Glaciers and Knots

          A busy ship is a happy ship so after breakfast, we are invited to our respective lounges, depending on language, for a sailor's knot class.  always something good to know so we showed up early again to get a good seat and this time, no Dramamine to put us to sleep.  The crew member showing us the knots was a Spanish speaker so we had another crew member as our interpreter and everybody wants to be a comedian.  But it was a fun class and we got to keep our pieces of rope and both my hubby and me did all the knots properly and by now I can't do a single one of them.  BUT the point is I did learn them so they should be easy to pick up again when we retire and have our little sailboat.  We'll need some of these knots then.

          We have our presentation of the glacier and on Marta Island as well.  Because we are the last cruise of the season, the penguins have already left and swam further north, I think they said.  So instead of seeing penguins, we will cruise over to Marta Island which is past Punta Arenas, see the sea lions that live there year round, and then back to Punta Arenas to leave the ship.  Marta Island is tomorrow.  Today is glacier day.

          We sail into de Agostini Sound which is quite beautiful with a rugged shore and a primitive forest, and glaciers, and wonderful cliffs and glacier carved areas.  It does take awhile to land everyone and the Spanish and French groups have already cleared the beach by the time all the English speakers are on shore.  We divide into groups and hike down the shore with the guides stopping at different places so that no groups are running into the others.  We walk around the corner and see the glacier in the distance across the bay.  gorgeous and glorious.  it seems massive from this distance and then we cans see tiny, tiny, less then 1" high miniature people closer to the glacier.  my gosh, it must be about a mile to get there.  not quite I found out but close.

          Our guide was really enjoying himself.  this was his favorite part of the trip.  he was a glacier guy.  So he pointed out every rock on the beach, every piece of ice in the lake, every broken down tree on the shore, and every line and crack and piece of debris in the glacier.  Most interesting for about half the trip there but then I just wanted to get to the glacier and look at it up close so I kind of start walking towards it on my own and our guide then went a bit faster to keep up with me.

          Finally we are at the face, as close as we can safely get, and the whole look of the glacier has changed from where we were a mile away.  so interesting.  then, for some reason, someone calls "group photo, group photo".  Say what?  I don't know these people from anyone so why would I want to be in a group photo with them or have a group photo with them.  But then I don't like my photo taken anyway, so I wandered off and my poor hubby, who loves having his photo taken, felt like he should wander with me so no group photo for us.

          We must have overstayed our time allotment because suddenly our guide is rounding us up and walking back to the beach to catch the zodiacs and he's motoring it fast.  I am a fairly mediocre walker, never going too fast except through airports to immigration then I hoof it fast, so we are left behind with the other stragglers.  But we get back to the beach well most of the boats have been loaded.  I think the Spanish and French group were already back on board but at all stops the crew had brought hot chocolate to the shore and whiskey to drink.  Most people were having the two together as was suggested by the crew.  BUT I prefer not to mess up my whiskey by diluting it with anything other than water, if that.   So a nice shot of whiskey and then back to the ship.

          Tonight is our last night on board.  short cruise.  We have to pay up in the store for our waterproof trousers and jacket then there is to be a farewell toast in the lounge along with a raffle of the ships flag - which must be quite a thing to get for some people as raffle tickets were selling quite well.  Then there is to be an auction of the navigation chart used for this particular voyage.  The crew is telling us that past charts have gone for thousands of dollars.  wow.  everybody collects something.  As we weren't buying raffle tickets and we weren't going to bid on the chart, we retired to our cabin to finish packing our bags and get ready for tomorrow to go to Patagonia Camp

          Don't know who won the raffle but we did hear later that the chart was auctioned for less than $500 so guess we didn't have huge gung-ho chart obtainers on this trip.  In spite of missing out on Cape Horn, still we got to circumnavigate it and the rest of the trip was good.  Tomorrow we see sea lions which are always enjoyable and then on to the next adventure.