South America & Antarctica Blog~January 2025

This post was originally a live blog posted on cruise critic. It's best to read it there in full as all photos are included, as well as commentary from others on the sailing.

https://boards.cruisecritic.com/topic/3042281-live-oosterdam-antartica-jan-6-2025/

January 1st, 2025: Let's get this party started

Let’s get this party started. Detroit is behind us as we are currently sitting in the very comfortable first class lounge in Toronto for our 16 hour layover (thank you AirCanada). I’m busy practicing gratitude since we are headed to sunny Santiago, Chili where the temperature is much more my style. I may have flipped Michigan Winter the bird during takeoff. I’m Traveling with my hubby. He is the brains in our duo. He’s also my Sherpa (and the love of my life). Me? I plan travel.  

Sailing on Oosterdam 22 night thru South America and Antarctica. I've sailed on her sister the Zuiderdam a couple times so I feel pretty confident I like the ship. Spent 35 nights on Hal last year doing the Tahiti run so I feel pretty confident I like HAL. Heck,  I have never met a cruise ship I didn’t like. 

Packing for this trip has been the most challenging ever. We will be gone 32 days. 10 of those days will be in Santiago and Buenos Aires where the temperature is set slightly below Purgatory. The rest we will be hiking on glaciers, viewing icebergs, or avoiding penguin poop which, apparently, can be quite the chilly challenge.

I feel it's helpful to have a little background on the reviewer to add perspective. I'm a fully retired Gen X who was able to retire in my early 50s.  I started cruising in 1987 and the first 5 cruises were on lines that eventually went bankrupt (Regency, Commodore, and Dolphin). Are you paying attention HAL?

My early cruises were all in the 20,000 GT range so I do have a historic love for the little gals. I've sailed everything from the SS Minnow to 'Behemouth of the Seas' and find that each and every ship has pros and cons. I have no idea how many cruises I have sailed, but it’s in excess of 50. Blah blah blah.

It should be noted that while I have sailed nearly all main stream lines, I have zero brand loyalty. Never have. Likely never will. I’m barely loyal to my siblings and they can breathe. Loyalty to a company has never resonated with me (it’s probably a Gen X thing). 

I select ships based on who I'm traveling with and perceived value. I don't look for the cheapest option, but I do weigh things that are important to me (which maybe different than things important to you). I sail on HAL when I want a great itinerary at a very attractive price point. That’s HALs niche and what they do best- long cruises to interesting ports at main stream prices. Win/win/win. 

The sherpas favorite cruise line is NCL for the District Brew house with 20+ draft beers. We really appreciate "The Local" on NCL, which is an informal dining option where you can sit down and order a hot meal off a menu nearly 24 hours a day. It's packed at 2 am after the live entertainment shuts down and reminds us both of hitting up Denny’s in our college days (unlike  HAL where the lido closes at 8 and opens up for a very limited snack at 10.) NCL is like our local pub where everyone knows your name. Hubby is used to late nights, great entertainment, and restaurant food available 24/7.   

Celebrity happens to be my favorite line. It’s more like a trendy martini bar in our slightly upscale hometown. Everyone knows your name but the floor isn’t sticky.

Hal is different from both of our favorite lines. To borrow a statement from the GOAT (whogo) HAL is a place seniors go to cruise…….  with their parents. Nothing wrong with cruising with your parents. I’d gladly drag mine all over the world on HAL if they were alive. 

I have been preparing DH for an experience much more subdued than NCL.  I’m not sure I’ve been successful since he just asked what night our reservations for the broadway show are. Next he will be asking me about the water slides. He has absolutely no idea what we’ve signed up for. That’s pretty typical. I once flew us to Amsterdam and the entire time he thought we were going to Frankfurt. The scary part is that he truly is the brains behind this duo.

I typically don't book suites (although I have sailed in several suites over the years including the Yacht Club on MSC). Suites just don't provide me with enough value where I can justify the cost. I never used my butler in the Yacht club since a butler is just not my vibe. However; I will gladly pay for a balcony (at the right price). Sitting outside gazing at the sea is very much my vibe. For this cruise the cost difference between an ocean view and balcony was 8K. I'll be finding my vibe on the promenade with the rest of the frugal folks. 

Finally, I should probably warn you that wearing rose colored glasses clashes with my skin tone. It’s just not my style. For those of you looking for a glowing report, this won't be it. However; I will do my very best to point out both the good and bad as I perceive. As always, just my opinion and YMMV.

By the way-  It should be obvious by now that I failed to master the cliff note version of anything.  Feel free to ignore all of my rambling. I promise you I will not be offended.

In return, if you are easily offended you should probably block me right now. I was raised on hose water and neglect. I once died and my mom made me walk it off. In other words: Feral.  

January 1st, 2025 cont

I’m bored, and slightly buzzed, so let me explain this airCanada layover mishap.

Since I retired I have 3 part time jobs - planning travel, churning credit cards, and trading on Wall Street. I’m not good a lot, but turns out I’m fairly good at those 3 things. 

If you aren’t sure what churning is, there is a course you can take online. I highly recommend the course before playing the game. Basically, churning is a very strategic way to gather credit card points. I redeem them for travel. You can redeem them toilet seats if that’s your thing. Be warned, churning is very time consuming and can be financially dangerous if you are not extremely disciplined. If interested, google 10x travel and start with the course. Don’t do this without the course. 

Anyway, I’m SUPER excited because this years churning landed us our very first business class redemption!! We have lay flat seats for the 11 hour non stop from Toronto to Santiago. Complete with pajamas!! Sherp has no clue. Mind you,  it says first class on his boarding pass and the lady checking us in the lounge thanked us for flying business class. I’ll try to snap a photo of his surprise when we finally board. He is going to be shocked.  All in for 60k points plus $130 in taxes. Not a bad lil financial reward for a part time gig. 

Now, NOT related to the redemption, aircanada cancelled our 5pm flight from Detroit to Toronto. Apparently no one wanted to work on New Years Day.

I had a choice to postpone by a day, add another layover, and lose the lay flat seats on one segment. Or, fly out early this morning, keep our lay flat seats in a non stop flight, and deal with the world’s longest layover. I opted for the long layover. Sherp is still clueless. 

So, here we sit, in the business class lounge. Hubs hasn’t figured out it’s the business class lounge yet, but he started drinking Guinness at 11:00 am. I was pacing myself with baileys and coffee but threw caution to the wind an hour ago. 

Our flight doesn’t leave until midnight. Still have 9

hours to go. Good thing this lounge has the fancy showers. I’m pretty sure they are designed especially for sobering up from the copious amount of unlimited alcohol being served.

My liver already hates me and we haven’t even gotten to the HIA package yet. 

January 1st, 2025: What a way to start the year!

 Two Words- HOLY SMoKES!!!

These lay flat seats are Sic! Da Bomb! Skibidi Rizz!! One thing for sure, they aren't Ohio (current kid slang, I have no idea what that means).  

Sherps was beside himself. Shocked is an understatement. I have the best video of him trying to figure out what the heck was going on. I love that man so much and surprising him brought me just about as much joy as hitting this magic button which turned  the aluminum tube into my personal stretch limo.

We are still in the air for another hour or so. It’s an 11 hour nonstop from Toronto. I slept, as in stretched out/zonked out for a good 7-8 hours. Should be able to hit Santiago running.  

Not gonna to lie- both dinner and breakfast were awful. Not gonna lie, I’d do that long layover and forgo food a million times over for another joy ride in this beast.

I usually don’t post photos of us on cruise critic but WTHeck -I feel like we’re family. Now mind you, these photos were taken after 17 hours of travel (and unlimited alcohol.) we do clean up. 

We are still in the air for another hour or so. It’s an 11 hour nonstop from Toronto. I slept, as in stretched out/zonked out for a good 7-8 hours. Should be able to hit Santiago running.  

Not gonna to lie- both dinner and breakfast were awful. Not gonna lie, I’d do that long layover and forgo food a million times over for another joy ride in this beast.

January 2nd. Santiago Chili.

Buenas Dias from the lovely Ismael Hotel in steamy Santiago.   

As suspected, we hit the ground running.

We prearranged with our hotel to send a private driver to take us from the airport to Hotel Ismael in the Lastarria District. The cost was $52 which was $20 more than an uber or taxi but it seems you can’t trust Santiago transport (and it was a madhouse with people hawking for your business). We met a lady yesterday who ordered Uber from the airport and when the uber showed up they wanted extra money. Plus, we walked out the doors of baggage claim to a gentleman holding a sign with our names. Sometimes it makes sense to pay a tiny bit more cash for lazy travel. I’d recommend it. 

Our hotel is decent and bonus it was cheap. We are here 3 nights and the cost was $65 out of pocket after using my $300 ventureX yearly rebate. Free breakfast and a nice roof top pool looking over a lovely park. Our room has a balcony overlooking the park and Mother Mary on-top of Cerra San Cristobal. It’s small, not fancy, but I suspect it will work nicely.

We selected this hotel because we are walkers and the area is supposedly one of the safest and close to lots of attractions.

We walked to Cerra San Cristobal from the hotel. 15 minutes tops. Took the funicular to the top. Walked around the Virgin Mary statue. It didn’t burst into flames so there’s that.

Took the cable car to the other end of the hill, back up, funicular down, went on a hunt to find my sherpa beer. That was challenging, and interesting. Three stores. Zero IPA but 9 other random bottles of strange looking brew. No clue what we bought. No doubt it will get drank. 

Lots of street vendors, super interesting buildings, and bars on all the windows. Feels like Detroit only more colorful and our limited Spanish makes communication humorous. 

There is Food everywhere. We had a pizza from a cute street restaurant- when in Latin America order Italian. 

The one thing of most interest is a warning about your phone. I have a pop up and usually walk with my phone in my hand. I was tapped on the shoulder by a very nice man (most people here are extremely nice) and told to put my phone away. I think that’s what he said through various hand gestures.

But this information was confirmed by our concierge. Don’t walk with your phone out and keep valuables close. Apparently grabbing phones out of the hands of unsuspecting tourists is a thing here. Be Aware. 

A few random photos before we hit the streets this morning. I wasn’t a great photographer yesterday since my phone was in my backpack, but here you go….

January 3rd, Walking tour in Santiago, Chili

A lovely (but hot) day in Santiago. We did a 3 hour free walking tour in the morning to get aquatinted with the city. Our guide, MJ, was really good.  

