So, dear reader, I owe you some updates. There have been some decent adventures since we last met! I still owe the three remaining days of our WNY / Finger Lakes adventure. Then we returned home and the following week (this most recent week) I went off to Baltimore for a conference (I’ll likely cover that in a single post). Finally, this recent Friday and Saturday I spent with my friends in their timeshare out in the Shenandoah Valley. But one more – we’re planning a camping trip with the dog in two weeks. This shall be an adventure as the dog has never camped before! But for now, we will start with the Martin House.
May 25 started just as many late-spring days in Buffalo – with clouds and gloom. Well, the gloom continued. It didn’t rain though; it was generally pleasant. We had breakfast at SPoT Coffee again with better service than the two prior days (did I mention how much I enjoy their espresso grind?) and then we checked out and went for a tour at The Martin House.
The Darwin D. Martin House in Buffalo, New York, is a world-class architectural masterpiece designed by Frank Lloyd Wright between 1903 and 1905. It’s widely considered to be the best (well, in my opinion one of the best) examples of his prairie house era. Martin was a successful executive, the chief financial officer, I believe, of a large company headquartered in Buffalo at the time and very much appreciated by his employers. He eventually was in charge of building a new corporate headquarters, also designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, but as a lead up to this he commissioned his own house. Before building his own house he had other homes built on the same plot of land. The gardener’s house above, for instance, was commissioned, as was his sister’s house:
And here is the view of the Martin house from his sister’s house – probably the only place where you can take a photograph inside at the Martin House. You can see from the above there are large beds of peonies that are likely blooming now, two weeks later, but at the time they were just green. Frank Lloyd Wright designed the windows used throughout.
Including these on the main house. Again, you can take photographs from the outside but not inside. Below this line of windows there are glass windows allowing light in to the basement level as well.
Upon entry to the main house you have a view towards where I am standing in this perspective. The entry has a door to the steps on the street as well as a door back in this direction to the walkway to the conservatory. The entry itself is fairly compact for the era with an archway to the left on entering (to the right from here) into a receiving room and then to the right (to the left from here) into a formal family area. If you have ever been in a Wright House it follows his philosophy of “compress and release.” The doorway and movement between rooms is compressed and then the room spreads out away from you and higher than you – the release as it is, capturing you into the space.
The view through the entry and down the covered corridor to the conservatory yields this – intended to impress.
What I enjoyed the most in all of this space was the Steinway covered with white oak; most are black but his wife had one covered with white oak. It returned to the house many years ago and is played by volunteers for maintenance.
While we were at the Martin house we started getting text messages from the Inns of Aurora where we were checking in later that day – 140 miles away! Seems they accidentally did not change our spa appointment to the next day. Therefore, we did not dillydally. We moved on, but first stopping at the Walden Galleria to verify that Western New York is not entirely populated by Dead Malls. I had to buy some sponge candy and a pair of swim trunks! And lunch of course (which sucked – mall food court food).
At the Inns we checked into the Zabriskie House, our home away from home for two nights. We definitely could have stayed longer. We enjoyed a couple’s massage at the spa here this evening (more on that later – we returned to the spa for their outdoor thermal spa experience the next day). We would both rate their massage experience as superb, probably the best compared to other resorts where we’ve enjoyed the massage experience (Woodloch Resort for instance, and Wildflower Farms in Gardiner New York). Not that there was anything wrong at the other places… we both realized that some of the reason why we enjoyed this experience better may be because we both had a male masseuse! Bigger hands with pressure more spread out.
We had dinner at the 1833 Kitchen and Bar which is part of the Inns. It was their third night open for outdoor dining for the season.
There are a ton of wines on the list I would have enjoyed traveling but the slow service allowed me to get as far as two only. We did enjoy some good food like this tuna crudo –
And some really good lamb as well (along with salmon, without the lardons please for her). Pro tip – some members of the guest services staff will do nearly anything for you, including the guy who checked us in who said he was “like a dog with a frisbee” and would answer any question. He told us how to get down to the waterfront in the morning for instance:
“Absolutely! No bother at all! You’re throwing a frisbee at a dog! I love this stuff! You will kindly find your way to the right side of The Rowland House following the grass down to the dock just behind the house. The Rowland House is marked with a large R on your map and just across Main St. from your location at Zabriskie House.”
But our true reward for the journey was sunset over Cayuga Lake.
And now finally the main reason we went on a road trip. There was a marathon for somebody to run! Fortunately, when we woke up early Sunday morning it was fairly dry. I say fairly because it did rain a bit during the marathon.
Buffalo Marathon starts at 6:30 in the morning near city hall. The route the race takes consists of three different “loops” each re-converging on downtown Buffalo. This made it easy for me as a spectator.
The first loop came up Delaware Avenue in front of The Westin where we were staying. This made it easy for me – I crawled out of bed just as Julia was leaving to head to the start line. By the time I arrived downstairs it was ten minutes before start time. I was able to cross the street and find a spot to cheer and so when she went by I yelled “Hey Julia!” She heard me even though I was on the opposite side of the street.
The race headed north for three miles, looped through a neighborhood, and then came back south – in front of the hotel again. This gave me the opportunity to attempt to get coffee. Unfortunately, everybody else and their brother decided to line up in front of SPoT coffee as well yet SPoT was not budging on their 7am opening time. As the day before had not gone well with a 5k running outside the front door once I realized it would only be the two employees who hadn’t been in the best of spirits the day before – AND they were NOT planning to open the doors until at least 7:15 – I abandoned and went back to the hotel room and made Hotel Room Coffee. Ugh.
My next cheering spot was about five blocks away from here. Once the course returned to City Hall it took a turn to the northwest and looped around one of the west side neighborhoods and went out along a waterfront park. I missed catching Julia here as I had taken another trip to the hotel room but I did catch her again when she returned. Then I relocated two miles further along the course – a decent half mile jog to get there – where I caught her returning from the waterfront where we ran Saturday morning.
She came running over to me at that point. “My phone is dead,” she told me.
“What???”
“My phone is dead,” and she held it out.
Then she started running away because I was not getting it.
Somehow in that five second window of time I realized she wanted me to charge her phone. And meet her further along the course. I did my mental calculations where I realized that even though the train wasn’t running and likely buses were not either that this was a town where I could easily get my car out of the garage and drive completely around the race course without running into traffic impediment and meet her…. Well, I was at mile 11 and I knew where to find her at mile 17.
“Hey, wait!” She gave me her phone.
So, I ran the mile back to the hotel. I figured that I needed to get to the hotel in about ten minutes, spend no less than ten minutes inside (charging the phone), spend about 15-20 minutes driving and parking, and then be in place to hand it back to her at I think it was 9:15am.
