Day 4 – 30 12 12 –King Penguin Tour – Tierra del Fuego.

After a brilliant but short sleep we were up at 5.15 for early breaky in readiness for our departure on our King Penguin tour on Tierra del Fuego Island at 6.30.

15 of our crew joined our driver Jose and guide Rodriguez on the 16 seater bus.

We travelled through the country side and alongside the Magellan Strait for a couple of hours. It was good to see what is looks like, pretty harsh and hungry looking country.  They farm it mainly for sheep (or sheeeps as Rodriguez said) beef and guanaco/llamas. We saw some guanacos (which are the native llama type animal) some Carachos which are carrion birds.

The area also houses several petrol and gas plants.

We arrived at the ferry crossing, which took us and several other vehicles across the Magellan Strait to the Island of Tierra del Fuego (TdF), it was only a 20 minute ride. While waiting for our ferry – the ‘Patagonia’ we had a wander around the lighthouse at the ferry landing. TdF is half and half Chilean and is about the size of Ireland.

We stopped off for a look around the first farm in the area – Estancia San Gregorio, which was built in 1876, nearby was a ship – the Amadeo and barge Ambassador that had been run aground in 1936.

After another 30 minutes or so, we arrived at a paddock in the middle of nowhere to the sign ”Parque Penguino Rey,” we are at the King Penguins. We broke into two groups and visited with two groups of King Penguins, one on the rocky beach and another group beside an inlet with spinifex like grass in the paddock. OMG, they were stunningly beautiful to look at, they are just so well groomed and perfectly preened, with white, grey, gold, yellow and blue colourings – just like Happy Feet. There were probably about 40 penguins all up and we had one hour to play penguin paparazzi, it was very exciting. This colony had disappeared many years ago and have only returned to TdF in the past two years, no one really knows why.

We then   boarded the bus for another couple of hours travel along a more picturesque coastline to Porvenir, where we stopped for a drink and then to board the 2 and half hour ferry ride back to Punta Arenas at 5.00. On this trip we had views across the Magellan strait again towards the Argentinean side of the island with amazing views of snow capped mountains on Dawson Island.

The port area at Porvenir, had many boats in the harbour, ranging from small and large fishing boats to a pretty swanky looking Armada  vessel.

The trip back was chilly, spent most of it up on deck watching the straits go by along with some dolphins and birds.

We arrived back in Punta Arenas at 7.30, then it was  back to the hotel, where we couldn’t be fed in the dining room prior to our 9.30pm meeting with Aurora Expeditions’ – John Horlick. His briefing informed us that the weather is not looking good for our flight to Antarctica. There were winds and fog predicted, which meant pilot couldn’t land on the gravel strip at the Chilean Frei base on King George Island, using visual means. So while all trying to keep a positive attitude, a few of us went out for dinner, we ended up at a restaurant called Jekus, the service was slow, and Mary and I chose poorly and ended up with HUGE, but delicious meals, honestly we could have fed the whole table with ONE of our meals, it was a range of meats and vegies and chips all piled together, with pickled onions and other bits I can’t remember.

Eventually home after midnight,  we had to pack in readiness for a possible departure anytime from 2am onwards.

 Estancia San Gregorio - First farm in Tierra del Fuego.

 Wreck of the barque - Ambassador.

 The lighthouse at the ferry terminal to Tierra del Fuego.

 Waiting for our ferry...Gay, Kate, Gary and Rob.

 Our ferry for the 20 minute crossing to Tierra del Fuego - the 'Patagonia'

 Some of the harsh Chilean countryside. The white spots are a type of carrion bird - Carancho

 Our arrival the Penguin Park. Really just a paddock in the middle of nowhere...

 OMG - our first sight of penguins, these are King Penguins...we won't see these guys in Antarctica...fabulous to see them today.

 and again...check out the sensational mountains in the background.

 Just to prove I was really there... and very happy about it too.

 A few decided to head off inland to where another group were clustered, with half our lot looking at them, we sort of followed these guys to the second viewing spot.

 Here go three on a march to the inland group of King Penguins...very cute. Hup, two, three, four.