If you have never done a free walking tour, I do suggest them. We take them in almost every major city that offers. Basically you walk the town, get a history lesson, and tip your guide what you thought they earned. We usually tip $50 and, considering what excursions cost, feel that is a very good value. I am a girl that can appreciate a good hustle. We did put in 14,000 steps during the walking portion of the tour, so you may want to consider your endurance before signing up. 

As a fellow trader we appreciated stopping at the Chilean Stock Market.

After the walking tour we spent some time in the Santiago Metropolitan Cathedral which is an absolutely GORGEOUS church. It’s the oldest church in Santiago. Reminded me very much of Rome and the Vatican City. Free entrance. Highly recommend. Simply stunning.

From there we went to the Museum of Pre Columbia Art and the National History Museum. My cerebral husband is into that. Mostly I try to find a tucked away place to chill. The art museum had this super comfy bench in air conditioning. It was perfect for a lil cat nap until the guard snapped at me and made me move. This may not come as a surprise to you, but I’ve been kicked off of much better benches. I wasn’t offended.  

The national history museum was slightly more my style as the contemporary art work  reminded me of something a first grader whipped up.  I’d still much rather be playing outside. The things I suffer thru for my Sherpa.

Had some fun trying to exchange money. Most people here speak only Spanish. Download a translator app. We ate yummy empanadas from a street vendor for dinner and finally found some IPA. Everything here is very inexpensive, (except IPA).  

All in all, a really great day with a grand total of 23K steps (so far).   We have hired a private driver tomorrow to take us up in the Andes for a glacier hike. It’s 2.5 hour drive each way. Should be cooler there since the hike starts at 6K feet elevation. We will hike another 1,800 feet up (approximately 180 flights of stairs) over 7.4 miles. Really excited for a 30,000 step day since I’m sporting some serious holiday chub. 

January 4th, Hike in the Andes Mountains

Headed down to breakfast at 7:00 am to meet our new best friends who had prearranged to join us on today’s hike. Their screen names will remain anonymous to protect the innocent.

Mauricio (our private driver) met us promptly at 7:30 for the 2.5 hour ride into the Andes. The scenery was lovely. Even though it was 80 degrees at 8k ft elevation, there are still active glaciers and some snow piles. Oh, and goats. Lots and lots of goats.

Unfortunately our new friends had to abandon the hike. In fairness, parts of this hike were VERY steep and the loose gravel made things slippery. Mauricio helped them back down the mountain while Sherpa and I forged on.

Of course, without a guide we could not read the trail markers. My translator app needs wifi and we left that way back in Santiago. We somehow managed the entire 12 kilometers to  hidden lagoon at the base of the San Francisco glacier. It took 3 hours to get there and 2.5 back. Given the poor trail conditions I’m satisfied with our timing. Signs we could not read:

The hike itself reminded me of Julie Andrew’s in the “Sound of Music.” Since the entire hike was above the tree-line we would have been toast without the breeze.  As it sits, I’ll be showing at tomorrow’s pre-cruise meetup in San Antonio looking like Rudolph.

Spaghetti grass and lots of flowers along the way:

We plan to have an early night. Ordering some room service, the Sherpa will finish all the random beer we picked from up across this city, and I plan to be asleep quickly. While I only managed 24k steps, I did log 655 zone minutes of cardio (that is not almost 7 hours of cardio because you get double zone minutes while your heart is beating out of your chest and your gasping for air).

I’m very happy with this day. I feel like we were productive and saw some glorious scenery. Plus we can check “hike in the Andes” off the bucket list.  

 January 5th, 2025: tour of Valparaiso, winery, and drop off in San Antonio, Chili.

Our new besties didn’t ditch us after all, so the four of us (and our 11 bags weighing 850 pounds) piled into Mauricio’s van headed to Valparaiso. 

Mauricio gave us a tour of old town and then we dropped our friends (and our 11 bags weighing 850 pounds) off at their hotel in Valparaiso while Mauricio, Sherp, and I tackled the hills, ramps, and staircases of this artsy little town.  

We walked up stairs, then down stairs, then rode the funicular down to sea level, walked around some more, rode a different funicular up, and if I thought we climbed stairs before, let’s just say those were a mere prelude to the stair climbing to come.

Eventually we made it back to our new besties hotel to pick up our 6 bags weighing 849 pounds. From there we backtracked to a winery in Casablanca where my hubby and I won the race for who could down their wine tastings the fastest. We have zero culture.

Showed up at the casino hotel in San Antonio at 5:30. The people checking us in were super happy folks and we had a few laughs. My room has a great view, but there are some issues here which need improvement. Let’s just say there is a reason this hotel is $75 a night.  If you are staying for one night it's very convenient to the ship in the morning, but keep expectations in line with price paid.

Great sunset view though:

Held the pre cruise meet and greet in the lobby (forgot to take photos). About 20 really nice folks showed up to chat. I’m fairly certain I’m going to end up with some very good friends on this trip. Shout out to my “peeps”!

It is also worth mentioning that I didn’t lose a single sharpie at the name tag making table. Every Single cruise critic meet and greet I’ve hosted, someone ends up taking my sharpies. This crowd gets an A+ in sharpie etiquette.

I have no idea how many steps I walked or cardio minutes I racked up because my Fitbit ran out of batteries before I did. 

January 6th: Embarkation day.

Ok, first things first! Another great lions victory last night as we clinched a number one seed for the first time in franchise history. Made even better by the Spanish announcers who are a super excited bunch.

I would concur with everything @Sea42said about this hotel with the exception that my room was freezing last night and we had a bad experience with dinner (waited 50 minutes for a carry out pizza and it was yucky). Oh, and our floor to ceiling blinds crashed to the floor randomly. 

Based upon conversations at the included breakfast, we may have had the only room with air in this 12 story highrise.  And speaking of high rises, it’s clear that they have left safety and building codes to their neighbors in North America because I’ve seen some sketchy stuff. Wasn’t bothering me much until I remembered we are in a location with a very active tectonic plates and I’m on the 8th floor. Sometimes my mind is my biggest enemy.

But, and this is a big but….. the view simply can’t be beat. Nothing like waking up to see your ship in port (even if you have to squint past the cargo vessels). We’ve been watching sea lions play (and Sleep) and the fishermen bringing in the mornings catch has been entertaining. I would have gotten up to watch the ship actually sail in (see @Sea42photo above), but I was too cold to get out from under the covers. Plus, I knew she had my back. The hotel is attached to a mall which I used to buy an adopter. Lots of eateries close by with locals selling their wares.  

For one night, I think this hotel works just fine. The cost was hard to beat at $78 (all in). We used a $50 CSP credit so we definitely got our moneys worth plus everyone here is on the Oosterdam so we’ve met lots of nice folks already.  

Oosterdam

Pile of sea lions

couple active sea lions 

bustling pier

It was fun to watch the fishermen from our hotel room

It i s staggered embarkation but I suspect, like every other ship sailing the 7 seas, folks will all pile into the terminal by 11:00. We have a 1:00 time slot, but I rarely show up to embarkation before 2:30. I prefer to start my cruise with a stroll onboard verses elbowing crowds. We signed up for the last shuttle from the hotel  (1:45), so that’s going to get us to the ship a bit earlier than I prefer. Elbows ready.

Here is the schedule: 

12:00 PM - Decks 1 & 7 - Main & Rotterdam Decks

1:00 PM - Decks 6 & 10 - Upper Verandah & Observation Decks

2:00 PM - Decks 4 & 8 - Upper Promenade & Navigation Decks

3:00 PM - Deck 5 - Verandah Deck There

January 6th: Embarkation

We left hotel at 1:00 on the last shuttle. Easy 5 minute drive to the port.  $15 (including tip). Apparently we needed a van because we have too much luggage (we do).

My infamous Yellow Luggage.

Walked straight thru all lines w/no stopping. Zero lines. One of the easiest embarkations ever (besides the extra step of busing us thru the industrial port). 

They are using some pretty outdated technology for check in. They were unable to scan boarding passes from our phone (quickly printed another).  

Hubby and I both sounded the alarm going thru security. The guard folks totally  ignored the red flashing lights and buzzing alarms and just waved us thru. My purse was still over my shoulder (forgot to put it in the tray). Could have easily smuggled my 9mm Glock 19 onboard. Not sure how I feel about that.

We had a sail away cruise critic meet up at the sea view pool. Nice crowd showed up. Nice folks too. Cruisers tend to be “my people.” Met two women who had their luggage lost by airlines. What a nightmare that would be. Sherpa was popular with the ladies. I expected nothing less.

Decided to eat dinner in the lido. Didn’t feel like changing and braving what is typically first night chaos in the mdr. I had decent prime rib w/ lots of horseradish (Polish girl if you haven’t guessed by now). Sherpa had……. Drumroll…….. teriyaki salmon. I didn’t see a station grilling fresh veggies in a wok. Not going to lie, I will be disappointed  if that option is only offered on pinnacle class. It’s my go to.

My first impression of this ship is that she’s a bit long in the tooth, but so am I. Now, before the HaL loyalists lose their cookies, remember I sail most cruise lines and have never met a ship I didn’t love. I also warned you to block me if you are sensitive to opinions that may stray from HAL worship. When it’s all said and done, I’m sure I will walk away with amazing memories and a soft spot in my heart for this “old gal.” But I will always call it like I see it. Every cruise ship ever built has areas which can be improved. Pointing out those areas doesn’t mean I lack gratitude.

Entertainment tonight was a movie. The history of HAL. We liked it very much. I may have cried at the end. 

Internet is working just fine except Sherpa is struggling to replay the lions game. He’d watch it on replay for days if he could. 

Our window room is plenty big enough (one good thing about older ships is that the square footage in cabins is typically greater). Everything seems to work fine in the room so can’t really ask for much more except a shower door since our room still proudly sports a very outdated shower curtain (did I mention she’s an old gal?)

If you would like to see the meuns and daily programs please refer to the my live post published at cruisecritic. These change so often I'm not going to include them in this blog.

January 7th

This girl loves her sea days!!

We had prompt service for breakfast. Sherps had salmon omelet (shocker). I went for steal cut oats. Zero complaints other than the “free” coffee had a strong chemical taste. We have the drink package so not a problem. I’ll be snuckered up on expresso all week.

Cruise critic meeting went well. Lots of nice folks meeting each other. Travelers are the greatest bunch. I learn so much. Thanks to @sea42 and @lynn (whose real name is Kathy just to mess with me). 