I was correct on my calculation. However, I went into the hotel and put the phone on the charger for five minutes, found my charged battery pack, hooked the phone up to THAT, and went down to the garage. Without my car keys! Back inside again.
Then I had to get out of the garage down a closed street which meant I had to drive on the sidewalk.
Here is our hero through the trees in Delaware Park just past Mile 17 at 9:19am! She was thankful – I managed to charge the phone to nearly 50% in an hour. Neither of us knows why it went dead.
Less than half a mile up the park roadway there was another junction point where the race course comes together. Next to the bluegrass band tent above there was a park refreshment stand which had coffee so I was able to replenish. Here it did start drizzling a bit but it wasn’t too miserable. After Julia passed here (Mile 21 at that point) I jogged back to my car (another mile…) and drove back towards the hotel.
I actually managed to catch her twice more, an all time record for me. On the drive back I came upon a traffic circle which was closed on one side for the marathon so I jumped out of the car here and cheered her and a number of the others on (they all looked familiar at this point as I had seen them all seven times thus far). And then when I parked at the hotel (back over that sidewalk again) I hopped outside just as she and the others were coming down Delaware Avenue.
She finished the race and we went back to The SPoT for coffee. Fortunately a third person had come in. Lunch was two pizzas from Frankie Primo’s +39 as takeout.
Naps were had all around and then Julia woke me up saying, “I feel like going for a walk. Do you feel like going for a walk?” Who goes walking after running 26.2 miles? Nobody I know.
The weather was beautiful by Buffalo standards for the end of May. It was dry and warm. As you can see the streets were reopened as well.
We made our way out to the seaport park hoping to eat outside at the marina tiki bar. Unfortunately they did not have their outdoor area open so we abandoned and walked back towards the hotel instead, ending up at Big Ditch Brewery.
And we continue with our January adventures…. As they rolled to a close! It’s time to catch up as now there have been more adventures.
So, Holland America has as an excursion option on disembarkation day the choice of having a private car and tour guide for eight hours – ending at the airport. For a solo person the car for two would be great. It’s likely a car the size of a Toyota Corolla I suspect. As we have six pieces of luggage with us (two checked each plus carry on) we realized we needed something bigger so we booked a “private minivan” which is supposedly large enough for three or four couples. I tell you, the van that picked us up this morning was big enough for about 12 people with 22 days of baggage but there was only ourselves in it.
Ours was listed as “Buenos Aires Private Touring – Full Day (Minivan) Ending at the Airport.” I suspect you’d want “Buenos Aires Private Touring – Full Day (Car) Ending at the Airport.” I’ll describe now how it worked for us. We think it was worth it and I’ll explain way, but also use this as an excuse to describe the experience.
The cruise port in Buenos Aires is pretty chaotic. So, from beginning to end.
As is the case for all disembarking passengers luggage goes out the night before by midnight. They haul your “checked bags” down, you bring down your carry-on. You have to carry your carry-on down in the morning to the cruise terminal shuttle and then carry it to the terminal. For these private touring transfers you are in the last group to disembark – at 8:30 for us. They give you enough tags for your bag and they call you when it’s time.
Upon arrival from the terminal you get off of the bus and go into the terminal and find your other luggage, which if like us would be Blue group C, a fairly small section towards the near end of the baggage claim area. Then you take your baggage (there are no carts) out through customs. At customs you must put everything through an X-ray machine (they will put it up for you but really didn’t help taking it down). In general there were not luggage trolleys available.
For us, this was a matter of maneuvering, between The Boss, myself, and my mother, one 76 pound rolling bag, one 65 pound rolling bag, one 40 pound rolling bag, a couple of fairly heavy duffel bags, a rolling carry on, a few shoulder bags and one backpack out through a fairly good sized building.
Then you spill out onto a wide covered apron near the street where a HAL person will direct you through a crowd to a corner of the building where there were numerous people carying signs with your name on them.
Pro tip – pack less than we did. Take advantage of the unlimited laundry offer.
So, we found our guide and he directed us across a dip in the concrete to a van that was luckily waiting on the best patch of curb available. The driver loaded our luggage and we were on our way.
Logistically, the way it works is on embarkation day the HAL excursion desk leaves you an envelope with a form for you to fill out regarding anything you may want to see on your private tour. In reality, our guide had a list of eight main areas he shows to everyone but if we had anything special we wanted to see it should go on the list. I was looking at something that wasn’t steak for lunch so I researched, and we wanted to see the Evita Peron Museum, so I researched that as well. Otherwise, he covered the five main areas we wanted to see including the cemetery and Plaza Mayo along with Recoleta and Palermo neighborhoods, We also added Ateneo Grand Splendid Bookstore which was also among our favorites.
So as I was saying, they picked us up and we were on our way. We spent the morning heading towards the central and then the more southern part of the close-in city and then after lunch we headed towards the northern part of the city. Finally, we went to the airport.
We stopped by Teatro Colon which unfortunately was closed except for the main hallway due to some electrical work being done. We could have done a tour here for forty five minutes in English but it would not have happened anyway.
One note – our guide, and most of the guides, are fully licensed and many of them have college degrees for being tour guides. With his badge our guide was able to visit most attractions without paying a fee, although we had to pay the international rate. he also seemed to know somebody on every single block. Martin was approached many times for the typical Argentinian kiss on the cheek greeting. Oh, but one other thing – even though he has free admission everywhere at attractions where they sell an electronic guide or otherwise he is often forbidden from providing his own commentary. More on this later.
We spent a bit of time in the square behind the theater talking about the buildings in the neighborhood including the palace of justice. Then, back into the van.
I snapped this photo of The Obelisk on our way to our next stop, Plaza Mayo. Santiago and Punta Arenas both had Plaza de Armas; Buenos Aires has the same thing, Plaza Mayo. Most Spanish colonial cities have something similar.
This heavily-touched-up photo I took of the pink house – their presidential mansion. It sits on Plaza Mayo along with the national bank and the cathedral and a number of other buildings.
This is the inside of the cathedral on the square. As it was Pope Francis’ seat when he was in Buenos Aires there is now a small Pope Francis museum attached apparently but we did not visit it. There is actually a bit to see here including The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier of the Independence. If anybody is curious I’ll look it up when I get around to reviewing my notes.
Back in the van. Let me tell you, it’s nice to only wait for two others climbing into a van. Martin wanted to take us to the San Telmo neighborhood but as we visited it yesterday we suggested moving on. Instead, he took us straight to the La Boca neighborhoodwhere we drove past the very famous soccer (futbol) stadium. Every building in La Boca seems to be painted in its colors. Here we got out of the van and went for a coffee in what I would call a “coffee speakeasy.”