 Here's the inland crew, we were probably a bit closer than the beach lot.

 Absolutely, stunning birds...just so neat and tidy and clean and colourful.

 Check it out!!!!!

 And again...I can't imagine how many photos I took.

 Some amazing little flowers and vegetation, amongst this harsh looking paddock.

 A cute cabin on wheels, somewhere on our 13 hour journey to spend an hour with the Penguins.

 and a cute little yellow boat to match.

 Mary with some mountains of TdF and Magellan Strait behind her.

 The harbour at Porvenir where we caught the 2 and half hour ferry back to Punta Arenas.

 Some of the fishing boats at Porvenir...guessing the tide was out.

 Our ferry all flagged up and ready to go.

 Leaving Porvenir, I really liked the shape of this point and the colours too.

 Linda Zweirlein, Mary and Margaretha - all part of our Teacher group for Antarctic trip on board the ferry. It was pretty cool, Linda just doesn't feel it like the rest of us.

 All out of order...sorry this is the farm again.

 Wreck of the Amadeo run aground with the barque Ambassador.

 Arriving on our first ferry, welcome to Tierra del Fuego - land of fires.

 Oh, here I am again, cheesily pleased to be spending time with the penguins.

 Finally back in Punta Arenas, we have had our Antarctic briefing, out for tea at 10.30 - not dark yet. Liked the Punta Arenas version of the phone booth, not sure Superman would approve.

Mary and I miscalculated with our order, the meal was huge....and we had one EACH!!!!

Day 3 – 29 12 12 – Our own walking tour of Punta Arenas

Well today was a free day, no planes, trains or automobiles required.  Overnight there was a lot of hooning in the streets, and I’m sure these cars have no mufflers at all, not a great nights sleep…

Once we were up and at em, had some breaky at the Cabo de Hornos where we are staying, Kate, Mary and I headed off for a look around Punta Arenas, we had a few things on our wish list, but no particular plans.

We headed off up the hill which afforded us some brilliant view across the city to the sea (actually the Magellan Straits. Amazing colours in the buildings, seemingly no town planner and we don’t reckon there are any building codes to worry about either.

Anyway I’ll let the pictures tell most of the story I think. Things we saw and did

·         Residential street walk

·         Some window shopping

·         Excellent lunch at Chocolatte Café (with free wi-fi)

·         Walked the Punta Arenas cemetery – mausoleums, amazing sculptured trees

·         Walked along the very windy foreshore to the port

·         Supermarket to shop for lunch for King Penguin tour tomorrow (Kate had her wallet swiped by the bagging lady, but luckily security checked video and got it back)

·         Pet shop – interesting pets for purchase – chinchilla’s, hamsters, iguanas, spiders, turtles.

·         Lots of lupins growing around the gardens and nature strips in town

·         Visited the street stalls in Plaza de Armas (city square opposite Hotel)

·         Noted the quiet – SIESTA time between about 1-5 in arvo, then everything opens again till late

·         Met up with others from our group around the town and in the Hotel

·         Also met some others on our cruise who were from Canberra and Melbourne in the tourist info centre

·         Finished off in the bar where we met up with many more of the group

·         La Luna for dinner together

·         Then trying to get home for bed a bit early. But straight after tea it’s already 12.30

·         Linda joins us tonight, but we left her in bar having a drink

 A view over Punta Arenas, from lookout behind the town, looking to the Magellan Strait.

 The port at Punta Arenas

 Looking over the town again with port in far centre. Lots of colourful houses and buildings.

 Some of the colour in the buildings.

 Lupins growing everywhere, and a yellow gorse like bush quite prevalent too.

 Lunch at Chocolatte, which was delicious and had the added benefit of wi-fi.

 The cemetery, with it most incredible graves and mausoleums, and sculptured cypress type trees.

 An avenue of sculptured trees in the Punta Arenas cemetery.

 We liked their bright yellow fire hydrants, the bombaderos (fire brigade) also had yellow trucks.

 View walking along an extremely windy foreshore.