I spent some time at guest services straightening out a few minor issues with OBC. Pleasant enough experience. 

Our on-board credit for shareholders, aarp, and military clearly states “non-refundable: cannot be used for cash or at the casino.” Is this new? I swore last year I used my shareholder OBC in the casino. Maybe I’m just remembering that wrong (I mentioned we have the drink package). 

Sidetrack- IMO; The day is coming where we won’t be able to use shareholder, military, teacher, or aarp OBC  for service charges either so be on the lookout. Many of the other cruise lines have already changed policy.

Sadly, it makes financial sense for the cruise lines to disallow use of promotional obc toward gratuity (which is why so many other cruise lines have already changed policy.) example- If I have $100 obc and I spend it on gratuity, in theory HAL should put the full $100 into the crew gratuity pot (Hal is out $100). If I spend that same $100 OBC on drinks, the cruise line is only out a fraction of that cost given the huge mark up on booze (Hal is out less than $50). Anyway, that’s just my free prediction- it’s worth what you paid.

For anyone that followed my live blog last year, you may remember the pool attendant who accidentally dumped a glass of ice on my head while I was sleeping? Well, he is here and he remembered me. Considering our intimate encounter with a glass of ice I’m not shocked. I mean seriously, how do you forget someone you almost killed? 

Pretty boring day so nothing of substance to report other than I napped under a bright blue sky! Temps in the 60s. Captain said it is unusually calm (it’s like glass). Tonight is formal night. I’ll be super  impressed if Sherpa remembers how to tie his tie. 

We did spend some time in the quiet library because, while my Sherpa may not remember how to tie a tie, he is writing another essay reply to David Hume’s  criticisms of the ontological and cosmology arguments for Gods existence (I napped.)  I kid you not.  Can’t  make this stuff up.  

January 8th, 2025: Puerto Montt

Last night was formal night. We went down to the mdr at 7:15. Waited 30 minutes. Told the waiter that we wanted to catch the 9:00 show and he had us out in 45 minutes. It helped that all I had was French onion soup. Hubby had shrimp appetizer, salmon, and chocolate ice cream. All very acceptable. Nothing exceptional, but good considering they are serving 2,000 people banquet style. I’ve never understood how people expect more from any cruise ship serving the masses. 

We watched “humanity” by step one. It is only the 2nd time I’ve seen it and sherpas first. I thought the graphics were innovative, especially for HAL, but this isn’t the same quality entertainment you will find on other main stream lines; Particularly the big ships.  All in all, it was a fine way to spend 45 minutes. No complaints at all. Reminds me of cruise ship entertainment couple decades ago. They dance way better than I can, so hats off to the hard workers! 

From there we went to billboards and Rolling Stones. I am going to refrain from comment until I get a chance to experience each a bit more, but let’s just say I was blown away by both. One because of how good they were, and the other…… 

Today was Puerto Montt. We did an independent tour with Dennis Purtov. Our group all got off on the first tender together and things ran very smoothly. 13 of us in a 15 passenger van. Very comfy. The volcanoes were playing hide and seek in the clouds but we did manage some good shots. Our guide spoke great English and really knew his stuff. I do have one criticism I’ll post in a formal review of the tour. But it’s a fine tour in a port that doesn’t offer a plethora of things to do. 

I’m having some issues with guest services and my OBC. I was promised it would be fixed tomorrow. I’m choosing to have faith. 

Our safe died. Luckily it was after we got our ids out this morning. Guest services told us we needed to be in the room to have it fixed. Promised someone would show in 15-20 minutes. Fifty minutes later and still no show. Called down. Told no one needed to be in the room after all and someone was on their way. You know where this is going. Five hours later and nodda. 

Called guest services again and was told we could store our stuff with them if it couldn’t be fixed because they weren’t sure. At that very moment a really nice gentleman showed up and had the safe fixed in 2 minutes. The kicker?? He said guest services never called earlier.  

Now, just so you know, this sort of total cluster mess happens on every main stream cruise line sailing today. This isn’t a slam on HAL, but it is another example of how HAL service isn’t exempt from creating debacles all by themselves.  

Sof dolphins and sea lions today. I could watch for hours. I’m all about the animals!  

Some photos of Puerto Montt-

January 8th cont...: Critique of Denis Putrov

Apparently there are quite a few folks on this cruise reading my blog because 3 people asked me what I would criticize about yesterday’s excursion, so I’ll just answer now. Remember, this is just my opinion…

My only criticism of the tour yesterday with Denis Purtov would be the mismatched description. My tour description reads:

“Not included: Lunch (people have free choice of restaurant and meals, also we can do just a short snack stop or skip lunch).” This was only partially true.  

Our group was lead into a restaurant where we were told that our “table was ready”.  Now, we have no desire to spend an hour in a crowded inclosed space eating lunch- that’s not our style.  We want to spend our time outside in fresh air, exploring.

We asked if we could be excused from this pre arranged sit down lunch (in restaurant chosen by your guide) to tour the town on our own. Our guide was fine with us leaving and we spent a lovely hour walking the boardwalk and listening to some local musicians. 

Our meet up time with the group who chose to stay for lunch was 2:50 and the guide was 20 minutes late to the meeting spot. This was a bit annoying since we started to question whether or not WE were in the right spot. I feel he could have whatsapped us a new meeting time to avoid a little bit of confusion. 

Anyway, all the rest of the people in our group stayed for the lunch and said the food was good. I’m sure the company would have been lovely too.  My point in criticism is that there really wasn’t a free choice of restaurants (unless you were assertive and asked to be excused, as we did). The guide had a reservation and table set for the group and it was clear he wanted us to eat at that particular restaurant. 

So, if you book with Dennis Purtov, know that you do have a choice to go off on your own and skip tour selected restaurant even if it isn’t obvious. We did enjoy the day and without the restaurant snafu id give the tour a solid score. It was still half the price of a ship excursion and far fewer people to manage. Plus, our group got along quite well which made the day even more pleasant.  

So that’s that. 

 January 9th Puerto Chacabuca

Today was Puerto Chacabuco. A very small town down a long fjord. Sailing in and out of the fjords was a real treat.

We did a tour with En’Patagonia where we explored the countryside. Spent some time in the old port city of Ayena where the suspension bridge is a really big deal.

We went to a national park to see typical national park stuff. Only had 30 minutes here so no hiking although it was calling my name. We could absolutely spend more time hiking in Patagonia, it’s my vibe.  

Highlight of our time in the national park  was having the crap scared out of me by a big ol fake mountain lion perched in a tree. What idiot thought that was a good idea?? Hidden cameras spaced to catch unsuspecting tourist reactions would be liquid gold.  

We ended the tour at a family run Patagonia farm where we were served traditional chow (I had lamb- sherp had salmon). We were also treated to a traditional Patagonia 140 proof lemonade, a bottle of Chilean wine, and authentic dancers showing off their skills.

A lunch made sweeter by finally hooking up with @cruisemom42. She is as delightful as I expected and I hope we get to spend more time together.  

Dinner was the lido. We went down at 7:45 and it was jam packed! Not a table to be had. Lines at every station. They ended up keeping the buffet open until 8:15 because there were so many people trying to chow. We had some fish and shrimp. I did find a fresh grill where I hope to be able to order proteins, but I really miss the wok man.  

We hung in RS again. We are very much enjoying the band. Their 45 minute sets started at 8:15 which means they played their last tune of the night at 10:59.  

We walked thru the whole ship at 11:15 and saw no more than a dozen people and most of them were staff. Even the casino was just about empty except for a few ladies performing some sort of witchcraft ritual on a Buffalo machine.

Overall, another great day. Bright blue skies. Zero rain in this temperate rainforest. Temp in the high 60s with a real feel of 75. The sun is very strong, bring protection. Scenery is getting more and more dramatic  as we move south. It’s still twilight at almost midnight but the temperature has dropped significantly. Tomorrow is scenic fjord cruising. I’ll cut a witch for a prime seat in the crows nest.  

Todays IPhone photos- 

January 10, 2025

And just like that, the beautiful weather is coming to a screeching halt.

The captain had a special weather announcement at 10 am. I knew that wasn’t good.  

Apparently we are going to encounter hurricane force winds and the lowest pressure system the captain (who is a total hoot) has ever experienced here.

The captain has been up since 4 am trying plan a route to keep us safe.  

1) Instead of a slow scenic cruise day tomorrow, we will skip Brinea glacier since we are making a 22 knot run into Puenta Arenas to stay ahead of the storm.

2) We will arrive in Puenta Arenas a day early and stay from 1-8 pm. So far, all the HAL tours are a go. We do have a Hal tour booked for this very reason (Puenta arenas is often cancelled). If our tour ends up cancelled I have two more penguin tours booked later in the trip (puerto madryn and Stanley).  

3) All aboard will be 8 pm and from there we will seek shelter in a fjord or behind an island until the storm passes.

4) Captain mentioned we will be in the Atlantic briefly as we make our way to Ushuaia the following day and he expects 8 meter waves. Recommended we just staying in cabin during that brief time.

5) So far Ushuaia is still a go as the storm should pass and it looks like we will make Antartica with the storm in our rear view window.

I am extremely pleased with how the captain has handled this. I feel very safe under his command and could ask for nothing more from the bridge. There are zero complaints from this sailor.  

I’m off to take some mescaline. I mean meclizine. 

 January 10th Cont,,,

Please allow me to back this bus up a moment and revisit yesterday’s experience at the Patagonian farm. 

Anyone who knows Sherpa knows he loves his beer so it should come as no surprise that he somehow managed to hook up with the one Patagonia family member from the farm who actually brews his own in the back 40. 

So, after lunch,  we trekked over the river (on a super sketchy bridge) and through the knee high field of dandelions (likely filled with some rare South American tick) to gaze upon the wonder of a  beer oasis parked literally in the middle of nowhere Patagonia. There is nothing I won’t do for my man. 

We were treated to a private brewery tour and even though 

Sherpa doesn’t speak a lick of Spanish and the beer man spoke zero English, it was abundantly clear they communicated perfectly thru some mysterious, but universal, beer language. Lots of Grunts- chugging motions, belly rubbing. More proof that it’s a small world after all. 