This was my cafe cortado. Mmmm. Anyway, the entrance to the coffee shop was through a souvenir shop behind a painted door and up some stairs in the back. You would not know it was there.
La Boca is a neighborhood that was settled first by Spanish immigrants and later by Italian immigrants in the late 1800s. Along the port there there is a walking street, Caminito, leading to the small port where today many artists sell their wares.
Caminito is actually a combination between an outdoor market, walking street, and outdoor gallery.
Our guide Martin highlighting one of the artworks.
The back of a meat-selling restaurant.
After this part of the tour it was time to say goodbye to the South and head north. Along the way we passed the new port district along the eastern side of the district, much better than the cruise port neighborhood. It reminded me of the newer parts of Baltimore’s Inner Harbor district or some of the developments along the Chicago River in Chicago.
Martin insisted we stop at this – it was not on our radar at all. Two years ago, long time Cruise Critic readers will remember, around the time of one of the January Antarctic sailings there was a tornado that hit this part of Buenos Aires collapsing part of the roof in the cruise terminal. In addition to collapsing the cruise terminal it did some damage to this, Floralis Genérica. This has only been reopened for the past two weeks. Prior to 2023, it opened in the daytime and closed at night; now it is just… open, but hopefully it will soon return to its opening and closing status.
After the flower we visited Recoleta Cemetary where Evita and her family are entombed. Of course, our guide told us the story about this as well. She was not actually entombed there until years after her death of course and there are many many mausoleums that are more grand than hers. If anybody is interested, please let me know and I will share more photos.
And then finally we visited Ateneo Grand Splendid bookstore.
This bookstore is great, obviously. It’s like a large Barnes and Noble if you speak Spanish. If not, then it’s just pretty. The English language section is on the ground floor on the left. There is a gift and merchandise section in the lobby. On the third (top) tier for a fee you can see an exhibit regarding the history of the museum and they will serve you snacks. Or you can pay for a coffee and sit on the stage.
I bought a dual-language cookbook here, it was on sale in the lobby. We also somewhere along here stopped for lunch.
I’m not going to say lunch was a mistake, but it certainly was an adventure. I think our guide’s intention was to take us to one of the market restaurants or somewhere similar, but prior to the day of the tour when we provided our list I gave him the name of Niño Gordo – “Fat Baby” in English. This had the potential to be a legendary lunch except for two factors – one, we had eaten ourselves to death on the few days prior and two, halfway through the meal the power went out!
Our guide was actually a young guy – in his mid-twenties, and perhaps when I assessed him as an adventurous recent college graduate in a cosmopolitan city I was wrong :-). We took him to an Asian – Argentine fusion spot. As you can see above, we were seated in a section that had low seats, near the floor, with light spilling in from the tabled area and from the bar area. We ordered several dishes to share including kimchi, an Argentine-Asian beef dish, and a fish dish. It was going great, but around the second course the power in the kitchen goes out and half the restaurant goes dark. Not long after that, the air conditioning above us starts dripping on us – because it was off and no longer blowing the condensation elsewhere. So, surprise.
We finished our lunch and then made our way to the airport. The airport is a bit crazy though. The key here that worked out well for us is with the private car or van our guide snagged us a luggage trolley, walked into the airport with us and showed us where our check-in counters are, and showed us where the security desk is.
One thing I’m going to note now –
EVEN WITH PRIORITY STATUS EZE IS A FOUR HOUR AIRPORT IN THE LATE AFTERNOON AND EVENING. UGH.
Delta’s check-in opens at five. American opens at six as does United (I think). Delta has fewer people staffing check-in but the same number of planes as American. American opened early. We arrived at 5pm and my mother got in line for check in right away whereas the two of us sat and had coffee for ninety minutes as we had several hours to wait. With priority our check-in was 20 minutes; my mother’s was 90 minutes. The security line was I think 50 minutes, passport control was 20 or 30 minutes. Okay, so maybe with priority it’s a three hour airport. However, as we arrived so early we had time to kill. We enjoyed a light meal at Le Pain Quiotidien along with some wine and beer prior to running the security and passport gauntlet. And then? The best thing ever. We visited the Admiral’s Club lounge where, after spending a hot summer day touring Buenos Aires, I was able to take a shower! We finally boarded for our 11:59pm flight and were happily able to sleep on the plane as well.
And all of the bags on the right (the four) made it on the plane to Miami. When we landed in Miami it was barely above freezing and there were gusty winds which slammed our plane to the ground twice. I figured we’d be in for the same at home but it was a more typical landing. Even so, brrrrr.
On approach the Potomac was full of ice. And then we spent the next week clearing snowcrete from our driveway and walks…. Back to normal.
Okay. Buenos Aires. We were in Buenos Aires on January 30 and 31. So, buckle up.
Before we left for South America Buenos Aires seemed as if it would take some logistics to handle. Instead, we learned it was similar to visiting New York City, London, Paris, Washington, Atlanta, or Montreal. Yes, there is traffic, but it is not crazy traffic. We thought it would not be easy to find places where it would be safe to walk around. We were wrong – much of the city, much of the center city, seems safe, safer than Santiago – and before we arrived in Santiago it seemed more approachable. So, arriving in Buenos Aires. Let me describe it to you.
When we planned our South America and Antarctica journey we had realized that one of us would be marathon training and mostly on a treadmill. As we planned to be out the evening we were in Buenos Aires (Friday the 30th), and as we had to fly home on Saturday night arriving on Sunday to be back at work on Monday, we decided Saturday would be a relatively easy day. It was. We slept in a bit, one of us spent the morning on the treadmill while the other got organized to fly home and walked some laps on deck, and we enjoyed some of the solitude of a ship in port for a while. Let me describe to you what this was like.
The view from the ship in Buenos Aires is lovely – not. It’s a view of a port and parking lots. At least unlike some other ports you don’t drive through huge stacks of containers to get to the cruise port. Instead, you come off the ship, you board a bus and drive past containers, and then you drive across parking lots for trucks and containers to get to the cruise port. It’s not a scenic cruise terminal. Two years ago the cruise terminal itself was struck by a storm during cruise season and nearly demolished – it has now been rebuilt which is pretty amazing.
Is it a nice terminal? I guess so? But it’s chaos outside. There is not much space for pickup; we attempted to get an Uber across the street but the terminal area has 3G signal rather than 4G or LTE so it’s hard to catch an Uber, and beyond about three blocks from the terminal it really is not a good part of town to walk as there is a tightly packed South American neighborhood-that-was-built-without-authority where as a tourist you do not want to pass. But beyond there, get about a mile or a mile and a half from the terminal, you are in a beautiful cosmopolitan city. Ignore the news about Buenos Aires’ currency catastrophe. Ignore the threats you hear; it’s like being in a Spanish-speaking Brooklyn in my opinion.
