“A journey is a person in itself; no two are alike.
And all plans, safeguards, policing and coercion are fruitless.
We find after years of struggle that we do not take a trip; a trip takes us.”
John Steinbeck “Travels with Charley’’
What a welcome sight it was! There she was in her red and white colours alongside
the quay in Ushuaia, the M/S Expedition, our new home for the next 11 nights.
We were welcomed on board by the smiling faces of her crew, and shown into the
ship’s lounge where sandwiches, cookies, tea and coffee were laid out for us. After
being shown our cabins and breathing a sigh of relief that our luggage had arrived
safely, we went about trying to orientate ourselves around our new surroundings. It was
humorous to count how many times we actually passed reception in our quest to make
it back to our cabin!!
in order to familiarize ourselves with the life saving equipment on board.
We were back in the lounge shortly after that, for a meeting with our Expedition
leader, Julio, and the rest of the staff.
being “End of the world but the beginning of everything” and proceeded eastwards
along the Beagle Channel. Our adventure had begun.
A delicious dinner was then served, as the ship sailed smoothly down this beautiful
channel with mountains on either side- Chile was on our starboard side as we passed
Peurto Williams the most southerly town in the world, and Argentina was on our port
side. The Argentine pilot boat retrieved the pilot during the evening before we headed
out into the open water.
After a tiring day it was a welcome relief to retire to our beds and drift off to sleep
dreaming of a smooth Drake Passage and not a nightmare that Julio was predicting of
5- 6 meter waves !
No comments:
Post a Comment