Those two hit it off marvelously and we were graced with two Patagonia beer mugs which will serve as our official first souvenirs of the trip. A great score on several levels as Sherps will be telling this story for years to come. A similar thing happened in the middle of nowhere Montenegro and I've heard that story told a couple thousand times. Big feet and a beer sniffy nose- what more can a girl ask for? In all seriousness, it makes me happy when Sherpa is happy.  

Doesn’t it look like they are taking? I assure you neither one had a the slightest clue what the other was saying. 

The Brewery

 View from the brewery

January 11, 2025

We have been sailing through the fjords since yesterday afternoon. Seas are still very calm. Temperature is 50 but it’s damp so layers for today’s penguin tour. Amazing how close we get to the sides of these mountains. We did see our first glacier last night.

We moved a speciality reservation from tonight to last night due to the changed itinerary. Showed up to Pinnacle at 6:30. Walked out of the Pinnacle at 8:40.  

Appetizers were enough for me (which turned out to be a very good thing). I had crab cake and the rib eye tacos. Bob had crab and shrimp. Both very good.  

While Sherpa maybe a pescatarian, I am a full fledged carnivore. I am a firm believer that God gave us eye teeth for a reason. As such, I order my steaks rare. Bonus points if they are still mooing. 

My steak came medium well. Saddest tiny bit of pink left. They cooked the life right out of that heffer. If I wasn’t so full from the apps I would have sent it back. That is, IF I could find the Waiter who never showed up to check on my steak until hubs sea bass was history. Server was very nice, but fairly incompetent.

example- desserts came with no silverware which meant hubbys icecream was a puddle before we could secure a spoon.  

I had some struffl-dufuslumpkin thing which was heavenly for the first three bites. It’s the kind of dessert that secures itself permanently to your inner thighs before you even get up from the table. We finally got a spoon so Sherpa could finish  mine. My coffee came before dessert, but the cream for my coffee didn’t show up until the dessert silverware did. It was a mess.

Again, the guy was nice enough and

we were in no hurry since Rolling Stones had the night off. I’m not complaining because I know that service just isn’t what it used to be on all main stream lines post Covid. I try very hard to stay in a place of gratitude since cruising truly is a luxury many will never experience. 

Now, don’t get me wrong. Staying grateful  doesn’t mean I will accept what I deem to be unacceptable. This Baby doesn’t sit in a corner if I’m getting hosed. I have plenty of weaknesses, but Assertiveness isn’t one of them. However; I really don’t consider a bad dining experience to be something to get all worked up about. In the end, I left with my tummy full and great memories of sipping wine with the love of my life as we sailed past Patagonian glaciers. 

Life is better than good.  

January 12, 2025

Good morning from somewhere in the Chilian fjords where we are hiding from the storm like 2,000 drunken pirates. 

The weather is just fine. A bit of mist right now but it’s smooth as silk and it’s really not all that cold (56F). It was a bit windy when I was walking but nothing more than my daily stroll on Maui.

The bow is open for scenic viewing. A narration of what we are seeing is playing on outside decks and in the crows nest.

We are gliding past SOOOoOooo many glaciers.  Feels like I could reach out and touch them. I haven’t seen much wildlife yet but that will come. Looks like we are heading sown a dead end fjord right now- I expect a 360 here any moment.  

I can NOT thank this captain enough. I don’t believe all captains/crew would have done what he has done in terms of scrambling to switch ports yesterday to offer us this amazing day today (and the penguins yesterday- more on that later).

This is the very first time ANY cruise ship of this size has sailed in these fjords. The captain actually sounded excited to explore new territory. Apparently this fjord hasn’t even been fully charted so he is being extra cautious. I’m always up for forging a new trail so this is right up my ‘Glacier’ Alley (ha- see what I did there). 

Apparently we are sailing on the opposite side of Glacier Alley so we will see these glaciers from the other side tomorrow. 

We are literally surrounded by glaciers and waterfalls. There arw also some nice chunks of ice floating by. 

You would never know there was bad weather close by in the pacific.  There is zero ship movement. I couldn’t dream of a better place to hide.

January 12, 2025: Puenta Arenas

Catching up from yesterday- 

We arrived in Punta Arenas a day early as our captain successfully outran the hurricane force winds closing in on us. Again, huge props for rearranging the itinerary (and all subsequent shore excursions) on a moments notice. If I wasn’t so enamored with Sherpa I’d make a move on the captain. 

We opted for the HaL Penguin tour here to use some of our $300 HIA shore excursion credit. It was a typical ship tour, pretty cramped with lots of waiting. A few more canes than we are used to but I give those folks mad respect for never quitting. 

After a 1.5 hour ride in a huge packed catamaran, we arrived at the island of Los Pingüinos. The ride was smooth and they gave us a a souvenir backpack with some snacks that we didn’t eat. The complimentary backpack will go right next to the complimentary beer mugs we scored from the impromptu brewery tour. A collection has started.

The island was more like a bare rock sticking out of the straits of Magellan.  We were literally surrounded by Magdalen Penguins. I mean surrounded! The guide said over 20,000 live on this little rock during the season.  The babies are born at the end of November and grow fast. As such, they were nearly as tall as the parents minus the formalities of tuxedo feathers. Typical teens. 

We spent an hour on the island- the circular walk can’t be much more than a mile. Penguins weren’t the only thing on the rock as we saw several different species of birds with their babies. 

The people running the catamaran were very competent- and quite helpful to some of the HAL passengers that needed physical assistance. 

The commentary on the way back to the ship was quite informative. Since I most certainly operate on a Third grade level, learned a lot!! Did you know penguins not only come back to the same island to give birth, but 70% come back to the exact same den (which made me wonder at what point do penguins decide to become the town Squatters?). 

I really wanted to see penguins on this trip and this was a pretty amazing bucket list day. Have I thanked the captain and crew enough yet? 

We got back onboard around 7:00 pm and hit the lido. Food fine, still missing my Wok Man (ha- see what I did there?). We wandered around for a few hours looking for the allusive gallery bar (seriously, this thing is NOT on any ship maps, photo evidence to follow). Watched some football. Closed Rolling Stones. Admired a ship completely empty by  midnight. We have officially settled into our routine. Man I love cruising!!!

This excursion was labeled “moderate” by HaL. Some have asked what moderate is? Here is the ramp you would need to navigate to board the catamaran. We did witness several people with canes needing physical assistance. The ramp was steel, narrow, and a bit slippery from the mist. You can also notice the very loose and uneven rocks to navigate before hitting the uneven (but better) one mile trail. This is one example of HaLS moderate…..

 January 14th, crossing Cape Horn

As mentioned, we crossed Cape Horn this morning. The narration started at 5:30am so I went to the crows neat at 5:00 am thinking I’d get a chair facing forward (sometimes I’m a hopeless romantic).

All front facing chairs taken- I met a lady who said they were all gone by 4:15 am! These old timers take chair hogging to a brand new level! Mad props.

I did get the last table along the port side. Since we were crossing the cape port side our area became very poplar for photo ops. Faces blocked to protect the innocent but I'm surprised this lady didn’t just sit on my lap.

Another lady walked up and sat her half eaten roll and glasses on our table because apparently she needed both hands to take a cell phone pic (through a window no less).  

Here is Photo of what the crows nest looked like at 5:30. By 6:00 it was standing room only crowded. Fire Marshall would have had a heart attack.

Now, before you think I go around knocking old people to the floor, I’ll have you know I eventually gave up my prime chair to a little blue haired lady with a cane. I also helped some lady find her cabin the other day (she was very disoriented). I may not be an exceptional rule follower (or any rule follower for that matter), but I do have a real soft spot for kids and the elderly. My dad would be  proud. My mom would have encouraged  me to knock em down. 

Anyway, We saw lots of dolphins and albatrosses. Sunrise was stunning. They said that it was exceptionally calm for rounding the horn and I agree- very minimal ship motion. 

Our weather has been just terrific (I didn’t experience the rain showers yesterday mentioned by@cruisemom42and our hike quite nice for a Hal excursion (more about our day in Ushuaia tomorrow since we are sailing the Drake and I have lots of time).  

The narration this morning was quite good. I, too, was interested in how sailors earned the right to put both feet on the table. That would have been me. We got “Order of the Moss Back” certificates delivered to our room this afternoon. It’s a nice gesture and I suspect those who are a bit more sentimental will cherish theirs. 

I suspect mine will  get filed in the cylinder along side my “scallywag” certificate from last year’s equator crossing. Feral. 

We ended up taking nice long naps this afternoon. First we’ve done that since leaving Michigan New Years Eve. We have managed to close the bar each night, but that’s nothing to brag about. As you can see from the dailies I’m posting that is 11:15 pm! Eleven-Fifteen. ELEVEN-FIFTEEN!! I’m not kidding when I say that the ship is empty by 11:30. This means we are asleep by midnight, something that Sherpa has never experienced onboard any ship. Not complaining, just reporting. We have assimilated.  

Here are some photos crossing Cape Horn- 

January 15th

We closed Rolling Stones last night. The band stopped at 11:15. We were the absolute last ones out the bar at 11:30. 

The shows are getting crowded in Rolling Stones. These guys are really good and we are very pleased. I was concerned about this with Sherpa because he has never sailed a ship with this few entertainment options, but we won’t need anything else. We’re officially regulars and we have a great waitress we’ve gotten  know.

The beauty of being in bed by midnight is getting up before 6. The sun was already long past the rising state today as we move toward 22 hours of daylight. Last night at midnight it was still quite light out.

I'm sitting in crows nest with a latte enjoying the sunshine. The coffee here is excellent. Neither one of us like the “free” coffee. We really don’t like the “free” coffee on any line so that’s not a HAL criticism. I don’t consider myself a coffee snob, but that free stuff has a distinct chemical taste. 

 . 

'We are in the middle of the Drake Passage. Captain said waves around 4 meters. It’s not the drake lake, but this isn’t the drake shake either. It’s somewhere in the middle. Rocking enough to slosh some water out of the pools, but not enough to bunker down.

We had no tv last night but do this morning. Internet is working quite well especially for being at the end of the Earth. Say what you want about Elon Musk- starlink is a game changer.

January 15th. Backing up to post about Ushuaia

 Backing up to share our day in Ushuaia- 

We booked the Trekking tour offered by HaL to use more shore excursion credit. The hike was labeled “strenuous”.  For a brief minute I reconsidered booking thinking it maybe too difficult - I’m much closer to 60 than I am 50 and I am not a gym rat. But, I do try to get some sort of cardio physical activity daily and we are pretty avid hikers (notice I said “try” because I’ve been in sloth action this cruise). 