Similar to Montevideo we aimed to have a market lunch in Buenos Aires. This was another grill open to the bar in the middle of a market – this time it was Mercado de San Telmo and forgive me I do not have the name of the restaurant within the market. We actually brought my mother along for this. Afterwards we explored the neighborhood. Two blocks away there is an outdoor art market which we explored.
As was the case with a lot of other places we visited we saw street dancing in the park.
And then we enjoyed a wine tasting in a wine shop! This was another thing I specifically sought out and one of the reasons we visited San Telmo as there were another of wine merchants. We actually brought a couple of bottles home from here (no surprise really), one of which can be purchased locally here. Interestingly the shopkeeper used Google Translate to speak out his descriptions of the wines and play them back. Honestly I could have done without that.
We saw interesting sights on the streets in San Telmo. And then we moved on back to the ship for a short siesta before heading out for the evening.
As is the case with a lot of tourists we ended up at a tango show. Our destination, courtesy of a Holland America excursion, was the theater stage at Cafe de Los Angelitos.
At the theater we were offered a cafe or dessert. Still working off lunch we focused on the pavlova which seems to be the national dessert of Buenos Aires (yes, I know Buenos Aires is not a country, but with many places it seems like there’s Buenos Aires and then there is the rest of the country). This was followed by an hour tango show with a mix of modern and traditional tango dancing.
The dancing was spectacular.
As was the singing.
This was well worth it. I think I’d see tango once a week if I were spending a summer in Buenos Aires.
And then we were done. Back on the bus for a ride to a closed door restaurant.
Apparently Buenos Aires has a number of closed door restaurants – relatively small restaurants focused on serving privately. Basically they are the speakeasy of restaurants. Ours seated I think about 30 people, so two thirds of a tour bus. I didn’t take any pictures at the restaurant. I think I would have enjoyed it more if we had not had a large lunch. As it was, the wine was great, the appetizer was good, but the steak dinner was the same as the others we had in South America – and I don’t remember what my partner had (she does not eat beef). It made for a long day. I think if I were to plan it again I would have planned my own tango stop followed by a more avant garde dinner somewhere, maybe even modern sushi.
We were back on the ship around 11:00 in the evening, so very early by local standards, ready to sleep for eight hours before waking up to be off the ship at 9am. And more on that tomorrow.
Friday was a fairly chill sea day for us, but it sure did fill up quickly. It had been two wakeups since we visited our friends in the Pinnacle Grill. Friday night we visited our friends in the Main Dining Room instead.
Crossing the Drake northward was generally a bit bouncy but nothing fell off the counters and none of us tripped or anything. The biggest tragedy was the champagne flutes acting like bowling pins in the cabinet overnight. Nonetheless, we woke up to bouncy seas, room service coffee, and a pretty chill morning. Neither of us left the cabin until 10:30. The Boss decided it was calm enough to have some treadmill time and I ventured forth to complete a number of errands.
On the to-do list –
Get our itinerary straight for our private airport transfer and tour leading up to airport drop off in Buenos Aires; I picked out a few different neighborhoods to visit and some major sites. This also meant I lined up what we wanted to do the day before more independently. I ran this through the concierge but I’m going to check with ShoreEx to see if it’s set up properly.
Have The Boss’s preferences set for Konigstafel. I actually have a photo coming on this. It’s a set menu of something like six or seven courses, but there are a handful of dishes they can sub out for a handful of fish or vegetarian courses. I tried to work this through the concierge but they were attempting an approach where they get us the menu and then menu with options (which I don’t think the dining room will get us) and then we return it during the day tomorrow (today) when we are off the ship so it gets turned back through them (the concierge) prior to dinner tomorrow night (it’s at 6, we get back on board around 4:30 today, so how is that going to work). We ended up talking to our MDR waiter Muis about this and while we were dining two tiers of leadership came over to our table to work it instead.
Do the same for the Cellar Master’s dinner in a few nights (this has not been handled yet).
Arrange appetizer delivery for yesterday afternoon.
So that was handled. Then I tried the Dive-In burger (it was good to great, fries were okay, I wouldn’t write home about it if people didn’t rave about it).
And then I joined my mother for a private behind-the-scenes tour.
Let me tell you, folks. This was something really special. I expected they’d spend an hour walking us through various parts of the ship with a little bit of talk, but instead they spent nearly THREE HOURS walking us through various parts of the ship interspersed with leaders of said area telling us about their jobs, responsibilities, and themselves for 15 or 20 minutes at a stretch!
The person who led us – this was her first tour. We were actually one of two tour groups. Each was supposed to be twenty people and they NEVER do two tour groups but I think because this was a rather long itinerary and there was good demand with a lot of sea days they set a second up. The cruise director kicked us off, and then we met:
The laundry manager and his staff.
Captain Kevin in the flesh in the bridge who then delegated his talk to another.
The provisions manager (runs the mini “warehouses” for food on board)
One of the dancers backstage during an actual production!
The chief engineer; he spoke at great length regarding all of the systems on board. I found this to be the most interesting and asked a number of questions!
The executive chef on board. He walked us through one of the three large kitchens for the main dining room as well as the Pinnacle kitchen (I bet you didn’t realize these are actually adjacent to each other and attached).
Finally, the hotel manager.
All of this was incredibly interesting. They provided us a lot of detail and allowed us to take photos everywhere but reminded us to ask in each area (there was one person on duty who declined and with good reason).
After this tour, they fed us small appetizers and sparkling wine. Then The Boss and I capped off our afternoon with a viewing of Evita (her) and a nap (me), and we enjoyed a pleasant MDR dinner.
Drake passage views
The linen press machine. This can press four sets of napkins at once and they come out the other end fairly well folded!
The view from the bridge. While in Antarctica, they had three spotters on constant rotation looking for whales. They noted 103 whales during the three days where we were sighting whales there. They claim this is an all time high but they’ve said that about so many things now I don’t believe it.
Bourbon storage. They also had a lot of beer and wine and a single case of Chimay.
The engine control room was my favorite part of the tour, possibly from my history of working in network operations centers with similar alert panels on the walls.
A happy breakfast and room service chef. I have more to come on the dining room tour. Spoiler alert – I repeated it yesterday (Friday) with our Friday evening dining experience!
On the left is the 22 day meal rotation for this cruise. Top right is the bread rotation. The right is the Koningstafel.
Yesterday we were in the Falklands. I wore three layers and a raincoat. Our truck was warm so ended up stripping to two for most of the ride. After the excursion we visited the local brewery which was popular with cruise passengers, the entertainment and dance squad from the ship, and locals dressed in shorts and t-shirts just getting out of work (it was 3:30 on a Friday after all). It was a glorious summer day! Aside from the 30 knot breeze…. That of course made return tendering a challenge but all in all it was a good day and lengthy enough for us to work up an appetite for Konigstafel!
