South American Adventure Part 7: Days 13 & 14

Day 13 – Thursday, February 9th – Aboard the Crown Princess – Ushuaia, Argentina

Allan and I visited Ushuaia, Argentina during our 2010 South America cruise and were looking forward to seeing it again. The locals refer to it as “El fin del mundo” (“The end of the world”), but its setting against the Patagonian mountains makes it seem like one of the most beautiful places in the world. – Ushuaia was our first port-of-call on that ill-fated South American cruise in 2010. We had much nicer weather this time around. - AFK

Before we left for this trip, we were notified by Princess that we’d have to set sail at 3PM instead of 4PM due to “port congestion”. The night before we arrived, the Captain told us that due to tides and such, our ship was just a little too deep in the draught to dock, so tendering would be required. I was disappointed, because tendering slows everything down, and with 3,000 passengers trying to get ashore, it meant our time in Ushuaia would be shorter.

We were jolted awake by the sound of the tender being lowered directly beneath our cabin (think metal rakes on a chalkboard). Outside, a beautiful day was unfolding. The mountains behind and surrounding the town still had snow on their peaks, and it was the first time we’d seen hillsides of trees in days (it’s very rocky down here).

During breakfast with Mike (Chuck had already consumed some in his room, but joined us later), we got the next announcement from the Captain: there was an issue with the pier that the tenders would use, and they were trying to work it out with the port authorities. More delays. And as we lingered over coffee, we saw our old friend, the Celebrity Infinity, come sailing into the harbor and docking where we should have been.

Since we didn’t expect to go ashore until to mid-day, we went up to the Sun Deck and took photos of the spectacular setting. When we returned downstairs, we discovered that things weren’t going too well, and there was a huge line to get tender tickets. We hung out in the Da Vinci Dining Room, along with five hundred other passengers. Nerves were getting frayed as progress was very slow. We felt bad for the staff, who were doing the best they could, but some passengers were yelling at them (as if they had control over this situation), both in English and Spanish. Mike was nice enough to make two trips to the International Café to bring us back sandwiches. In all, we sat there for over three hours before we got off the ship at 1:00PM. Remember that 3:00PM departure time…

We got off the tender a half-hour later and had a little time to explore the town. I felt bad, because we wanted to show Mike and Chuck what an interesting place Ushuaia was. You can’t do that in ninety-minutes (we gave ourselves a 2:30PM deadline to take the tender back to the ship). The town still has that crossroads-of-the-world feel: backpackers and adventurers amid well-heeled tourists. The main part of the town is a 15 x 17 block section of jumbled architecture, although most roofs are metal and steeply raked (it does snow a lot down here). It starts in the bay and rises toward the mountains. The tree line only goes up a third of the way of those mountains, and as I said, is beautifully dramatic.

We found some shopping opportunities along Calle San Martin: this one store featured local art and handicrafts, and Allan purchased an acrylic painting of a penguin; a very fat penguin in a sea of colors. Later, we stopped in a food specialty store where Chuck bought some boxes of alfajores (those popular Argentine cookies with a dulce de leche filling) to take back to the States.

Despite the abundant sunshine and festive atmosphere (the man viewing was particularly good), we headed back down the hill and joined the ever-growing queue of passengers waiting to take tenders back to the ship. With the jerry-rigged setup at the pier, the line easily stretched to a quarter-kilometer along the waterfront. We had to wait about seventy minutes, and there were still hundreds and hundreds of people behind us. In the end, we did not depart at 3:00PM (closer to 5:30PM once the last tender was hoisted back on the ship).

I had a short nap, and then went on to our balcony to watch the ship depart Ushuaia. The clouds were starting to roll in, and the ship headed east before making a 140 degree turn to head west into the Beagle Channel. The captain warned of 50 knot winds and 4-meter swells at about 2:30AM when we would be entering the open ocean for a few hours.

Sunset in these parts was about 9:15PM, so we could see the passing scenery as we traversed the Beagle Channel (mostly hills populated with evergreens that rose from the waters’ edge. Very reminiscent of the Inside Passage to Alaska, but much, much closer to the ship). During the latter part of dinner, everyone got up and rushed to the starboard side of the ship because in those big dining room windows was a glacier that went from water’s edge up the mountain. It was spectacular! And that was our introduction to “Glacier Alley”.