After researching the hike a bit more, I realized it was well within my wheelhouse. Only 3 miles with Minimal elevation gain. A stroll really. 

In the end, I didn’t think this hike was strenuous in the slightest. My fitbit never registered zone minutes which means my heart rate didn’t increase significantly. If you are in remotely decent shape, this hike will be a breeze.

With that, if you aren’t in good shape this hike isn’t for you. More on that in another post but we did have falls and injuries.

Tour met in theatre then went straight to busses. Very well organized by HAl. We drove about 25 minutes outside of the city to a husky farm where they raise cute and cuddly sled dogs. There was a nice shelter there with proper restrooms. After about 15 minutes of layering up the group was off. 

Patagonia has weird weather. One minute I’m peeling off layers and the next I’m putting them back on. It threatened rain all day but the most we saw was a light mist. I opted to leave my real winter coat at home this trip and instead went with layers. I wore a tank top, medium thickness merino wool, and a marmot rain jacket and was perfectly fine. I didn’t bring my rain pants but probably should have since they pack super light and are meant to go over regular pants. Senior moment.

For pants I have been wearing fleece lined for outside. They are pretty thick and have worked just fine. I did wear my merino gloves and hat on the hike, but kept putting them on and taking them off. It’s all about the wind here. When we walked into the covered forest it was far from cold (high was around 50F). But walking in an open field with wind it becomes quite nippily quick. 

The hike goes through and around a peet moss bog. Beautiful mountains. The guide explained lots about the topography during the hike. It was a weird  feeling squishing on-top of the massive bog. Our guide said that this power bog is some of the only virgin bog remaining on Earth since it’s been all used up on other continents. Not sure I buy that, but it’s out of my zone of indifference so I didn’t bother fact checking. . 

After the hike we were served finger sandwiches (ham and cheese), coffee or mate, and apple strudel. I tried the mate which is a hugely popular drink in Argentina. It tasted like strong black tea. I skipped the sandwich but the apple strudel was yummy.

The bus made two stops on the way back. One in town and one inside the port. We decided to get off in town since we weren’t particularly tired from the hike and still had lots of time. Not only did hiding in the fjord give us a chance to visit Punta Arenas, it also increased our port time in Ushuaia by 5 hours. When is the last time that happened?

We did some shopping on Main Street. I wanted an Antartica hoodie and I wanted Sherpa to get an Antartica hat since I am pretty sure there won’t be stores where we are headed ;). 

Main Street had lots of shops. Some fancy, some souvenir. I felt totally safe there. We had no luck with the shopping and gave up. I’m not a shopper and Sherpa is a male so a shopping expedition is bordering  torture for us both. 

As we walked, I noticed tons of people writing post cards. Notice I said “I” noticed because Sherpa isn’t always the most observant when it comes to human behavior. He can spot a deer at 100 yards, but the TSA agent yelling at him for walking the wrong way into the port went completely unnoticed. Boys. 

Anyway, I was reminded that Ushuaia is a HUGE post card stop since it gets stamped “End of the World”.  We decided to send a couple postcards which turned into a bit of a hilarious fiasco. I expected nothing less as this was a case of the blind leading the blond (ha- see what I did there?). 

After walking up and down the wrong streets we eventually found the post office. The map was very poorly laid out. Stamps were $9.00 US (that is not a typo). After recovering from a mild heart attack, we decided to send the postcards  anyway. 

Like many government agencies in the USA, the Argentine post office is not immune to making life difficult. They only take Peso.  

So off we went to find a currency exchange (in spite of said poorly laid out map).  Up and down, over under, we eventually stumbled upon it (tiniest sign ever). 

We wanted to exchange some of our Chilean left over dollars to Peso. We like having a small amount of local currency for things like beer and banos. We only do a small amount. We learned the hard way (Montenegro dollars are still sitting in our safe). 

By the time we found the currency exchange and did our business there we hiked back to the post office to find it closed. I did mention fiasco, right?

I had run into someone from our roll call who mentioned buying stamps at one of the souvenir shops. So off we went to find a souvenir shop to sell us a stamp and a post office box for mailing these $9 postcards. Our friends probably won’t even notice it’s marked “end of the earth”. 

In the end we were successful as a team. By team I mean I read the map and found all the locations but Sherpa paid for the postage. 

By this time I had racked up 24K steps and was getting hungry. Sherpa recognized his precarious position and we headed back to the ship. 

Lo and behold, inside the gate just outside the ship there are a few shops. They had an Antartica hoodie and Antartica hat. Sometimes my aloha energy just works. 

From there we did dinner at the lido. I spotted several whales for the lido patrons. There were hundreds of penguins too. Sail out of Ushuaia was just gorgeous!

The ship had some line dancing in the lido in the evening but it was “learn to salsa” and my salsa had run dry.  The 8:00 Monday Night NFL game is really shown at 10:00 our time so I decided to call it a night and watch the game in our room. Sherpa bounced between the Rolling Stones band and gallery bar and was still back in the cabin by midnight. 

Those poor Vikings.  

Ushuaia hike and sail away-

January 15th cont...

 We have entered a very foggy drake lake. We are almost to Antartica. It’s 10:30 and it’s super foggy out. Captain is blowing the horn every few minutes. I love this -  Pretty cool experience. 

Sunset is around midnight and sunrise is 3:30ish (close enough). I just snapped these photo

 s. I wish CC would let me upload video of the fog Horn blowing 

January 16, 2025

 And just like that, we’re in Antarctica!! 

The first view physically took my breath away. I may have gotten a little teary eyed too. I am filled with gratitude for the opportunity to visit here.  

Getting ready to pick up the researchers from Palmer Station. It’s snowing and small amounts of snow are accumulating on the deck. Temp is reading 32F which is warmer than the 14F in balmy Michigan.  

This place is off the charts. 

This captain is amazing!!  We just slid thru the tiny pass between booth island and the Bruce Plateau. It’s like you can reach out and touch em.  

The crew is going nuts too- said they haven’t gotten this close all year due to weather and icebergs. Not sure if that’s true (when I do the whale watches we always tell guests that they saw the most whales lol). I do hope everyone got this experience.  

It’s hard to decipher that we aren’t in a movie set right now. It really does feel surreal.

January 17, 2025

 I have turned into a sloth.  I haven’t done tai chi, dance class, or hit the gym once this cruise. It’s all Sherpas’s fault. Yesterday I logged less than 10K steps. My Fitbit actually called me lazy. 

In other news, I think I have converted dh into a lido guy. Neither one of us eat many carbs and that man just loves his salmon. He eats a plate of salmon and shrimp nightly and is perfectly happy.

Given my slothness, I skipped both breakfast and lunch yesterday and had a tuna fish sandwich for dinner and was quite content. 

Now if I could just find a low calorie cocktail I’d be all set. They ran out of ginger beer for mules so I’ve been drinking wine. I don’t really like wine but it’s the only thing I drink onboard that gets me even the slightest buzz without turning the scale upside down.  

I am still missing my woK man. That is my favorite healthy meal onboard. The Kdam does offer WAY more healthy food choices. I did make a note in the app inquiring if there would ever be a wok man this cruise and was told a flat out “absolutely not” in the sweetest most kind way by the lido manager. Of course, he will assist me if I need anything else. 

The last two evenings they have offered a classical type music as the entertainment in world stage. A guitar duo and a pianist. HAL folks sure do love their classical music as the venues were packed for both the 7:30

and 9:00 performance. Classical music isn’t my first choice for entertainment, I’m more of a Clapton and Slash kinda gal, but I will say this…. Those musicians have mastered their craft. I even stayed awake the entire time. While classical may not be my preferred genre, I have mad respect for those performances and so did the audience as they received standing Os each show. It really was a lovely way to spend an hour and I look forward to future performances.  

I’m falling more in love with our Captain. Yesterday he sailed us Soooooo close to the glaciers and icebergs. . He even took us to another penguin colony last night as a bonus trip.  

This guy takes scenic cruising to a whole new level. It’s like we are in cruise ship X games. He clearly has an adventurous side and I like it! It doesn’t hurt that I feel perfectly safe as we squeeze between ice sheets and the continent. It’s been total eye candy since we hit Antartica. I can’t see how anyone could possibly complain about how the captain has handled this voyage (although I’m sure someone will).

They have turned the area behind shore excursion into the “Antartica Experience Hub”. Lots of exhibits and people to answer questions. A really thoughtful gesture. The Oosterdam is a well oiled machine and there are nice touches like these that indicate they really are mindful to go above and beyond.

Apparently we are in for another great day with smooth seas and sunshine this afternoon. Captain said he was taking us to see more of our friends. I suspect penguins are on the agenda.

Antarctica hub experience photos- 

January 17 cont..

Apparently we are making a few “stops” today. 

Our captain glided this beast thru a narrow pass and skidded to within 100 meters of this penguin colony. It was as if he was  parallel parking a sporty Lamborghini.  

Note to self, penguins smell and make funny noises.

I have some amazing video of penguins swimming alongside the ship early this morning. They look and behave like small dolphins. Too bad I can’t upload to CC. I really should get my blog back up and running so I can share video.  

I’ve seen at least a dozen whales today.  Currently the sea is like glass so it’s easy to spot them. Nothing like a morning out in Maui as the behavior is very calm. They are just floating along opportunistically eating. No evidence of bubble net feeding yet, not sure if they participate in that down here. I will research. These humpbacks are slightly different than the North Pacific whales I study in Maui, but I’d think they would exhibit similar behavior.

Here are some pics from this morning. 

Posted January 18 

Today was, IMO, the best day of the trip so far. At one point I counted 9 humpbacks floating around the bow. They are just logging and eating krill. No bubble net feeding that I have observed.

BUT- the star of today’s show was undoubtedly the 250,000 Adelie penguins who inhabit this area. They are soooooooo stinking cute! 

I so wish I could share my video but it doesn’t play well with Cc. I’ll try to get my blog up again before I take off for the Tahiti trip. The video is even cuter!  

Photos taken with mix of iPhone and pocket canon. 

Just to piggy back on my friend, the captain said we would either do elephant island or more scenic cruising. Given the captains track record this cruise I totally trust his judgement.

He also mentioned that this stop with a Chilian airlift is the first time in HaL history.

I believe that makes 3 brand new areas HAL has never been before 1) the fjord to outride the storm 2) within 100 meters of the penguin colony yesterday and 3) whatever happens tomorrow.

