of summer, it looks quite good although there are parts of the town that are clearly not well off. They don't really get snow in winter so it must be a really miserable place. Today however, the sun shines, it's a balmy 11°.

It's a long flight back to Buenos Aires and we don't reach our hotel until 6:30. We are tired, looking for a meal and a good night's rest.Lue lisää