Yesterday was what I’ve been looking forward to the most on this cruise – visiting the Falkland Islands, particularly the offroad excursion to Volunteer Point. Supposedly this is the crown jewel of excursions here in Stanley, and with good reason as far as I am concerned.
View through the windshield was often sideways
My recommendation is as follows –
If you are planning this excursion and you’ve booked for December 2027 through February 2028, go ahead and buy it now. For this coming Dec 2026 through Feb 2027 cruise season it may be “too late.”
There were two groups for this excursion, and that’s why I say it may be “too late.” The first set filled I think about seven SUVs, and I believe the second set was similar. You want to be in the first set. Departure time is 8am, immediately upon arrival in Stanley; meeting time is 7:45 (and you know that means that even though there is no real reason on HAL maybe you should be in the World Stage by 7:35). The second group has an 8:30 departure time.
The reason why you want to be in this first group – purely logistics. Both have the same amount of time at the rookery, but realistically the second group leaves the port area around 9:15 meaning you‘re back to Stanley sometime between 3:30 and 4:15. We were back at the port a few minutes before 3pm and sitting outside in the sunshine at the brewery enjoying a beer at 3:08pm, just as the line formed to be thirty people long on this glorious Friday summer afternoon (more about that later). We had time to chat with our cruise mates, enjoy our beer, and visit two souvenir shops. Then it was time to line up for the tender. There was a short line – 1 1/2 tenders full of people – but they were stalled, which is not too unusual for Stanley (more on this later). After waiting on line for about 20 minutes there were then about eight tenders full of people just standing there in the port car park.
Land Rovers at work
Anyway. The penguins are fascinating, but I was just as fascinated by the journey to get there. It seems as if half the vehicles in the Falkland Islands are Land Rovers – not necessarily late model (in fact, most are not), many heavily modified. The majority are Defenders. We saw Defenders driven by teenagers, adults, soccer moms, and old men and women who appeared as if they were long retired.
In the peat
Our squad to transport us to the beach consisted of half a dozen vehicles from Bagley‘s 4×4 Tours (if you want a private tour, go ahead and look them up on Google). Their fleet for this tour consisted of four Defenders, one Nissan Patrol, and I think a Toyota (not too sure on that, I wasn‘t concentrating on photographing it). If you’ve been reading recent Live threads for HAL or other lines you will read “somebody will get stuck” on many of them. So, we ended up in the Nissan and I asked the driver, “does this get stuck more than the Defenders?” At first he wasn’t too amused 🙂. But he did open up a bit. Turns out our driver Nathan has his own business and is an auto mechanic. He’s an interesting guy – originally from St. Helena. The other passengers in our car were put at ease after hearing about his mechanical abilities. “See that Defender? I built that.” He went on to explain that six years ago one of the better looking Defenders was assembled from multiple vehicles and new and used parts from him for one of his friends, and clearly it was still running and not getting stuck.
Rear view
He also explained to us that the Nissan Patrol rides better and is more comfortable than the Defenders (it is), something that was also shared by a couple of our beer drinking buddies at the brewery – the Fords they have are also more comfortable. However, as the Nissan weighs more (three tons instead of 2 1/2), it does get stuck more easily. When did you get stuck last? Once this year so far, in December. He explained how he managed to get stuck when alone with nobody to pull him out so I’m certain there’s some hilarity there, and now he has a two way radio as cell signal doesn’t cover everywhere!
They look like they’re in deep sometimes
So the drive actually really, really does require a good 4×4 – as in, a really good 4×4. My Range Rover Sport at home with street tires, although Mud & Snow, won’t cut it. It would have gotten us two thirds of the way there.
Garage princess
The first quarter of the drive is on dry pavement on what is called a licensed road (you need a license). Then after I think 15 miles you turn off the paved road for a gravel road. At the 27 miles point you turn off that gravel road for another gravel road. That’s the second quarter of the drive. I think around the 35 miles point point you come to a private ranch. This is the rest stop – you stop, you get out, you take a few pictures, you pee.
Typical Falklands Street vehicles
The next quarter of the drive is clearly worse, and until a few years ago it was entirely overland. The ranch is building a lower-quality gravel road across their property little by little. I feel it stretches halfway, as far as distance goes, from the ranch house to the sea. This is probably the worst road I would take The Boss’s Subaru on and not expect to break something. I’d probably take my ancient Mini on it and not really care.
Typical Old Man’s Car in Stanley
The final quarter of the drive is the most rugged.
So, as a farm kid I have memories of driving across dry corn fields at harvest time, or on hay fields. You could do this with a Chevy Vega station wagon, or our later Chevy Cavaliers. For a pasture, you’d need proper four wheel drive and an awareness of where it gets swampy (that’s where you need the tractor).
All of this final quarter is tractor-land. It’s scrubland and peat bog, constantly. The trucks are driving over peat bushes that stand almost to your knees in spots, and they have to go over them because as a path gets used it becomes boggier and boggier. There are numerous small banks to mount, many where the driver takes a 25 or 30 degree angle sideways (my seat-mates thought it was 45 degrees, but no) and many where you see the sky through the windshield. Nathan did show us exactly where he got stuck in December, too, and I can see how it happened.
Anyway, our drive there – and back – occurred without incident. If you have a sore back or otherwise, you may consider not doing this tour. Obviously as the ranch extends the gravel road the tour will become easier, but my hunch is it will take them a few years to complete – and if there’s a change in finances then this activity may change or cease.
Upon arrival you are asked to get out of the truck and walk through a foot bath, then climb back into the truck and you go park. HAL advertises a box lunch which is provided by Bagley’s in this case – one truck has sandwiches in the back, another has thermoses of coffee and hot water and cold water. The sandwiches are designed to feed you. They’re good but not gourmet. They fed us after the penguin viewing.
It’s penguins all the way down
The penguins are amazing. I believe we saw three kinds, but when I post my photos I’ll let you inspect them and correct me (if you’re impatient to wait, check my Instagram link). We saw an abundance of King Penguins, a Gentoo nesting colony, and Magellanic penguins.
Flappy Flappy
The main point of visiting Volunteer Point is to visit the large King Penguin population. This mostly consists of a large squad of penguins hanging out in a stone circle half the size of a football field occasionally squawking and flapping flippers at each other. You’re not permitted to enter the circle but they can come and go as they please. They generally won’t come too close to you but they will follow you if you’re walking where they’re planning to go.
You have to look closely to see the hatchlings!
As of this January there were some still hatching eggs and there were some youngsters hiding under their parents. I didn’t notice this on our first pass through here where we spent ten or fifteen minutes watching them.