It’s formal night again. We are total  rebels sporting our Lions gear in the Gallery bar. Had portobello burgers from dive in for dinner (skipped breakfast and lunch). We obviously aren’t here for the chow.  

I thought I did a post about our Caneletto dinner last night but I must not have hit submit and I’ve already deleted my food porn and dailies. Sorry about that. In summary, it was fine. Service was better than pinnacle, but still not totally on point.  

I feel like I’m living in a movie set :). 

January 19, 2025

We had a super lazy day today. I’ve licked my wounds healed and am proudly sporting lions swag. Detroit fans are the REAL DEAL - whether supporting our sports teams or musicians. Those HAL cruisers complaining about the decibel level in BBKings need to steer clear of Ford Field.  

I have no food to report today because other than a single slice of cardboard  pizza I’ve passed. Sherpa has had salmon. For breakfast, lunch, and dinner. We are the worst food porn people in the history of HAL lives- good thing I’ve got peeps to back me up!

We are jumping between Rolling Stones and gallery tonight since there are still some good games on and we’ve gotten to know some members of the band (who totally rock this ship). Seriously, this maybe the best cruise ship band I’ve had the pleasure of sailing with and I’ve been on some themed music cruises.  

Side note- Why is it I can remember the every single lyric to Hearts MagicMan, but can’t remember to grab my room key on the way out? 

Captain got us close to elephant island. Here are a couple iPhone photos, I think my canon will be better as it was pretty foggy. I’ll transfer tomorrow.

Today was our first day of questionable weather this whole trip and if you bundled up it wasn’t hateful.  Couple that with great new friends, a caring crew, and an exceptional captain and this is a cruise for the history books with 10 days still to come. I feel extremely fortunate as we make our way to the Falkland Islands. 

January 20

Good morning from a very sunny Drake  passage where, once again, we have dodged both the Drake Shake and the Drake Lake. It’s Somewhere in the middle. About the same amount of rocking as departing San Diego headed to Hawaii last year. Although, admittedly the gentle rocking did keep me asleep much longer than normal this morning. Cruising is simply decadent!!

I meant to grab you a photo of the entire band without people blocking, but forgot once the dance music came on. This is all I grabbed last night. I’ll get a full shot tonight. They are insane. The lead guitarist from Rio De Genaro totally ripped up Purple Rain last night. I mean hit it out of the ballpark! So much fun.

The band is still ending at 11 or 11:15 but with the 2 hour time change the playoff games are still on. We have found the best party is in the gallery bar after RS wraps up. The band members even join us and Manny, our bartender, is a hoot. 

Not sure what today brings. It’s a decadent sea day. I think I’ll do something decadent.  

Here are the photos from my canon of elephant island yesterday. Not sure they are any better than the iPhone- 

January 22nd

Not gonna lie- All this talk of book sharing and history lessons has thrown me off my game. I am clearly a mental midget compared to those of you rushing off to buy books on the history of Elephant Island. I’m lucky to read a single Janet Evanovich book once a year, and that’s only because she is hilarious. No brain cells required. (Side note, lots of chatter about books happened in the live thread).

No offense to those of you who love your books but that’s just not the world I play in. Reading interferes with my ability to close a bar and get up the next morning. I’d much rather be hiking than reading and I’ve always felt that there’s a reason we call it history. Don’t get me wrong, I love hanging out with people who read. It’s like getting cliff notes entirely free. Carry on.

To recap last couple days - I had a lovely dinner with a new friend on Monday in the MDR. I felt courses were served at appropriate times. Food was decent. Again, I don’t expect much when eating banquet style, and, imo the mdr is banquet style. Like one huge wedding without the aggressive twanging of forks on glassware every few minutes. But,  I feel like I made a new friend, and for me that’s one of the best parts of cruising! 

After dinner I met Sherpa and we closed RS again. Last set was very lightly attended due to an early arrival in Stanley yesterday morning. HAL folks do like their sleep. 

Despite closing the bar, we were up by 6:00 am to be in line by 7:00 for the first tender which was scheduled for 8:00 am. 

By the time we got to Rolling Stones the line snaked back into the casino. They finally opened Rolling Stones to distribute tickets around 7:30 and we were on a tender by 7:40 and on the island before 8:00 am. I suspect the unexpectedly calm conditions of Stanley Bay helped speed the 20 minute tender ride. 

We choose to spend the day at volunteer point. Tour was operated by Shaun Jeffery who bought out the Patrick Watts operation. We were quickly paired off with another nice couple to share the ride.

They do cram 4 passengers and one driver into a Land Rover so it’s quite cozy.  I got the middle back seat for the ride out and was quite surprised that it was perfectly comfortable even though there may have been some accidental tushy touching as we struggled with seat belts.

The ride is long. Slightly over 2 hours each way. The first hour is on combo of paved and dirt roads. The last hour is off road. Nothing super extreme, but enough that many people were uncomfortable (and complaining). Not recommended for anyone with a bad back. Actually, I wouldn’t recommend this tour for anyone with physical difficulties since the area to see penguins is large and the ground extremely uneven. Not to mention abandoned penguin burrows pop up out of nowhere (ask me how I know). 

The Falkland Islands aren’t much to look at from a visual perspective. Rolling hills but  no trees. Quite barren in fact. Dare I say boring? But the star of this show is the Penguins! Literally 1,000s of them. Three types all in one very large beach area (gentoo, king, and Magellantic). 

We had unbelievable weather. Volunteer point had snow last week and it’s known to be ridiculously windy, but the wind was quite mild and with the sun out all I needed was a medium weight merino long sleeve shirt and a zip up fleece that I wore unzipped. Guide said this was the nicest day he’s had all summer (again, not sure I totally buy it),  but it really was a very lovely summer day in South America. 

Did I mention the star of this show was penguins? Seriously, it’s like Downtown Manhattan of the penguin world. Extremely dense, very diverse, with some egg thievery thrown in just to keep things interesting. 

The Kings were sitting on eggs with some newly hatched. The Gentoos were kept at a distance due to bird flu, and the Magellanic had juveniles about the same size as what we saw in Punta Arenas. Photos taken with iPhone and pocked cannon (I mean canon)- 

Our Land Rover mates bailed once we got back to Stanley but by this time we had made fast friends with our driver who offered to give us a longer tour.  Didn’t hurt that he was a fine specimen from the British Royal Marines. He took us to gypsy cove where we hiked the loop and found more penguins, a WW2 era shore battery complete with cannon (not canon), and some great views of the city. So glad we opted for this additional side trip. 

As you would expect, we had our driver drop us off at the “Victory” in Downtown Stanley. It’s an old traditional British style pub where we met up with more friends from the ship. Sherpa had a locally brewed pub bitter so he can maintain bragging rights with our friends across the pond. 

Last tender was 5:30. We weren’t the last tender but let’s just say the town was pretty empty by the time we jumped in line.

The Orange party was last night. HAL really needs to do a bit better job scheduling this event. Last year they held the orange party on an evening before we had to get up for Fakarava (mind you, we had 9 sea days forthcoming). With all the sea days on this itinerary, it seems we could have had the orange party on a sea day or without early arrival in the morning. Anyway, the orange party really wasn’t any different than a normal night in Rolling Stones other than some orange decorations and staff handing out treats, but it was much more crowded than a normal night for the first set. By the last set it had thinned to typical HAL numbers. Even I was tired after a long day touring. 

Today is another sea day as we make our way to Puerto Madryn. The Weather is just lovely. Seas are calm. Sun is shining and we are throughly enjoying our time on the exceptionally well run Oosterdam! 

I almost forgot- Sherpa and I saved a penguin!  

We are the wandering type and while at volunteer point we wandered pretty far away from the crowds near the fence and stumbled across a penguin stuck in mud.  

We watched him for a bit and quickly realized he wasn’t going to make it out. This mud was THICK and he was laying in it. Coated.

We hurried back to the crowds and found our Marine who found a penguin warden. We took them to show the penguin. They radioed for a 4 wheeler and two guys picked this little dude up from the mud but he still couldn’t move because he was so coated. Eventually they put him in the 4 wheeler and took him to some rescue center.

Im pretty sure that penguin would not have made it out without help. Maybe some other wanderers would have found him eventually, but I’m glad we were there.

Aloha energy

January 23

We did go to the piano players show last night and much to my delight he did a rendition of Guns N Roses- Sweet Child of Mine :). I thought this guy was VERY talented. He got off the ship today. Not sure if someone else got on to replace.  I’ll miss him. Now, if the comedian got off today……..

We closed RS again last night. We’re officially regulars. I finally got the crabby bartender to smile. I made that goal day 1 and this guy held out for a long time. I think he’s mine now.  

Nothing to report for food because we skipped breakfast and dinner (light lunch of salad and Sherpa had shrimp pasta). We did head to the late night buffet for the first time EVER. They had wings but they were undressed and just too greasy for me to eat. We grabbed watermelon and cantaloupe for the room and it was delish. I don’t think they replace anything at late night snacks because we were there about 11:15 (band stopped at 11 again) and things like dressing for the ceasar salad were long gone. Cheese tray was sadly picked over too. There was some cardboard pizza again. It’s weird, there are two types of pizza they put out. I swear one is a cheap frozen $3 kind and the other is fairly decent with a thicker, softer crust. Not sure what’s going on there but there is definitely room for improvement in the Pizza area.

All in all it was a very relaxing sea day. We basically laid around and read all day (yes, I can read). At one point I looked over at Sherp and this is what he was choosing to read. I wasn’t kidding when I said I loved intelligence. Most of the time I don’t even understand the titles he reads. Total swoon city right here…..

January 24th

By now, many  of you reading this know me personally and I think you will verify that I’m a pretty straight shooter. On the rare occasion when I can control my mouth,  my facial expressions have a mind of their own. I surrendered clandestine long ago. It’s futile. I’m feral. The end. 

If you want something sugar coated you best get yourself a donut, cause I am not your girl.  With that, here are some of my  thoughts about the Oosterdam. 

@Sea42 mentioned that   “those on upcoming sailings to be aware there might be random issues”.  I’d expand to say there most certainly will be random issues. This girl is 22 years old. That’s a full blown senior citizen in ship years. 

