Diane

Today we visited Ainsworth Bay where we went on a forest walk and in the afternoon we visited Gallegos Glacier.

There are screens on the ship that give the daily schedule. They are in multiple languages- English, Spanish, French. Folks are divided into groups for excursions. The excursion groups are also grouped by language.

Each excursion is rated on

• Pace- how fast you’ll walk- the longer the distance the faster the pace as all excursions have the same amount of time ashore
• Mud- how much mud you’ll have to walk thru
• Slope- how steep the slope is
• Physical Activity
• Educational Content- this happens to be inversely proportional to the pace- the faster the pace, the less educational content

The forest excursion we went on was rated ‘low physical demand’ but it had a large educational content. It was so amazing to see the forest with it’s tall green trees, lots of beautiful lichen and mosses with a mountains and glaciers in the background.

We saw a fox just on the beach as we were getting ready for our walk so that was exciting.

We saw the landscape that was changed by the introduced beavers. They have created a whole new eco system with ponds instead of streams.

It was exciting to see our first large glacier of the trip. We heard the cracks from the glacier and saw a couple of smaller calving events. We felt like we were right at the glacier but learned when we came back aboard that we were 2 kilometers away.

As we were leaving, I saw two V-shaped wakes in the water that were moving quite fast. I couldn’t figure out what was making those tracks but found out later they were Flightless Steamer Ducks. These ducks flap their short, stubby wings and paddle with their webbed feet and can get up to 24km/hour as they motor across the surface of the water

Tibor arrived yesterday afternoon. He was super excited about his trip.

This afternoon we will get onto our ship for our cruise- more on that later. There is no WiFi on the ship so it will be a number of days before I continue this blog.

Today I took a tour to “Park of the Strait of Magellan- Fort Bulnes”. I took this tour because the other ones I was interested in were full.

It was an interesting tour with great views but I”m spoiled because I’ve had English speakers on other tours. This time the tour guide only knew Spanish. I’m sure he was a very good guide. He talked the entire hour drive to the park and then talked during the hour and a half walk around the park.

I was bummed because I only understood a few words- vamos (time to go), a la derecha(on the right), cementerio (cemetery- see picture below), aqui (here) and some place names (Punta Arenas, Magellan, America- not sure if it was America, American or South America).

The last stop of the tour was a museum and the guide said to meet back at the bus at trece(13) but I understood tres(3). Since it was only 12:15pm I was surprised to learn we had until 3pm to visit the museum. I watched the other folks on the tour and when they went back to the van so did I. Then I figured out what happened- we were to meet at 13 o’clock e.g. 1pm. Trece and tres sound the same to someone that doesn’t really speak Spanish.

Finally figured out why Fort Bulnes was so important when I purchased a map of the area that had a few paragraphs about tourist spots. Fort Bulnes was the place where Chile made claim to the Patagonia/Strait of Magellan area. It was the settlement which was moved to another location and became the town/city of Punta Arenas. The reason it was moved is because it was very cold and it was difficult to grow food. Even today, it was rainy and windy at Fort Bulnes but nice and mostly sunny in Punta Arenas.

I met TIbor when he came in from his Patagonia hiking trip. He had a great time and hiked/walked over 100 miles!

Today I went on a very nice tour to the Natural Monument of Penguins on Isla Magdalena to see the Magellanic Penguins.

My 10 minute walk to the meeting point took 30 minutes because I went the wrong way a couple of times but I got there in time to check-in and board the boat. Note to self- allow extra, extra time when walking and don’t believe all the times shown on the mapping apps.

It was an hour and a half boat ride on a very nice boat to the island and we had a strict time limit of an hour on the island. There were plenty of empty seats on the boat so I got a table and window to myself. I’m guessing we had about 30 people and the boat held 80 or more.

Saw a whale blow off in the distance and crew said it was a sei whale as other whales are not typically in that area. Also saw either seal or sea lion. I was in the bathroom towards the end of the trip and when I came out, everyone was looking out the window and just putting their cameras away. I’m guessing they saw a southern dolphin since the crew were excited and said they don’t see them very often.

We had lovely weather and I enjoyed watching and listening to the penguins. By the end of March all the penguins will have migrated off the island.

Interesting fact- when the Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan came thru this area in 1520, there were penguins on island. The penguins have been here over 300 years.

When we arrived at the island, the penguins were right on shore and had to walk away so we could land. That’s when I discovered that my camera battery was in the red and I forgot to bring a spare battery. So very happy my battery lasted until we were leaving the island.

It was pretty funny to see the penguins disappear into their burrows.

Today was a day of errands- laundry, repacking, and getting the lay of the land. Walked around the area by my hotel- it is pretty quiet and there aren’t too many folks on the streets as the Antarctica travel season is ending.

I wanted to book two tours since I’ll be in Punta Arenas for a few days. The local, family owned agency I wanted to book with was closed so I ended up with the fancy company. Since I was booking at the last minute I didn’t have a whole lot of choice of available tours but did book two.

Smooth travels from Sydney, Australia to Punta Arenas, Chile. Took hotel shuttle to Sydney airport leaving my big, heavy suitcase behind. The luggage service folks should pick it up tomorrow.

Waited 30 minutes or so for the check-in counter to open, quickly went thru customs and security, waited in lounge for my flight and hopped on a bus to the plane, walked up the stairs and found my very nice window seat.

After about 12 1/2 hours, a few hours of rest, 2 movies, 1 novel and three nice meals we landed in Santiago, Chile. I had a four hour layover and was happy I did since it took over and hour and a half to get thru customs & security. Then onto the plane for the 3 1/2 hour flight to Punta Arenas, Chile.

When I went to the baggage claim, the warning that the conveyor belt was starting sounded just like a cat yowling. Boy was I surprised when a cat in a cat carrier came out onto the conveyor belt! Poor thing had to go around 3 or 4 times before their owner came and it yowled the entire time. Also a tiny dog in a carrier came out onto the conveyor belt. They didn’t make a sound until their owner came and then it started barking.

Happy to make it to my Hotel José Nogueira room so I could sleep in a flat, non-moving bed. Also happy to be able to wear the sweaters I lugged all the way from home.