Surviving the Drake Passage

Hello again!

Once we left the security and calm waters of the South Shetland Islands, we began experiencing the turbulence of the Drake. The good news about our Drake experience was that, although we had waves cresting at 20 feet, we didn’t become seasick because our captain was able to steer us behind one storm and outrun a much larger looming storm (see the chart below). That enabled the ship to be able to move with greater speed and we were able to make it to the Beagle Channel in two full days and a few hours, arriving on Sunday night before dinner. There were no berths available as other ships either headed back early or didn’t depart, so we anchored off the harbor until 6:00 a.m. Monday. We ended up with a full day and night in Ushuaia.

Notice below that the Captain sent us further east, then cut back to the west once we were past the approaching weather!

Also a picture of John showing how tilted over the ship was — the whole background is sea!

When we departed Ushuaia, one of our naturalists pointed out a ship which had been thirty miles south of where we were when we left the Shetlands; it ended up leaving two hours later than we did and spent three and a half days in the Drake bobbing around, only arriving at 4:00 a.m. Tuesday morning – so glad our captain made the decision that she did!!! It was a lot more fun to knock around Ushuaia! Silversea did provide a group bus trip to Tierra del Fuego, but John and I had been there ten years ago and decided it would be anticlimatic. It’s pretty, but….

 

We did all run out on deck to watch some dolphins who were swimming with us at some point — fun to watch:

So the night before we docked, there was a Captain’s Farewell Party. I took a few pictures of people we enjoyed:  the crew, Peter Harrison and Shirley Metz, Kevin and Tim (cruise director) and Melanie and Franci, fellow travelers.

Shirley is most impressive in her own right.  She founded Hobie Sports (with her husband at the time), served as a consultant to The North Face and in 1988  was the first woman to ski over 800 miles to the South Pole!

The next day we ventured into Ushuaia. I took a shot of John in front of a large statue at the dock, then we climbed our way up a hill to the main shopping street. It was souvenir hunt time!  John collects ball caps, t-shirts and, over my objection, more and more coffee mugs. We had to search for good ones. Late morning we needed a rest stop and decided to have ice cream and coffee at Freddo’s – a discovery from our last time in Argentina……fabulous ice cream! Then more shopping.  Finally, after a long walk, we made it back to the ship, had a light lunch and began packing.

Views from the ship:

 

 

On our last evening, before dinner we watched the video that our ship’s photographer had created from our trip. We did buy it and would be happy to share it with anyone who would like to see it.  It is wonderful!  Afterward, they auctioned off the ship’s navigation chart that had been adorned with art by a member of the staff; it was bought eventually for $5,000 by a guest – all for a charitable cause….

We ate dinner with the same group we had, both on our first night aboard and on my birthday – such fun people!  The couple in the front is from England; he was a solicitor and became general counsel of Barclay Bank. They are both retired and run an 8 room hotel near the English shore. The two women are from Michigan- both lawyers-one retired and one not (their husbands didn’t want to make the trip). Interesting people with very quick wits.

On Tuesday on the way to the airport, we stopped at a scenic overlook to enjoy a view of Ushuaia one last time……another lovely day!

 

And then, on to Buenos Aires.

Ten years ago we were in Buenos Aires and we enjoyed it so much that John wanted to stay there again. We remembered that we had a guide there whom we really liked and I had kept her contact information. In addition, I found her on Facebook; we reconnected and made arrangements for her to guide us parts of three days to various places. She now owns the agency but agreed to guide us.  I’m sure you will see her in some coming pictures.

I’m going to add some fun videos that I couldn’t include before because of insufficient bandwidth.  Hope you like them!

Love,

Beth