At Sea, Drake Passage
This morning we woke up at 6am with grey skies, wind and waves coming in from the northwest, a wind speed of 35 miles per hour and an air temperature of 35 degrees Fahrenheit. The ship is moving beautiful and steady in the famous howling 50’s. Here on the bridge our early bird guests have already lined up around Karen Copeland. She is always up at 6am ready to point out different species of petrels and albatrosses to our guests. Here in the early hours everyone is treated with fresh croissants from the bakery. The ship has done very good speed over night and we have only five hours until we reach the coast of Tierra Del Fuego.
At 9:30 am our National Geographic photographer Ira Block gave a colorful talk about his expedition to the North Pole. Later in the day Magnus Forsberg gave us a description of Antarctic adventures pertaining to the Ross sea area. Around 10am the wind dropped and the skies produced beautiful clouds on the horizon that pleased some of our landscape photographers.
Nearing 2pm we cruised around the wild and rugged coast of Tierra del Fuego. In the calm water large concentrations of Sooty Shearwaters were seen flying in all directions. Later on we were ready to pick up the Argentine pilot. Over the loudspeaker it was announced that everyone should come out and take pictures of the famous Argentine pilot jump. But there was no response because of the Swedish pancakes which were being served in the Bistro at the time.
Later in the evening we went alongside in Ushuaia. We can see our guests are very happy because our expedition to Antarctica has been very successful as a result of seeing lots of wildlife and the fact that the weather has been beautiful every day. I can see by the smiles on our guests faces that they will come back for another icy voyage north or south of the equator.