I have not witnessed any water leaks personally, but I have no doubt they exist. I did see a random bath closing near The Rolling Stones room. That’s the only public restroom I’ve ever used so can’t speak for others. There are tiles missing. Stained carpeting. Paint chipping. Rust showing. We are missing the square stool in our room. We still have a shower curtain. There are two windows in the crows nest that have seals broken which did distract from glacier viewing. The decor leans old school and ornate in many venues. Bright, crisp, and modern this ship is not. If you book on a 22 year old ship, you should expect some niggles. But she is clean, and that matters. Not all old gals can say that. 

What the Oosterdam did offer to us was the absolute most responsive team onboard that I have ever experienced. That’s nearly 50 cruises spanning almost 40 years (blah blah blah). These people want honest feedback and respond. 

I tried to order a grilled cheese after Rolling Stones one evening and was told it was too late. I wrote in the survey distributed half way through the cruise that I would like them to reinstate grilled cheese and quesadilla to the late night room service menu. The room service manager called me to say that these items would be available to me 24 hours a day moving forward. 

I wrote and inquired about my missing wok man and the lido manager called me to say that they just didn’t have room for a wok at dinner on the Oosterdam, but if I needed anything I should contact him directly. I’m sure he would help me if I called, but I am calling BS on this reply because there is a station closest to the sea view pool starboard side that remains completely empty every dinner. It’s the same spot they put my Wok man on K’dam.  I tend to believe this is just a manpower cutback. 

The only place I’ve had even remote push back was guest services with my account issue. We also had issues with the guest services and our safe that were not handled prudently, but even those annoyances got straighten out in the end.

The only place that feels understaffed consistently is coffee in crows nest but that is NOT because of workers. They bust their rears and are some of our favorite people. It’s just VERY busy and there is only so much space behind the small bar to make complicated coffee drinks. 

Ironically, we have had the most inefficient service at speciality restaurants. Shouldn’t they be the most trained? It’s a bit of a cluster. Pinnacle gets one more chance tonight. 

Most of the time we use “let us know” to compliment staff and we’ve had notes and messages left thanking us for feedback. They are paying attention and are responsive. 

I have heard random complaints. Most about the food and entertainment. No surprise on entertainment (although Rolling Stones band single handedly saved our cruise).

I have been disappointed in the food compared to the Kdam last year. That might end up being the difference between a legendary voyage (stay tuned). I think the food here is “ok” at best. I do see some cuts in quality and variety as the offerings have been pretty repetitive. In fairness, I have the pallet of a toddler so my opinion on food probably shouldn’t hold much weight. 

The star of this show is Captain Kevin. I feel so fortunate because a) he boarded the cruise with us in Santiago and b) his mom is onboard. We think he maybe showing off 🤣

Seriously, Captain Kevin avoided Hurricane force winds by hiding in a fjord that no cruise ship our size had ever entered (rumor is they had to buy special permit for that stunt). He got us to Punta Arenas a day early and then gave us 5 extra hours in Ushuaia. We got closer than has ever been to the penguin colony day one in Antartica. He got us super close to the Wendell sea which offered us amazing glaciers that weren’t listed on the itinerary. He got two critically ill passengers off at an Chilian naval base in Antartica (another place HAL has never ventured) and still managed to get us to Elephant island with plenty of viewing time.

I have never felt that a Captain of a cruise ship had much effect on my cruise other than safe transport, but  I would go out of my way to sail with Captain Kevin again. He’s that good.

We still have a few days left for me to gather more thoughts, but unless things turn exceptionally south, for us, this cruise has more than met my expectations. One of the best yet for the both company (Sherpa and I actually still like one another) and most incredible scenery.  Most. Incredible. Scenery. 

I am filled with gratitude.  

Just book it already.

January 25

As we sail into Punta Del Estes I just realized I forgot to tell you about our last penguin encounter this trip. It was also sherpas favorite.  

We booked three penguin tours because so often ports are cancelled on this itinerary and I wasn’t coming all this way without seeing penguins. I loved each and every one of them. I was worried I’d be penguined out after 3 penguin excursions, but that didn’t happen.  

The tour was independent to El Pedro farm. Long boring bus ride (this side of Argentina is not nearly as lush as the pacific side). But once there, the penguins showed off in true penguin form. Can they possibly get any cutier?

We also had the best meal of this entire trip this here complete with unlimited beer and wine which helped for the long boring ride home. The company was really nice and all in all I’d do this trip again. 

Between the long pier and the 5km walk to the water to see the penguins I finally got another 25k steps in. I would not call this excursion strenuous, but you really need to be fairly stable on your feet and able to walk at least 3-4 miles because the best part of the penguins is the end of the walk at the beach.  

 I have some great video of penguins here but CC doesn’t like direct video. I’ll make a real effort to get my blog up and running before I head to Tahiti.  I can share all my videos there (if you are interested). I can also share some thoughts that I’m not allowed to share here on CC without breaking their rules and getting tossed in time out. Win/win

Tenders are running behind. Apparently some bozo in a yacht took over our second tender pier so it’s SLOW. We have a walking tour at 3:00 so not in a hurry but o suspect it’s going to take several hours to clear. It’s 11:15 right now and RS and Billbowrd are jam packed with people waiting for tenders. I’m not even sure if they have all the tour people off yet.

While I’m waiting I’ll do a review of Pinnacle last night. The good news is that the service was dramatically improved. The maitraD even stopped by twice to check on me. Last visit I couldn’t even get my waiter to come back.

The bad news is that it was one of the worst streaks I’ve ever had. Certainly the worst steak from a cruise ship speciality restaurant.  

I take some responsibility. After the let down with the filet first visit I went for the rib eye. It’s a ridiculous 15 oz, but I figured it would be easier to cook med rare. They did get it med rare but this thing was a grisly mess. Seriously a very low budget cut of meat. No other way to say it. The streak knife lost the battle of cutting

On a positive, the shrimp cocktail really was jumbo and the side of mushrooms tasty. Bob said his snapper was fine. Both of us agree that the speciality restaurants on Oosterdam have been the worst we have experienced on any cruise line. Of course, the one thing they are known for is inconsistency so you may get a lucky night. 

January 25th cont...

Could this captain get any better?

We arrived in Punta Del Estes, and one of our tender piers was occupied by some moron with a yacht. The captain contacted the Coast Guard and had that yacht towed so we could use it!!!! His boat is clearly bigger. I love this guy so much.

The reality is this did cause delays in tendering. We arrived at 10 AM and it took us until 1230 to hit the shore and there were still gobs of people with tender tickets waiting. 

All we had planned today was a free walking tour that didn’t start until 3 PM so we were not affected by the delayed tendering.

We had a very nice day walking around Punta Del Estes. They call this place the Miami of South America. Lots of really cool vintage cars and a great boardwalk surrounding the peninsula. It’s hot here and the sun is intense. For those coming soon, sun screen is a must. I’m a Maui girl and got burned. We managed to get 25,000 steps in so far today so we all know I’m happy. 

Even though I don’t think the captain needed to apologize, he did. Authentically. Genuinely. Took full responsibility for the delayed tendering. In a world where people often deflect, captain Kevin went above and beyond once again.

January 26th

It’s summertime in South America! We’ve spent the last few days exploring the country of Ugarary, rich in both culture and history. And sunshine. Lots and lots of sunshine. 

Monte Video actually surpassed my expectations. That doesn’t say much as I had pretty low expectations going in, but this city really reminded me of Barcelona in architecture. I suppose that’s from the rich Spanish history. It is a Sunday so the old town was not at all crowded and gave us a good chance to see many of the sights. I bought a super cool throw blanket hand made from sheepskin.  

Our walking tour guide was fine and explained a lot. We have another two walking tours planned for Buenos Aires. If you haven’t tried these, we think they are great. Be sure to sign up online in advance as space is limited. The guides are usually local history majors from the area. We like to do these as an introduction to any city we visit. They sort of show us the lay of the land and we decide where to go when the tour ends. Usually that’s a museum because my fuel cell guy is into learning any chance he can get. 

The tour ended up close to the cruise ship but we hoofed it all the way back to city center to visit the National History Museum of MonteVideo. It’s Sherpa’s thing. My thing is finding a comfy chair to crash while he “museums.” We both did our thing.

They turned seaview pool into a dinner venue with white linen tablecloths. They had some extra things offered on the buffet. The buffet decorations were extra lovely. Someone put some energy in that. Reminiscent of the days of the midnight buffet. 

 Even though we aren’t to Buenos Aires yet, I am going to answer a question about cruise direction.  I think the best way to do this cruise is Santiago to Buenos Aires for the following reasons-

1-The earlier in January you go, the better the weather (typically). 

2-The glaciers viewing in Chili is amazing, but the star of this show is Antarctica and I think visiting glacier alley after Antartica would be a let down.

3-The tours in chili start earlier and last longer. They need energy. The kind of energy have at the beginning of a marathon. More go-go-go. These last two ports (punta del Estes and monte video) have been very laid back. No getting up early- up at normal hour, plenty of time for breakfast. No need to rush off the ship. Just chill days walking around town. This has been nice after running pretty hard for 26 days straight  (we left home December 31st). 

Sorry to those of you boarding in a few days, but that’s just my opinion and by now you should know I’m a whack job. Easily dismissed.  I probably feel this way because this cruise has been so amazing. I’m sure that those sailing next  will have your very own reasons why starting in Buenos Aires is better. 

In reality, there is no wrong here. 

Just Book It. 

28

While we are waiting for our luggage color to be called-

Buenos Aires is an industrial port- on steroids.

You must take a shuttle from the ship to the terminal- so virtually no walking off with luggage unless you can load it on a bus yourself. There was one small area to store luggage by the seats, but you would have to put most on your lap.

Getting caught up, it’s been a whirlJanuary

wind here in Buenos Aires.

The first day Oosterdam arrived in Buenos Aires brought a bit of showers. We walked from the ship to the Roceleta district. That’s where our hotel is and we wanted to let them know in person of our early arrival the next day.  

The walk was fine. Maybe 2-3 miles tops. The area you must pass to get out of the port is SKETCHY. Train and bus station. Be aware. 

We got lazy and took an uber back to the ship. Uber works GREAT here!! Do not use taxis. They want cash and have been known to change prices. Uber is a set price before entering and you tip in the app

too.

We signed up for the ship offered tango evening. As all ship tours, it was very overpriced. You could purchase tangos just about anywhere in this city and uber there and back. But, I’m glad we had the experience and it was a no brainer just following ship directions. 