Gentoo Jackson Pollock
After the King Penguins, we wandered down into a mini-valley to visit the nesting Gentoos. The Gentoos were really, really smelly even though they were not there in huge numbers (I’m guessing there were fifty or a hundred). They had a larger percentage of youngsters, though. They had painted their whole nesting circle (similar stone henge around them) like a Jackson Pollock painting. This is where we learned that youngsters who are rather large and just fed by their parents flop out on their bellies looking dead as they digest and grow. Hilarious. Anyway, I guess at this point they’re large enough to appear full sized but not at the point where they are ready to take to the seas.
Then we decided to wander out to the beach. The main attraction here seemed to be mainly King Penguins going in small groups (three or four or five) to and from the sea or just wandering aimlessly. There was, however, a seal terrorizing the area. The seal apparently occasionally comes out of the surf and kills a penguin for sport – the guides told us it’s the same seal that has been hanging around for a while now and he doens’t actually eat what he kills.
Penguins having a beach day
So, we saw a group of penguins wandering up the beach to the no-go zone. Then we saw the seal in the surf. I didn’t get a photo of the seal when it came out of the surf, but what happened next is he came out of the surf, the group of penguins took off at a high speed run towards the dune, a ranger yelled at a lady taking photos to “get back” because the seal would bite her too, and then the seal went back into the surf (note this is all anecdotal – I was looking elsewhere when this happened).
Seal
Then we started walking up the beach towards the rocks. Nothing interesting there. Then we started wandering back over the dunes. Then we realized what we weren’t seeing – the Magellanic penguins nesting in burrows in the dunes! In most of the borrows there was a parent penguin standing guard with a younger penguin behind. They were really cute.
Baby Magellanic penguins!
Anyway, we eventually returned to King Circle and watched parent penguins feeding their babies discretely. You really had to pay attention to see them – mostly it looked like there were fat penguins with an extra set of flab just above their feet, but often you would look closely and see the parent leaning down and sharing a tasty morsel.
Hatchling and parent beak!
This was a ninety minute stop at Volunteer Point. Then we set out for the two hour drive back in the glorious summer sunshine…
On return from Volunteer Point the driver dropped us at the “cruise terminal” and we walked to Falkland Beerworks where it seemed as if everybody in town in addition to every cruise ship passenger and the entertainment staff from Oosterdam had decided to throw back a pint or two. Falkland Beerworks has authentic hand-pulled cask ales and in my opinion they are good. IPA fanatics will ask for a bottle of the Iron Lady IPA instead which seemed to be a little toasted like it had been aged in peated scotch barrels and then may be slightly disappointed.
A lot of people also recommend Victory Bar in Stanley which we did not visit. Supposedly they have excellent fish and chips. Instead, after sitting in the sun with cruise friends and observing the locals in shorts and t-shirts we made the observation “it’s very windy; we’d better return to the ship sooner rather than later!” And we left. But not without visiting a couple of souvenir shops.
When we arrived back at the “cruise terminal” there was a line on the dock for tenders and a line through the 20 foot long “cruise terminal” building ending in the glass shed (20’ by 10’) behind it. This is where we joined the queue…. As the line was paused others joined behind us, snaking out into the parking lot. A few minutes later they announced, “tendering operations are paused while the captain repositions the ship to accommodate for worsening conditions.” I later learned that the captain was very frustrated because the harbor master had allowed numerous Asian squidding vessels to drop anchor throughout the bay and harbor around Stanley and they had very long anchor lines limiting the number of safe places for Oosterdam to drop anchor andprovide shelter for tenders. End result, tendering was a game of bumper cars.
By the time tender operations recommenced, the line snaked through the parking lot, out into the street until the constable came around (which they do because there’s nothing else to do), and down the dock adjacent to the tender dock.
Tendering in the rough
It was pretty rough out there. I wouldn’t say it was scary, but the boats were throwing up considerable spray and of course it was dripping in through the hatches. When we arrived back at the ship it was with a sudden crash against the gangplank.
Arriving back on board we had time to rest, shower, and change for the Konigstafel experience! Now this I will write up in real time as I refresh myself by looking at the photos.
Konigstafel is a concept introduced by HAL over the summer last year where once per cruise they offer a “king’s table.” I will note that it is not a chef’s table which implies that the chef gets creative with whatever they have available and / or is fancy or neat. Instead, it’s a set menu throughout Holland America. From the reviews I read last August and September it has not strayed far. Accommodations for dietary restriction are limited; they only have set plates created for vegetarian modifications.
I took this photo from the behind the scenes tour I attended on Friday and on the right you can note the Koningstafel menu. Like I said, they stick to this.
We went through considerable effort to check on getting my partner’s meal changed to exclude beef tartare and lamb because she is pescatarian. They were actually willing to accommodate her, but she said if she had to do it again in the future, because there is so much food, she would probably accept the cauliflower they subbed for the steak tartare and not the modification they made to replace the lamb; she was just not hungry at that point.
The setup for the whole situation begins in the Ocean Bar where there was a jazz band playing (I think this was purely coincidence as the whole bar was not roped off for the event). They make you sign a medical questionnaire as you end up going into crew areas where they check to ensure everyone is healthy (this tells me the entire crew signs the same sheet every single day under threat of not lying and that, in part, is how they maintain a healthier ship). Then, they served us a cocktail.
The cocktail, coincidentally, consists of a sour cocktail similar to a Pisco sour! Some guests were guessing we would actually be served a Pisco sour, but we were not; it was the same menu in September elsewhere.
Update – after checking the menu, the name of the drink was not actually noted! Anyway, this is served with two canapés – crabmeat, caviar, and mint croissant which was to die far as well as caponata.
After the cocktail and canapés we decamped for a full galley tour – identical to Friday’s behind the scenes tour! It was a good refresher, but it did give me the opportunity to skip the food digester section. Also, this is where I noted that it does interfere a little with the kitchen flow and they start to use up some extra resources to make the dinner happen – perhaps this is why they schedule on a busy port day? Less lunch service, more time to prepare, and everybody heads to the Lido instead?
We sat down to an intro from dining room section heads and a bread course which consisted of sesame challah loaf including poppy seed braids. This was served with four butters – plain butter, coconut butter, Thai red curry butter, and blueberry thyme butter. My favorite was made by blending the coconut with the Thai red curry butter 🙂. Poppy seeds were everywhere of course.
An Amuse-Bouche of Asian Wagyu Steak Tartare was served. What a great use for this. The beef was soy-mirin marinated and it was heavily saline. The tempura shiso leaf was a great touch.
This was served with a smoked champ agne cocktail (there is a typo on the menu so it’s now champ agne).
