Admirals lounge, Buenos Aires airport

Friday night on the Drake passge proved that everyone must pay the Drake tax and we got to experience teh Drake Shake to the point that a few times during the night I had to grip the headboard of the bed as I thought the ship would throw me out. Anyway we arrived in Ushuia at Midnight last night.....needless to say Micahel and I were still up having a couple of fairawy cocktails.

This morning we were awoken at 6.30 in order to disembark and fly to Buenos aires where we are now. So after an overnight flight to Miami we go to Atlanta and then on home. We will see everyone soon.

Kennel club this weekend...... we will be serving tea and cookies.

Sorry to say goodbye......

Yesterday was our final day on the Antarctic Penninsular with two landings on the continent itself. The afternoon blew us away; we saw first hand the effects of global warming as the temperature hovered between 45 and 50 degrees; so warm we were mostly down to long underwear t-shirts only. We went on the second hike of the day climbing a couple of hundred feet to overlook the glacier, (beautiful views) and then snow slide back down; Diana actually rode down acidently on a mini avalanche, we were all amused but I don't think she was. I got to witness a huge block of ice fall into the ocean which created a mini tsunami. As we rode the zodiacs back toward the boat 3 Minki whales surfaced about 10 feet away and stayed with us for 5 minutes or so. Then we cruised off toward a "surprise" that the ships staff had been telling us about - this was a zodiac moored to an iceburg serving champers in the middle of a flat calm bay with tons of ice bergs flating around with indescribale mountain views so we could toast our amazing voyage. During the evening we had a pod of 17 killer whales right next to the boat (I took about 100 pictures in a 7 minutes period - now up to about 1800). As we were crusiing the bays and channels the captain announced that we were cruising to one more bay so they could drop off the mail - we litterally crusied to this tiny remote wooden hut that was on a tiny island - they lowered a zodiac and one of the crew ran all postcards etc to the island so they could officially be mailed and stamped from Antarctica - the captain really does treat this ship like it is a run-about, very cool. Th evening ended with Michael, Donna and I having cocktails to the wee hours with Rob, Cindy and Morris and watching an amazing sunset at 12.30 AM; we could not have asked for better.

So now we are crossing the dreaded Drake passage and I have seen rougher water in Paradise Lake, in fact the crew are referring to the conditions as the Drake Lake!!! The cruise director Yanni says if the conditions continue as they are the captain will have another suprsie for us - one can only imagine. We have two days at sea and then into Ushia where we should arrive early Sunday morning. We then fly straight home and arrive Mondya afternoon in Bermuda.

Happy New Year!!!!!

What a way to end the year - it could not have been more magical. We had a wonderful diiner (it was so sunny they had to pull down the window shades) put on by the ship and then went to the Darwin lounge (the ships lecture hall / night club) to watch a comedy show put on by Kevin (the hots of the TV show Emergency Vet) which was hysterical; as it was so bright outside someone looks out the window and yells "killer whales"; sure enough with a quick glance there is a pod of about 7 killer whales swimming toward the ship. The entire room empties in a micro second as everyone runs to their rooms for their jackets hats gloves and cameras. When I get up on the main deck there they are swimming off of the bow of the ship; watch them and take a few photos before they swim off. Back to the lounge by 11.40 to watch the end of the show. The show ends at about 11.55 and we wait for the New Year count down - oh by the way forgot to mention who the star of this show was!!!! During dinner Yanni the cruise director comes to our table to talk to Phoebe and says that as she is the youngest passenger she gets to count down the new years and blow the ships horn at midnight (merchant navy tradition apparently). So there we are in the Darwin lounge, bright daylight outside, glass of champers in hand, beautiful snow capped mountains on both sides of the ship with Phoebe counting down; 10 - 9 - 8- 7.......... it could not have been more amazing! We heard this morning that there was a humpback right off of the stern at midnight.

So this morning we were woken up bright and early (7.00 AM) for a 800 foot mountain hike, the snow and ice was knee deep, Michael was the only one in our group that made it to the top. Then it was a zodiac trip looking at the magnificent icebergs while penguins swam all around the boat.

Yesterday afternoon was spent in the zodiacs in "iceberg alley" this was a bay that was filled with the most spectacular icebergs, the shapes, sizes and colors blew us away yet again. You cannot possibly imaging how big these things are even with pictures you dont get a perspective on the size until you get along side of them, (some are bigger than our ship). To cap this all of at we are cruising around we see a leopard seal basking on a berg; so we go over to see and get within 10 feet, they are strange creatures very snake like in appearence. As we are there drifting around a group of penguins comes over to swim right in front of the seal as if to taunt it - my predator and prey in the same picture are very cool.

We have been incredibly blessed with weather it has been out of this world in fact the expedition leader. Lou says that someone on this boat is blessed as this never happens. So one last expedition this afternoon and we head back across the dreaded Drake Channel toward Ushia where we should arrive by Sunday morning!!!!!!!!!