We decided to watch the passing grandeur from Mike and Chuck’s balcony.

By the time we got back to Chuck and Mike’s room after dinner it was already past sunset. The sky was getting darker and darker and the cloud ceiling was only a few hundred feet. The four or five glaciers we could see of the starboard side were quite spectacular and one of them had a gushing waterfall flowing out from underneath about two hundred feet above the waterline. I took several pictures and two short videos (check my Facebook page for those at: http://facebook.com/allan.kellner ). - AFK

We returned to our warm and cozy cabin for a good night’s sleep.

Day 14 – Friday, February 10th – Aboard the Crown Princess – Punta Arenas, Chile

As the captain had promised, the boat was rocking in the middle of the night. Our cabin had creaked during moments like this earlier in the cruise, which was enough to wake me from my usual light sleep. One of our deck chairs slid into a different spot, and that was the extent of the changes wrought by the tossing tempest.

When we awoke, we were sailing north toward Punta Arenas, our first stop in Chile. It had none of the geographic excitement of Ushuaia, and the winds were brisk all day. After breakfast with the boys, we got tender tickets, got it together, and waited in the Da Vinci Dining Room. Yes, another buggery tender port. It seems like fun until this is your seventh or eighth time in the last week. Then, it just gets old. I know: high-class problems. A lot of it has to do with the size of the ship: our draught is too deep to dock in many of these ports, although smaller ships don’t have the same problem. A consideration for future cruises: bigger isn’t always better.

We were off the ship and on land by 11:30, and it was apparent the two cities were quite different. While Ushuaia is a small town clinging to the side of a mountain, Punta Arenas is a small city gently rising from the water’s edge with no dramatic scenery.

Punta Arenas is well situated along the Strait of Magellan, which connects the Atlantic to the Pacific without going around Cape Horn. Architecture wise, there were excellent examples of late 19^th century buildings and some beautiful mansions of merchants who made their fortunes before the Panama Canal inflicted a heavy toll on sea traffic through this parts in 1914.

We strolled to the main square, La Plaza des Armas, which featured many large, beautiful old trees, a statue of Magellan, and one of those annoying pan flute players with recorded accompaniment (think of the Peruvians selling those CDs at Westlake Center in Seattle – now make the song “Time to Say Goodbye” by Sarah Brightman and Andrea Bocelli play several times. I had a headache and wanted to run screaming from the square). The statue of Magellan has figures of local natives on several sides, and if you kiss the foot of the statue, you will return to Patagonia. I kissed it, and I hope I didn’t catch anything from doing so!

We strolled around the square, which had the best buildings in the city. There was a cathedral in one corner, but our attempt to get in was thwarted by a wake in progress. However, at the other end of the block, we enjoyed a spectacularly excellent lunch at the Sarah Braun Mansion, now the Hotel Jose Noguiera featuring the Shackleton Bar. – The restaurant attached to the hotel was located in a stunning sunroom just outside the Shackleton Bar, named the “Taberna de la Union”. - AFK

Our lunch took place in a large solarium with grape vines growing above us. The filtered sunlight made for a beautiful setting. Allan and I started off with a delicious pumpkin cream soup, and Mike and Chuck had an excellent seafood appetizer (as well as the local beer, Cerveza Austral). Our main course was steak and cheese sandwiches, while Mike had filet of sole with seafood risotto and Chuck had a lamb stew. Dessert was a berry ice sorbetto accompanied by a maté ice cream. The service by Fabian was warm and friendly. All in all, a terrific lunch and the high point of the day.

Lunch lasted several hours (the solarium filled up and emptied during our time there), and we finally waddled out around 3:00PM and continued our stroll around town. Alas, there wasn’t anything noteworthy (except for another mansion turned into the Magellan Regional Museum, which we didn’t visit).

We headed back to the tender pier, and were back on the ship by 5:00PM. We took naps, and when I awoke there was a colorful rainbow over the harbor. Dinner in the dining room was better than the previous night (chicken and leek pot pies were the highlight), and then it was off to bed.

For those curious why I haven’t mentioned any shipboard shows, I haven’t gone to any. For example, I skipped tonight’s salute to Cole Porter, “What a Swell Party This Is”. I didn’t want my memories sullied of this great composer’s music.