Seafood starter was a Butter poached lobster tail with lemongrass coconut foam made of vanilla, champagne, and orange.
Although diminutive as it should be, perhaps my favorite course. Such good flavor. This was served with a Tattinger Brut Prestige rose.
One thing I’d note – in the reviews I read in September the sparkling rose was served in a champagne flute whereas the smoked champagne was served in a teacup style champagne glass. I think the smoked champagne was better in the flute, as Oosterdam did last night, with the Prestige rose in the teacup style champagne glass.
The one dish which surprised me was the spinach ricotta malfatti which was served with truffle garlic butter, shaved seasonal black truffle, and parmesan foam. The truffle was not overpowering like it sometimes is, and the ricotta did not form a pile of gloop as sometimes happens.
It was quite nice. However, when I see “parmesan” I think “Wisconsin,” rather than Italian equivalents, so I wonder if this could potentially be upgraded? I believe the red is a dehydrated tomato peel. This was served with Pascal Joliet Sancerre Blanc Sauvage from France (basically a white French wine that is good).
Then came a mid-dinner dessert.
Sour cherry granita with vanilla lemon sorbet. Mmmm.
Many guests would say they have happily dined up until this point. Well, folks, buckle up. This is where lamb turns controversial.
The main is a cannon of smoked lamb with pistachio crust served with date purée, lamb jus, and “Mediterranean” vegetables. I put Mediterranean in quotes because I didn’t know carrots are Mediterranean and I think after nine days without fresh provisions and two weeks without full replenishment you probably get what you get on Oosterdam.
They also really started pouring the wine at this point.
And that’s how I found myself sitting there with three glasses of wine.
The Figgins Figlia Merlot / Petit Verdot from Walla Walla is certainly a combination I would definitely seek out again. The port and Amari were there to complement the cheese course and then the dessert course.
Cheese went great at this point in the evening. As did dessert.
This is where it started with sweets galore.
Dessert was interesting – I liked the honey cremieux with lemon curd served with bergamot gel, honeycomb guile (what is that?) and lavender honey. The croutons seemed a bit like cereal. It was good for sampling. The sweets that followed were a bit much.
I couldn’t goad The Boss into eating more than one of these but they were as expected and well presented.
When we arrived in our cabin macarons were waiting on our coffee table. Again, I was a solo diner for these.
Overall, it was a good experience. It was really enjoyable sitting and talking to our table mates, but four hours can be a long time if you are accidentally assigned seats incorrectly (we were not, I had the chance to get to know a couple of folks who have posted on Cruise Critic!). I think if I were cruising HAL again this year I wouldn’t repeat the performance, but if they were doing a different menu every year I certainly would.
It’s great after a day in port where dining is limited (our lunch yesterday consisted of a sandwich on white sandwich bread). Knowing the lamb is coming I may have held off on my Pinnacle lamb a few days ago, though.
And this morning for breakfast – we weren’t hungry; we shared a carafe of coffee and then had nothing until 1pm.
There have been soooo many good experiences lately that it’s almost been overwhelming, and now we’re winding down for the last week of vacation.
Okay, so I’m catching up on my writing as today is our final sea day until our Antarctic adventure begins. I went to two lectures on polar ice today and a third discussion led by the captain on our planned route once we reach Palmer Peninsula early tomorrow morning. Basically he warns us “if you’re living life to its fullest you’re going to be busy.”
Morning view, Friday January 16, 2025
Our mornings are predictably beginning fairly early here and I’m finally settling into a routine where I’m able to fall asleep and take a nap if I’m trying to live life to a fullest. Unfortunately, my Oura ring which I’m using to track my stress levels, heart rate, readiness, and sleep doesn’t seem to be able to tell when I’m taking a nap on a ship. I know it can tell how much sleep I am taking at night but it doesn’t see when I reach the same level of stillness I normally do for a nap at home – because obviously the ship is moving.
It hasn’t tracked a nap since Santiago.
Anyway, the first thing I tend to do in the morning is look outside off the stern of the ship. If it isn’t raining I hop out there and snap a photo. Beautiful, isn’t it? Then I sit at my desk here and write a little and sip coffee.
The further south we were going in the waterways of Chile the more ice we saw and the closer it came to sea level.
On Friday we went down to Pinnacle Grill for breakfast.
Pinnacle Grill breakfast
The Pinnacle Grill menu is obviously more substantial than the MDR menu. On this particular day I had the aloo masala (potato curry I think) and egg burjhi (eggs with peppers and spices I think). It was served with a dosa (lentil crepe), chapati bread, stewed lentils, and some chutneys.
For comparison, today I had the Pan Asian breakfast, you know because I have to try everything out.
Pan Asian breakfast
This was served alongside miso soup poured table side.
I’m really impressed with the variety of food served here. It’s even higher than what we saw traveling in Aqua Class on Celebrity. I know we have some perks due to Neptune Class, but this variety even extends to the room service.
Acai bowl
Anyway. We were cruising through the Beagle Passage past a series of five glaciers as we were dining that morning. I didn’t get the best photos, but that’s fine.
Many of my glacier photos were stained by the window
It was enjoyable to capture the moment and instead rest for a change.
Another day, another glacier
We were able to have a fairly active morning as we were not due to arrive in port until 1pm. This was actually delayed even though our original plan was 2pm; the captain had to wait for a couple of expedition ships to clear out before we had space on the pier.
I was able to go to the gym and have some treadmill time (something I’m hoping to repeat today) before going to the aquatherapy room and the thermal suite.
View from the thermal suiteThese loungers are heated
I mean, this was a civilized way to come into port.
Anyway, unlike Punta Arenas, in Ushuaia it just seems as if you suddenly arrive on a scene. The city itself likes tucked up against the mountains on a narrow tilted shelf pouring itself out at the harbor. It looks and feels as if you’ve suddenly been dumped in Queenstown, New Zealand, or Aspen, Colorado. And it’s priced the same.
Expedition ship in Ushuaia
And there are these pricy expedition ships docked there to remind you of your mortality.
As we didn’t really have any opportunity for souvenir acquisition in our previous three stops we decided to begin our time ashore by going shopping.
Typical construction in Ushuaia – both old and new
There are a lot of shops that sell chocolate alongside t-shirts. And a number of liquor shops as well with whisky that normally costs us $60 at home going for $200 here. Fortunately the local stuff is cheaper – I think a small bottle of Patagonian gin was about $15 USD. We actually found the most interesting gifts in a coffee shop / cafe called Espirito Fueguino Cafe & Gift Shop. I now have a heavy black hoodie with a mythological Patagonian creature on the back of it; it should come in handy the next few days.
There are three museums near the port (there may actually be more, but I searched and saw three). There are two Museo del Fin Del Mundos; we visited neither. We did, however, visit the museum at the Presido, the old prison, which actually consists of about five small museums in one.