 Some shipping buoys, in a yard near the port area.

 Birds of some type by the hundreds on an old pier.

 Wind was howling and the waves were crashing, those coming into shore, meeting those going out.

 The port of Punta Arenas.

 The main pier/dock area.

 Liked the penguin ad for the beer. we won't be seeing the emperor penguins however, they live much further south in the Antarctic than we will get.

 Bernard O'Higgins, famous for something...can't recall what, plus more sculptured trees.

 Mary and Kate purchasing some goodies from the market in the main square opposite our hotel.

Another coffee and wi-fi break, much later in the day, I thought my moccacino looked pretty good.

Day 2 – 28/12/12 - Santiago to Punta Arenas

OK, today I am tackling differently, as this is proving very tricky to find time to write a diary and blog and photos etc etc. So now I think I’ll tell a bit of a story and just put in some pictures to capture the day…as best I can.

Even though we have only had ONE day out, already there is so much to see, do and talk about.

We had a great breaky at the San Galerias, then caught our pre-arranged taxi to the Aeropuerto. At the airport we met up with Karen, Nicole, Leanne and Gary, who were on the same flight to Punta Arenas.

The flight down was amazing…heaps to see out the windows, lots of mountains, volcanoes, snow and Lago (lakes)  

We arrived at Punta Arenas, a port town in the south of Chile. An interesting town that is very spread out and diverse in terms of housing etc.

Some of the challenges for the day, were about the language, eating lunch, we had trouble getting understanding about what the menu meant, Mary and Kate were keen to try a local beer, so they got that sorted and I chose a Chilean wine. Then we tried to translate the menu. We ended up with a hamburger ‘sandwich’ which was really tasty and hit the spot.

At the supermarket, Kate unfortunately had her wallet pinched, luckily the security guards were confident of having it returned and they bailed up the bag packing lady, who had it in her pocket. Kate was very lucky, as this wallet contained both cash and two of her cards.

We also stumbled across the Intituto Antarctico Chileno building, which had a great sign of the Antarctic, which we took photos at. It wasn’t till we were waiting for Kate to sort out her wallet, that we realised the model of Antarctica was actually ice…very cool!!!!

Out for dinner with the rest of the Vic Teachers Antarctic tour group to a little place up theroad called El Merado Chilote,we had Centolla – which is the local King Crab, it had been recommended by the eccentric poet in Santiago, it was very nice and light and refreshing.

Again the strangeness of daylight lasting late into the night, caught us on the hop, it was 10.30 when we left the restaurant and walked home, a bit cooler tonight, and some shops and bits and pieces were open on the way back, quite unusual.

Back to the hotel to do our laundry, we were going to put it in at the hotel, but got a bit stingy…so we used the bathtub and our clotheslines.

Yet again it was late to bed after a long day…tiring as all get out.

 View of a snowcapped mountain from the plane - Santiago to Punta Arenas.

 

Arrival at Punta Arena Airport, while we were not off to Antarctica tomorrow, it should be in a couple of days.

We negotiated a shuttle bus to the hotel for the bunch of us...here we are, all aboard waiting for our driver. L-R. Nic Riley, Karen Bowker, Gary and Leanne Edwards, Kate Crellin, Mary Morgan.

Whilst looking for the supermarket, I stumbled across the Chilean Antarctic Institute, later in the day, we discovered, that the Antarctic bit, really WAS ice.

Finally we got around to stopping for lunch, no idea what the menu said, or what we were ordering, but I got around to my first wine of the trip.

Cheers, with Mary and Kate.

Here we are out to dinner in Punta Arenas, at a place up the street. L-R. Nic, Gay & Rob Higgins, Karen, Leanne, Gary, Mary Kate, half of me.

 

Day 1 – 27/12/12 - Tullarmarine, Sydney, Auckland, Santiago

This is being posted on January 10 from Ushuaia, after disembarking our home for 10 days, the Polar Pioneer.

Alarms awoke us at 2.30am, me from a deep sleep, Mary – not so much! The Ciloms courtesy bus had us to the airport by 3.30 and there was no-one home yet, so we sat and waited for the Qantas staff to arrive.

