Not so good conclusion to Great Expedition

When they announce our Miami flight, Carol is sound asleep and CJ is on the computer.  Perhaps he should have become suspicious when all the other cruise people left the lounge. Due to the long distances, Carol is using a wheelchair.  The person pushing her realizes she's not the person she was supposed to be pushing and dumps her not half way to the plane; very bad form.

Sometime during the flight to Miami, CJ realizes that in the panic of departing the lounge, we've left our parkas. The pilot sends a message thus beginning a multi-day saga.

An Uber delivers us from MIA to Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood airport.  We're not allowed to check-in.  Food and breakfast is only available inside of security and we have a four hour wait.  Shortly into the wait, Carol gets a text.  Our flight to Christmas with mother in Atlanta has been cancelled.  Tons of flights on the board and ours is the only one cancelled. With mother just out of the hospital and in a rehab facility with only limited availability, we decide to drive home.

Holiday traffic, road lunatics and little sleep on the overnight flight render CJ exhausted by the time we make Orlando. After an overnight, we restock food in Orlando and drive home.

Three days later LATAM ships the jackets to Orlando. CJ embarks on a driving adventure of a lifetime. If ever the statement "you can't get there from here" was ever accurate. The four hour round trip turns into an eight hour frustrating adventure and tour of Florida's back roads; but we have our souvenir parkas.

This concludes the Antarctica blog.

Next blog begins 8 Feb 2020 from Australia 

Ushuaia and Santiago

This morning we bid adieu to Orion and the marvelous expedition staff.  It's a partly sunny, partly cloudy, sometime light rainy day in Ushuaia.

We disembark Orion on the first day of the southern hemisphere's summer, our winter.  The group is bussed to the local 'prison/maritime museum'. The most interesting thing about the place is the painted penguins.  We would have purchased one and had it shipped to US if they sold them.

Lindblad has a hospitality suite at a local hotel that we use before we're ferried by bus to the airport for our charter flight to Santiago. With the first reliable Internet connection in more than a week, every addict in the room is glues to his or her cell phone, downloading and catching up on email.

We get a few good looks at the Andes on the approach to Santiago.  The first picture is of the mountains east of the city.  The second includes the tallest mountain outside of Asia: Aconcagua.

Why can't we get into Chile.  A cantankerous immigration agent won't let us into Chile so that we can retrieve our luggage. He won't accept that our luggage was not checked through to Miami. We nearly get arrested for abusing immigration agents (who are stupid we might add).

Crossing the Drake Passage – Part II

Breaking free of the pack ice, we're later treated to a beautiful sunset.

 

As a part of the continuing weather package visitors to Antarctica can only dream of, the return crossing is almost as civilized and the trip down.  The first evening we have slightly heavier seas and walking one needs two hands to negotiate the trip to the dining center. 

Like us, many of the passengers sleep through until the noon call for lunch.

The day is filled with lectures as is the second day of the crossing.

In the evening we have the crew show.  Unlike big cruise ships with professional entertainers, our crew is putting on this show and it's quite entertaining.

Seas have calmed again and we make good overnight time and sight land just before lunch.  Orion embarks the pilot at 1500. We arrive early in Ushuaia at 2000.

 

 

Last Full Day In Antarctica

Palmer Station allows 10 boats to visit each season.  The scheduled first two have been unable to break through the ice this year so we’re the first station visitors of the season.

 

Palmer Station is the smallest and northernmost of three US sponsored research stations on Antarctica. The South Pole is still 1744 miles from here.

 

 

 The station scientists are out gathering samples and diving near the edge of the glacier.

 

As Orion steams north toward the Drake Passage, we feel the expedition is over. After an hour where the sea ice appears to melt away, it becomes heavier and heavier until one wonders if we have enough ship to break through.  Orion is in dense pack ice for about three hours.

 As we push north through the Bismark Strait, the ice continues to get thicker and thicker.

 

During that time, we have numerous sightings of seals sunning on small bergs or pack ice flows. At one point the sight of Orion’s bow looming ABOVE them sends two seals scurrying for safety.

 

 

 Check out the marks/bruises on the neck of this seal. He's tangled with something.

 In this picture, the seal on the left is attacking the one on the right.

 This seal is not happy we're passing by this close.

Breaking free of the pack ice the only thing standing between us and disembarkation is The dreaded Drake. The forecast is for a Drake once again on its best behavior.

Paradise Bay Kayaking

Following a very good Mexican lunch, Orion has boats away: the Zodiac contingent are launched in preparation for the kayak launch.

Paradise Bay is a large bay filled with icebergs, floating ice, glaciers and a Argentine field station.

CJ's getting tons of comments on his snowboard helmet.  He's brought it because it has a GoPro mount.  He suspects terrible pictures because he continuously slips into a reclining position while paddling. These kayaks have no foot bracing nor hard seat backs.

We have been spending time with Bill and Sandi from Manhattan Beach near Los Angeles.

Sandi and Carol elect the Zodiac tour while Bill joins CJ in the kayak. The ladies leave on the Zodiac tour after the first two groups of kayakers depart.  They return before CJ and Bill who are in the second wave of kayakers.

 

The Zodiac group cover much more ground and have an amazing encounter with a seal. They first run up near a glacier.  This one is calving regularly.

 Those of us in kayaks didn't have the range to spot this marvelous molting elephant seal.

 

On their return to the ship, they have a close encounter with the first wave of kayakers.

The first destination is the nearest glacier.  The edge where the calving into the sea occurs is beautiful.

We get a final briefing from Expedition Leader Doug.

 

 

It's a long paddle to the glacier. It takes us a while to get the paddling coordinated.

 

 

 

 

 

 The next goal is the Argentine station.  We run into ice, icebergs, and a seal sleeping on an iceberg.

 

 Orion is a long way off when we turn for the ship.  The return paddle serves up a panoramic view of Paradise Bay.

 

Our return docking is perfect.

 

 

Doug has changed the plan yet again.  He announces the polar plunge will immediately follow the retreival of all Zodiacs and kayaks.

Fellow passengers gather in the lounge for the polar plunge. It's already something CJ regrets not doing.

After months of stressing about the effect the cold of Antarctica would have on her surgeries, note her dress late in the evening.