A museum in the prison
This museum has about two wings dedicated to prison life – one to the history of the prison and the prisoners who were in residence, and then one completely devoid of furnishings so you could wander around and enjoy the silence.
There were also two gift shops. And an art gallery.
Maritime art
The only requirement for a piece of art to be in the art gallery is it had to be pretty good and it had to have something to do with water. Nonetheless, it was good art, mostly South American from what I could tell. Much of it resembled European art work, or even American art work from the time periods where they were created. For instance, there were a couple of Hopper-esque oil paintings I enjoyed. I could have enjoyed standing in silence in this wing for a while longer but I wasn’t alone. It was time to go eat.
And even though it was neither Patagonian lunch time nor dinner time, we found a nice meal at Isabel Cocina Al Disco.
I think we actually spent big city prices for our meal but it was worth it. One massive 750ml beer from Patagonia Brewing Company and two large but not massive beers from a local brewery that makes a red ale. We also shared the house specialty – seafood and potatoes cooked in a disc from a plow, or a de arado, or plough in British English. In modern times they actually use a cast iron pot with high edges similar to a paella pan.
And thus the term “al disco.”
It was so good. Mussels and baby octopus and shrimp and calamari stewed in white wine-tomato broth with nicely roasted and fried potatoes.
I tell you. I researched this place months ago. I had no idea what the cast iron pot was until now and didn’t connect it until I saw “plough” on the English language menu. And Isabel is easy to get to from the port – you walk off the ship, down the pier, out through the gates, and across the street and it’s to the right one block.
Back to the ship for us.
We did not join Seabourn Pursuit
It was a beautiful late afternoon stroll back to the ship where we whiled away the evening with our feet up on the loungers in the Crow’s Nest.
This is a great pier to walk out
Ushuaia is a great cruise port – my favorite so far. Logistically it’s easy. For excursions buses and vans come straight out to the ship. Visiting town is a half mile stroll along the pier.
Views of the town are stunning
Local beer here is great, by the way. Next up, two days at sea.
So we’re leaving for Santiago in a few days to join a cruise to Antarctica returning via Buenos Aires. This is a big deal – it’s something we started to dream about a few years ago and started to book 16 months ago. We’re in our mid-fifties; we started planning this when we were younger. This is our third cruise together. The shortest was 12 nights so we have certainly discovered that we are a younger demographic on longer duration cruise!
Questions I want to ask others are as follows. How did you decide to go to Antarctica? Why did you book on Holland America? When did you decide to go? Was this a long held dream or was it recent? If you have done it before, does the Drake Passage compare to other seas-of-drama? I’ve cruised the Bay of Biscay a couple of times and have touched a Cat 1 hurricane off the coast of North Carolina so I’m confident I will be fine – can it be that much worse?
For us, the story begins with a walk.
Walking in Valencia
When traveling and away from home we spend more time talking about things we enjoy. Often this happens when we’re sitting on a balcony watching the sea go by or when we’re on a long walk, or sometimes on a long run, because we do run. We talk about where we want to retire, how we want to live, or what we want to do next.
In 2023, we were in port in Valencia on a Cunard Queen Victoria cruise. We didn’t book an excursion because we felt we could explore Valencia on our own. Although Valencia port isn’t necessarily walkable, Cunard was nice enough to provide a shuttle to the City of Arts and Sciences. Valencia has a greenbelt built on the diverted Turia River bed that begins at the City of the Arts and Sciences and passes by the old town core so we used it as a conduit. It’s a two mile walk each way. We should have worn our running clothes and run instead.
Jardi del Turia
Anyway, I don’t know what exactly we discussed that particular day, but sometime around then we started talking about future travels and I suspect on the long walk we discussed much of what we wanted to see in the world. Patagonia and Africa came up as being fairly high on the list. To be honest, we didn’t talk about Antarctica.
Flash forward and we eventually started reviewing options and talking about planning. We discussed the merits of Africa over Patagonia, and I was sneaky enough to slide Antarctica in there. The Holland America itinerary is actually one I planned for January 2014 back in 2012 when I was still married. It’s a great itinerary starting in Chile and taking in parts of Patagonia, the Drake Passage and Antarctic Peninsula, and the Argentine and Uruguayan coasts along with the Falkland Islands. But obviously I’m not married anymore so I ended up canceling – my mother went instead, and we’ll see how this works out because literally two days after we booked this winter’s expedition she joined her local travel group to do the same. She swears it was merely a coincidence, but we shall see!
Compared to expedition cruises it’s very cost effective, and compared to other main-line options it’s longer and takes in a wider variety of ports, countries, and cultures. I was also looking at an Azamara cruise that covered roughly the same territory but we agreed upon Holland America. If we’re going to be on a ship for 22 days, we want relaxation and recovery in a larger cabin with more options.
So here we are preparing to embark in six days, and preparing to travel a few days beforehand.
As a run-up to our January expedition I have been trying to track if anything is missing from my needed inventory for packing. End result, I have been asking myself questions such as “I don’t know if I have enough pairs of long johns” or “Do I have enough outer layers that are presentable for lunch in the main dining room on a day where I am layering so as to rush outside to look for penguins and whales?” Anyway, it ended up being laundry day, so as part of the process I spread my long cruise suitcase out on the bed and as I folded clothing I stacked what I needed carefully or not so carefully in my suitcase and did an assessment. Do I have everything? Will everything fit?
The process
The short answer is I do have everything. The longer answer is maybe I do not or should not pack everything. I put too many heavy shirts in there, too many pairs of jeans, the right amount of khakis, a suit, probably the proper amount of underwear, more than enough running shirts and yoga shirts, and an extra swimsuit. As I have unlimited laundry even though I am packing for three climates I don’t need as much.
The suitcase wouldn’t close
It wouldn’t close. It would close when I zipped out the expanders, but even in business class that puts me in penalty zone. It’s still within weight limit (69 pounds, not over 70 pounds) but my winter coat isn’t in there yet. It’s beyond size limit (62 inches total length plus width plus depth including wheels) but not beyond extra size limit (65 inches). It’s clear what I need to do.
Standing suitcase, 69 pounds, three inches too wide
I need to remove a quarter of what I packed and I need to add a duffel for extras on the return trip.
Anyway. I am not a fan of packing early, nor am I a fan of practice packing, but this time was helpful. New strategy – plan to go over if necessary, but try not to on the trip outbound. Old strategy – pack a duffel bag.
Unladen Swallow
About my suitcase – $79 at Macy’s Backstage, bought for a thirteen day cruise two years ago (you can see if you zoom in on the label on the side). It may only last a few cruises, but that’s fine. Eventually I’ll get something better.