Once we checked in about 4.30, we wandered through to the gate lounge, nothing was opened, so we waited for the coffee shops to open then we enjoyed a cuppa and read the complimentary papers.

The flight from Melbourne to Sydney on a Qantas747-300, it was a refurbished plane with interactive touch screens, quite comfy really.

At Sydney, we met up with David and Susan from our trip on the bus between terminals, then ran into Kate at the gate for our next flight, we had a bit of time to walk through duty free, but not enough to seriously look.

It was all the usual fun being early in the trip, not quite sorted, so juggling the passports, tickets, liquides and laptops, we hope to get a bit more organised as the trip progresses – fingers crossed!!!

There was an issue with out seating through from Syd to Santiago and Mary and I couldn’t be seated together, as it was a full plane, this wasn’t a major issue, as we at least had aisle seats and could talk if we needed.

I was seated in the second last row, but had a nice South American couple beside me and were OK, just got a bit sick of being second last to get fed/watered everytime.

We were all on board by 9.00 am, but still waiting for some passengers so took off a bit late. The flight time to Auckland was 2.45. Watched the Bourne Legacy on this leg, which managed to keep me awake…just.

Landed into Auckland approximately 12.50 AEST, through transit into lounge for a bit, met with Kate, David and Susan again , then back on board about 2.25 AEST.

Our plane from Syd to Santiago, was not quite so flash a LAN Airbus 340-300, a bit older etc.

This flight was approx. 11 hours and we had plans to sleep, so we could aligned to Santiago time, our best laid plans were foiled, as it just didn’t happen. Watched another movie – Contagion and some other TV series etc, did some reading, got dinner and breaky and some catnaps along the way.

Finally arrived at Santiago at 11.30am local time on the 27^th. No issues with customs or reciprocity taxes, though the airport was very busy, the lines moved pretty quickly.

We managed to organise a transfer to the hotel San Galerias. We dumped our gear and took off to explore.

Our first challenge was accessing some local PESOS, we couldn’t quite figure out the ATM in the hotel, they sent us across the road to a bank, and luckily some other Aussies from our flight and were able to assist us –easy when you know how.

By now it was about 2am AEST on the 28^th, but we were still on the 27^th…we wandered around the centre of Santiago and explored Cerro Santa Julia – a large hill in the centre of town which was developed into a public park by Benjamin Vicuna Mackenna in 1872. There were lots of terraces – like Neptune Terrace

Santiago is surrounded by mountains, and was quite warm, interesting to see that dogs just roam the streets, they are all quite healthy and very happy, but no collars or leads and seeminly no owners, they have great road sense, and cross at crossings when people do. Must get a photo of the dogs when I go back.

After our walk up and around the hill, we walked out to the artsy/foodie precinct, and had some tea at Sur Patagonica - I had a lovely Oceania Salad with a raspberry drink of some kind and Mary and Kate braved and enjoyed the local beer.

After tea, we wandered back to the hotel and back our for a bit longer. Finally made it into bed at 9ish Santiago time.

PS. Having trouble with photos using current wifi available, so will post the writing...sorry about that, the photos are the best part, I will keep trying.

Mary and I at the airport...super early and eager!

Having a cuppa and reading our last newspapers in the lounge- selfie in the mirror shot.

Selfie with the new iPhone fish eye lens think this was Sydney airport lounge

Panoramic shot of Santiago from the top of Cerro Santo Lucia.

 Kate and Mary enjoying a Chilean beer. We have been awake for a very long time, it's hot and they deserved it. Great place to eat Patagonica Sur in Santiago.

Me and my non alcoholic and extremely sweet berry drink...

Neptune's Terrace at Cerro Santa Lucia.

View of the Andes through the city.

Mary and Kate with the city and Andes as backdrop.

A red flower that caught our eye, around Cerro Santa Lucia.

Kate and Mary again.

Kate, Mary and I upon arrival at Santiago airport, awaiting our shuttle bus to the Hotel San Galerias.

Think this was us out "selfy-ing" each other.