We took an Antarctic cruise that started in Valparaiso, Chile and ended in Buenos Aires, Argentina. It was a 3 week trip on the Holland America ship Zaandam. We bought our airline tickets through Holland America. They sent us through Toronto to Santiago on Air Canada.
Taking a direct flight would have cost twice as much but might have been less adventuresome. We spent a total of 16 hours in the air from Houston to Santiago. Our luggage probably spent 3 more than that.
We arrived in Santiago with Brooke carrying a purse and a bookbag with cords, meds, and her library books. I was riding my motorized chair that survived 2 flights that crossed North America twice and South America. Our luggage didn’t show up at the airport.
Here’s an important travel hint: LEARN TO SPEAK AS MUCH AS THE DESTINATION’S LANGUAGE AS YOU CAN.
You might be able to decipher the signs or order in the restaurants but those don’t help in extraordinary situations. Not having any spare clothes two days before a 3-week cruise counts as an extraordinary situations.
That being said the girl at the lost luggage counter could speak English. She had a bad attitude and called a different girl over to help us. She helped us fill out forms and gave us telephone numbers and websites to track the search process.
The numbers didn’t work and the chatlines didn’t work outside of North America. We were getting frustrated because we both have Mensa cards and couldn’t work a Chilean phone. We were relieved when the numbers didn’t work for the concierge.
The Air Canada website said they were having problems due to an ice storm. I thought at the time and still think that if there are 2 airlines that could handle cold weather it would be Air Canada and Alaska Airlines. I would have accepted a holiday excuse even though it was a week before Christmas.
We got our travel agent and Holland America involved. They couldn’t get any information either. We were calm because they had a couple of days before we sailed.
We didn’t get our bags until 9 days and 1900 miles later in Punte Arenas.
Holland America was nice about it. They gave us $100 to get some clothes in the shipboard gift shop. It was all right for my wife but I am what Gabriel Iglesias would call “Fluffy”. There is not a lot of clothes for big people in a small clothes shop on a ship because the passengers have brought all kinds of LUGGAGE.
Brooke also went to a department store to pick up some things, Ripley. Driving into Valparaiso I saw a Ripley store and thought it was a Ripley’s Believe It or Not museum and took a few pictures. The guide and the driver must have thought I was a real hick. Follow the link and you’ll see that it wasn’t as dumb as it sounded. She brought me back some waaay too small underwear.
As we approached Antarctica the winds grew stronger in the small channels. It averaged 35 mph switching sides of the ship. It peaked around 50. The winds died down when we got to the continent. My scooter was envied when the ship listed; and it listed often around 2 degrees on average.
I know this because my iPhone has a level app in the extras button. I would put it on the bar in the Crows Nest. The Crow’s Nest is at the front of the ship on the top deck so you can see what the bridge is seeing and watch the bow rise and fall.
I will write a post just about Antarctica.
We pulled into Ushuaia after Antarctica.
It’s been almost 6 weeks since I’ve been back and the memories are fading.
The Falkland Islands were the next port of call. The landscape there looks exactly like the default hilly landscape on every 90s computer game I’ve played.
I saw a wreck yard for boats in the Montevideo harbor.
Some Uruguayan naval vessels were on the other side of the ship.
The pictures were taken the same day but edited with snapfish and gimp respectively. Gotta build up them photo software skillz Yo! That’s another post. This post is getting like Moustache from Irma La Duce.
The next day we arrived in Buenos Aires. We were going to be there for 2 days. The second day was for disembarking. Since our flight was later in the day we combined a tour of the city with a trip to the airport.
It was a great tour through the Embassy row, the rich parts, and the poor parts. The tour is a post in itself. I know, Moustache moment.
All the airports I’ve been to (except Love Field in Dallas) have had iconic structures associated with them. I don’t know about Toronto since it was night both times I was there.
After you pass the security gate you see gray blocky buildings. The terminal is behind these leftovers from World War 2. Since you can’t see the newer terminal from a distance when you approach from land our first impression was the inside of the terminal.
Their version of TSA was pretty quick. Maybe we caught them on a good day. The airport was like most, all the interesting shops were past security.
The flight from Buenos Aires to Toronto has to make a stop in Santiago. Everybody has to deplane with their belongings in Santiago. We saw this at the beginning of our trip but we were’nt affected since Chile was our destination.
Coming from Buenos Aires we were affected big time. We were in the back of the plane so they had plenty of time to get my scooter into a waiting area at the end of the jetway. They put me in a wheelchair and pushed me up to the area.
There were three other people that needed assistance and we all waited there. The bad part of this was we didn’t know what was going on and we couldn’t speak the language. We were being watched by armed security people.
The good part was that we didn’t have to go through customs with everybody else. We were the first ones back on the plane after about 20 or 30 minutes. (It’s been about 4 months now. Memory fades.)
Brooke and I were in the middle 2 seats of the middle aisle. We were bracketed by two ladies. It was an 8-hour flight. Unfortunately I had to use the restroom during the flight. I try to be invisible because of my prosthetics. Going to the bathroom from the middle of the plane makes this impossible. The stranger in the aisle seat has to get up and wait for me to come back. The only bright side is that we were one row away from the bathroom.
After we went through Canadian customs in Toronto we were held up in Immigration because they couldn’t find our bags. At least we knew our bags were lost before we got to Houston.
The Toronto shops in the airport are a lot fancier and bigger than IAH. I didn’t take any pictures because a shop is a shop. I took only two pictures; a pay phone
and a 747.That’s the end of this blog entry. It took six months but it’s done. I know I owe the blog an Antarctic entry.
