Well, it wasn’t very rough last night...nothing like the night before. But the weather has deteriorated to rain and low clouds this morning. It is really a shame the weather isn’t better as we sail through the fjords all day today surrounded by snow capped mountains. We do get a teaser look at the peaks every now and then.
About 9AM we enter Amalia Fjord. This area really remind us of Norway with its steep mountain sides covered in dense forest and topped with patches of snow, Darwin called this area a "green desert" and that is a good description as there is very little animal life and no humans. By 9:45AM we are in front of the Skua Glacier.
It is much wider than the one yesterday and a lot more active based on the ice flow in front of it.
We have to wait for a short while to get inside the ice flow as there is a small Chilean Exploration ship up close to the glacier. As she leaves we have a battle of the horns...we win!
While we wait, a small boat is lowered so some of the crew can try to get a berg for us to see on the ship and the captain can have his 10 year old scotch with some 1,000 year old ice! After several attempts, they finally get a big berg in the boat and head back.
As soon as Chilean ship leaves, the captain eases the Mariner into the ice flow and we can really hear the cackling of the ice as it melts...sounds like a big bowl of rice crispys. This glacier is retreating very fast and Terry, the commentator, says there is really a noticeable change since last year. She points to an area where there is now an icy bay behind a terminal moraine that wasn’t there last year. Last year the Glacier face was at the moraine. Interesting.
We leave the Glacier and head out through the Fjords toward the Strait of Magellan. Carolyn heads to the Galley Tour with the head Chef. He is a Canadian with a good sense of humor and gives a good tour. There are only five of us and we are treated to champagne and caviar.
Everything is made fresh several times a day on the ship, and not from packaged dry ingredients. That explains why the desserts and breads are always so good!
It is raining and cold so we spend the early afternoon with the balcony door open watching our passage through the Esteban Strait and by the Esperanas Islands, messing on the computers and having a sandwich from room service.
We are suppose to pass the Santa Leonora wreck at Paso Shoal with a historical commentary from Terry about 4:30PM. We head for the observation Deck with a book and iPod about 3:30PM so we can get a front row seat. It is just too messy to stand outside!
About 4:15PM, Terry announces we are behind schedule due to a nasty current and head wind and will pass the wreck at 5:30PM. We order a drink and continue with our reading. Then about 5:30PM we are told it will be another 45 minutes...OK, we are enjoying the passage in this very trecherous body of water so we wait, but many give up and go to the Seven Seas Society member’s cocktail party. We are invited, but pass in order to see the wreck. Finally about 5PM, we can just about make out, through the rain and fog, three little islands in a narrow spot ahead of us.
The one on the right is the stern of the Santa Leonora sticking out of the water. This wreck happened in 1968 and is important because it was a stupid mistake by the helmsman that caused the loss of the ship and a valuable cargo and changed the course of navigation. That day the captain and the pilot were talking to each other on the bridge, the pilot said "all right’ to the what the captain said and the helmsman thought the pilot meant ALL RIGHT and turned the ship hard right and ran it up on the shoals in this very narrow, treacherous canal. The accident was ruled a navigation error and from then on port and starboard are tge required directional terms used on the bridge of a ship to indicate the direction of a turn.
After we pass the wreck, we head out into open ocean again for a while. The Captain comes back on the PA reminding everyone to be careful and use the handrails as it will be rough for a while until we enter the Strait of Magellan about 8PM.
Carolyn had changed the Prime 7 reservation to tonight, but the Compass Rose menu has all our favorites on it including escargot, French onion soup and rack of lamb so we cancel again and eat in the main dinning room. Prime is a good steak house, but its menu is always the same. Carolyn had actually reserved Signatures originally for tonight, but that menu is still the one from last week that we really didn’t like so we canceled Signatures several days ago.
We are late for dinner tonight because of the wreck. The dinning room is full because it is one of the formal optional nights and the service is slow. We luck out and get a table for two by the window. Since it isn’t getting dark until almost 10PM now, we have a pleasant, but slow dinner watrching the Strait of Magellan slide by.
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