Feb 24, 2020 - Puerto Montt, Chile

Our last stop before Valparaíso. We didn't stay in the city, but took a short ride to Puerto Varas. This small city is on the shore of Lake Llanquihue at the border of Chile's lake district. It was established in the 1850s by German immigrants who were given tracts of land to encourage immigration. There is still a German influence in the architecture. It felt very much like a mountain resort, quite touristy. We just walked around for an hour before going back to the ship. The nicest thing about the place is the profusion of roses that are...

Feb 23, 2020 - Amalia Glacier

Today was a most glorious day of sunshine and calm water as we sailed along the west coast of Chile. The highlight was sailing very near to the Amalia Glacier, which is located in Bernardo O'Higgins (great Spanish name) National Park. The glacier originates in southern Patagonia, and is only visible from the water. It is considered a retreating glacier, and has receeded over 7k since 1945. The glacier partially surrounds the Reclus volcano. This has been compared to glaciers in Alaska, but I have not seen those and must say I was very...

Feb 21, 2020 - Punta Arenas, Chile

Punta Arenas is located on a Peninsula north of the Strait of Magellan. It is the capital and largest city of Chile's southernmost region, with a population of around 125,000. We did not get a chance to visit the city at all, as we boarded a catamaran to go to Magdalena Island. It is home to over 100,000 Magellanic penguins. Unfortunately at this time of the year, most of them had migrated to Antarctica for the summer, and there were a lot more gulls than penguins. It was a bit of a disappointment after visiting Volunteer Point in the...

Feb 19, 2020 - Cape Horn

We had another very lazy sea day yesterday, only taking time out from our busy schedule of doing nothing to have deep tissue massages. This morning we sailed the route of many explorers and rounded Cape Horn. On our way there from the Falkland Islands we passed Isla de los Estados, an island that is an ecological reserve. The weather was cool and very windy, with temperatures around 8 degrees. There is a beautiful sculpture of an albatross that I just happened to catch in one of my pictures. It is a monument to the thousands of sailors who...

Jan 5, 2020 - Coquimbo and La Serena, Chile

Dear All, Unfortunately, we left behind the adapter cable that links Doug's camera to my computer. So there won't be any pictures until we get home or unless we can find an adapter in Lima or some other big city that has computer stores. Also the WiFi on this fancy dancey boat (as Doug calls it) is flakey so we can't send or receive efficiently. Of course that may be because we are at sea today and tomorrow. Anyway we'll do our best to keep you informed of where we are and what we are doing! First, our plane landed in Santiago but we didn't...

Jan 4, 2020 - Fly to Santiago, Chile

We're off!! We actually started our journey on Friday, January 3, 2020 and arrived in Santiago, Chile on Saturday, January 4. We had the usual problems with a late flight, missed connection, rebooking! But we're here, so all is well. This is the hardest part of any journey. Getting there!! Our Oceania ship, the Marina, is beautiful. We were upgraded to a very nice room with a balcony. We just finished our safety drill. Learned how to put on our life vests! But they didn't make us practice getting into the life boats, which we will do calmly...

Dec 3, 2019 - And so ends the journey… for now!

This is the last post for this RTW adventure. I have been away for nine weeks and unlike other “holidays” for the same duration, this one seems to have really flown by. I think its because we kept moving in Europe, with a maximum of five days in one place, and the incredible diversity of destinations. Once again, I packed too much (but only a little bit) but that is what happens when you are planning for all seasons. I thought both Japan and Europe would have been much colder and was sure I wasn’t going to wear the thermals and “doona” that...

Nov 29, 2019 - It started with a hike…

And ends with a hike??? After a very relaxed day yesterday cruising around the fjords and seeing two additional Chilean glaciers, I decided to sign up for the Torres del Paine towers walk. Craig was not feeling well and chose to stay in the hotel and catchup with some work. I was collected at 7:15am and upon entering the minibus, was a little concerned as all the other passengers were sub 30 years! Even though I had done the Kumano Kudo (well, parts of it anyway) I had been indulging a little more since then and wasn’t too sure of my...

Nov 27, 2019 - It’s chilly in Chile!!!

To get from Argentina to Puerto Natales is not that far by road but when you take the bus and have a double decker bus load of people to get through border control, FROM BOTH SIDES, it basically takes the whole day! I think the bus is the only way to see Patagonia from both the Argentinian and Chilean sides, and it was a full bus of travellers. When you hit the Argentinian border, you need to queue to have your passport stamped, as you would expect. This took approximately one hour. Then 20 minutes down the road, through what can only be...

Mar 20, 2019 - Calama to Valparaiso

We left the dust and dogs of San Pedro de Atacama and headed for the grime and dogs of Calama. Calama is still high at 2250m, it's a working class city not really geared to tourists unless you want to go visit some of the biggest copper mines in the world. We remembered the Chilean mine disaster of 2010 when 33 miners were stuck underground for 69 days. One of those trapped miners does tours but we decided not to go. We've already visited some big mines in Australia. Our flight from Calama was delayed for an hour due to wind and the rest of...

Mar 15, 2019 - San Pedro de Atacama - we have arrived in the desert

We picked up our hire car and drove 100kms to San Pedro de Atacama a town 2438m high in the dry plateau of the Andes mountains of northeastern Chile. We are booked into Hostal Orange for four nights and it wasn't easy to find but after asking half a dozen random Chileans we got there. At checkin the receptionist said our American dollars were "too broken" and wouldn't except them. The town is very, very dusty and there are lots of stray dogs that love to bark all night. At night the temperature drops dramatically and during the day gets to...

Mar 12, 2019 - Country towns and lakes

After our interesting stay at Choshuenco (which Grae refers to as a kidnapping) we drove around Lake Panguipulli and stopped at the various viewpoints along the way for some stunning views. The roads were very quiet. We went in to Panguipulli for lunch and I made the mistake of asking for cafe con leche which is coffee with milk and is actually a cup of hot UHT milk and a sachet of nescafe - verrryyy milky! At least I've had my calcium intake for the week. I had a completo which is a hotdog with chopped tomoto, mashed avocadovand mayonnaise...