The cafe where the tango was held was a gorgeous old building when lots of photos of movie stars who had visited. They served empanada or dessert. Sherpa ate mine so I can’t comment. They did keep our wine and beer glass full the entire time so that was very nice.

We had packed before leaving for the tango so got back to the ship in time to set the luggage out and hit Rolling Stones.  

Proud to say we closed Rolling Stones every single night of the trip! A perfect record. Note that the last night they put us to bed at 10:45. I’m leaving that little detail out when bragging to my homies.

We sound like party animals who drink a lot, but that isn’t true. We like FUN and HIGH ENERGY. We tend to laugh more than most couples and I dance- a lot. Rolling Stones was the perfect fit for us and we got to be friends with the band exchanging emails and such.  

Speaking of friends, I’m kinda proud to say that our favorite Rolling Stones waitress invited us out to party with the crew night one in Buenos Aires. Compared to these kids we are grandparent

age (well, we are grandparent age regardless), but she was sure we would fit right in. We declined, those kids should have time away from passengers, but the invitation was sweet and we have exchanged email addresses.

A few photos from our last full day on the Oosterdam. I’ll catch up on debarkation and day one in Buenos Aires later.

January 30th

Two things I’ve learned over the last 50 some cruises spanning nearly 40 years (blah blah blah).

1) be the last to arrive at embarkation 

2) be the last to debark at the end of the cruise.

This strategy worked perfectly yesterday and it’s a good thing because I needed time to dry my eyes after the Captains farewell speech. And wouldn’t you know it, he was right there shaking hands as we walked off the ship. If I wasn’t so happy with my Sherpa ….

Anyway, we were gray 3. Gave us lots of time for breakfast. Our stewards invited us to stay in our room (after they made the bed) until they called our number which was a very nice gesture.

We were called off about 9:45. Little hold up waiting for buses to take us thru the port to the building where our luggage was held. Once through we picked up luggage, ran it thru a detector and crossed the street to the police station entrance where we ordered Uber. It wasn’t the easiest debarkation but it wasn’t hateful either. No line was exceptionally long. Pretty typical process for an industrial port. 

Our uber took us to the Hyatt Park Palace Duhau, which is literally an old palace renovated into a hotel. Because we had checked in with the concierge to introduce ourselves yesterday, our room was ready within 30 minutes of checking in (11:00ish). I asked for a room with a view and they gave us a corner suite on the 17th floor. Score. 

We met with the concierge who made all our reservations for us. This trip was a ton of work in terms of planning and preparation and, to be honest, I ran out of steam and planned nothing for BA.

She recommended we do a boat tour to the town of Tigre tomorrow. She also made reservations for us at a Michelin restaurant down the street. It’s so nice just turning things over to a concierge to make all arrangements. Score.  

When in Argentine, one must eat steak and this was one of the very best steaks I’ve ever had. Sherpa had trout. The restaurant is called Fervor and I would recommend to anyone. Score. 

We also signed up for a private tour of the palace. The concierge walked us thru and gave the history of the building. They also sent up a bottle of wine and basket of macaroons. Score again.  

The band twenty one pilots was staying here last night so that added some extra excitement around the hotel with the street filled with kids peering over the fence hoping to get a glimpse. 

We also had a very good walking tour downtown (ubered there and back). I’m starting to get all my walking tours confused, but she did give some great info about Avita which i found particularly interesting.

Here are some pics of our Palace hotel and my only food porn contribution to this thread-

January 30th

We racked up a couple more walking tours in Buenos Aires. Added in a few museums. This is like my fifth 25K day in a row.  I’m actually getting tired.

I think  Sherpa may have had his fill of both salmon and museum this trip and that’s something I thought I’d never say. 

We have enjoyed Buenos Aires (and I love our super swanky palace hotel) but I’m just not a city girl. Bring back the penguins!!

Next up is a riverboat ride to spend  a day in Tigre. It should be super easy no brainer then it’s off to catch a midnight ride to Miami. The only way I could justify lay flat business class seats for the flight home is to overnight in Miami. Sherpa is still clueless about both the lay flat business seats and the extra night in Miami. Good thing he rolls with surprises.

Some Buenos Aires photos-

January 31st

We spent our last day of this vacation sailing up the Rio De Plata to the town of Tigre. It was an extremely relaxing day and a perfect way to end the trip because this tour required zero brain cells and that’s exactly one more than I have left. 

Tour picked us up at the Hyatt Palace and drove to main port to board a catamaran ferry. Sailed by the Oosterdam and two Costa ships on the way upriver. Waved to all those folks who have been following this Live and wished them an equally spectacular journey. 

The first hour was pretty boring. River is quite turbid so not particularly beautiful. After about an hour we entered the deltas of the town of Tigre. There are 100s of small islands. Many with weekend homes. Obviously no cars, so much like Venice the primary transportation is boat. We saw a lumber delivery and grocery store floating down the river (photos below). 

The town of Tigre is a tourist town complete with the largest amusement park in Argentina. Sadly, no time to ride the roller coaster. This girl still loves a good coaster and as long as I can ride one without snapping a hip I will gleefully. 

Lots of little shops in Tigre. We had a lovely lunch included in the tour. Spent some time in a market. Bussed back to the hotel.  All in all a nice relaxing finish to a pretty darn amazing vacation. 

Whoopsie daisy- I forgot to upload the photos from the tour to Tigre 

Sherpa wasn’t surprised to discover lay flat seats on the leg from Buenos Aires to Mexico City.  He acted as if it’s par for the course now. He’s spoiled- and wrong. 

We got to Buenos Aires 3 hours early per their directions and I wouldn’t recommend any less. We had only 30 minutes in the business class lounge before boarding our 9 hour and 50 minute flight to Mexico City. I slept like a baby. 

Transfer in Mexico City was a complete debacle. I can’t even begin to describe the level of incompetence. This was my first, and hopefully last, time transferring in this airport. Enough said (unless you want the gory details).

Flight from Mexico City to Miami was inhumane considering they took away our lay flat seats. Actually, the seats in business class were quite comfortable. Nineteen hours after we left the Palace in Buenos Aires we were safe on USA soil in Miami. Feels a little like a foreign country which will help us assimilate. We are slowly weening ourselves off the HIA package.  I’m afraid my liver is never going to forgive me for this stint.

We will fly home on Delta. In coach. I couldn’t even get exit rows. My 6’2” Sherpa is about to get slapped back into reality.

If you have any questions I haven’t yet answered, now is the time. Also please repost if I failed to answer along the way. I’ll have lots of time for the next day or so. 

I do have some final thoughts including the great, good, and downright ugly about this trip and I really am going to try to get a blog up and running. It won’t be perfect, but I want to show you the penguin videos which are soooo stinkin cute.  

Last sunset from Hyatt Palace

February 2, 2025

Some final thoughts-

This cruise was exceptional. Truly exceptional, but you folks knew that already. You want the dirt….

Two issues with passengers stand out. First, why can’t people cover their mouth when they cough? It’s disgusting and to stereotype, it seemed most prevalent in men over 75. Seriously gross. And for the love of God- wash your hands people!

Second- I did have words with an elderly man berating one of my favorite baristas. You people probably figured this out by now, but I’m not particularly afraid of conflict and actually called the man out. He was shocked (I tend to think he wasn’t used to a woman standing up to him). We had an exchange of words, and let’s just say I never saw him step foot in the Crows Nest again. The nearby passengers thanked me for speaking up. The crew works so hard and there is no reason to treat them with disrespect. They aren’t your servants no matter how big you think your britches are. 

The only thing I found quite disappointing (that was under HaLs control) was the food quality. There is a significant decline in both quality and diversity when compared to

K’dam just last year. A dramatic decline compared to cruising pre-covid, but we should all expect that.

The Kdam cruise was a legendary cruise so that maybe the reason the food was so good there and lacking on this cruise. There was positively a dramatic change in under a year between the Kdam and Oosterdam. I’ll know more on Feb 15th when I board the Kdam  for a repeat spin on the Legendary voyage to Tahiti. If the food on the Kdam is as poor as the food on the Oosterdam I won’t have to worry about gaining weight. Even the food offered on Carnival last January blew this stuff away. All in all, this was the worst food I have experienced in over 50 cruises spanning nearly 40 years (blah blah blah). There, I said it. 

With that, Sherpa loved the salmon. It’s offered every single day with a new name. Breakfast, lunch, and dinner. He said it all tasted about the same regardless of the name, but it must have been good because that man ate his weight in salmon and shrimp. 

For me, the dinner food was sometimes OK and sometimes yuck.  Breakfast was always good but I found myself going for simple things like a tuna fish sandwich for dinner. We skipped the mdr often because the food just wasn’t up to par and certainly not worth the time it takes to eat there. 

The steak served to me in pinnacle was terrible. HAL should be ashamed. Although, I know others who enjoyed their meals in pinnacle so maybe we just had bad luck—twice.

My ossobucco in Catalonia was very fatty, but the small meat portion in the center was good. 

Overall, food is SUPER subjective and we’ve already established I have the pallet of a toddler. Unlike many on the HAL boards, I don’t cruise to eat and this cruise delivered in so many other areas that I am in no way disappointed. But, if there was anything truly negative about the cruise, for me it was food offerings. 

Sadly, what I lacked in food calories I made up for in alcohol calories. HIA package is dangerous on the waistline. I’m starting the 35 night Kdam cruise a chubby mess but I cruise different when I cruise solo. Between Tai chi, dance class, and the gym I should be able to kick myself back into gear. 

I can’t complain about the activities offered on this cruise because Sherpa and I spent a lot of time just enjoying the moment without running from activity to activitiy. He attended several lectures and thought they were fine. Not great, but plenty good enough to learn a couple things. 

I attended an art class and reestablished the fact that I can’t paint a bookmark. The art director was 10x better than the art director on the Kdam last year and it showed in that her sessions fill very quickly. I have never seen an origami class with a waiting list? Seriously. 

I really was a sloth. I skipped dance class each morning but got my share of dancing in Rolling Stones.

I never did find my tai, or my chi. I did get my zen on in other ways 😉

As mentioned many times, Rolling Stones band single handedly saved our evenings. We weren’t into many of the shows, although the piano player, duel guitarist, and the Motown group that joined in Playa Del Estes were very good. I’m not going to even mention billboard musicians and that should speak volumes. 

Would I do this cruise again? In a New York Minute! Sherpa and I are doing the Galapagos next January or I’d already have it rebooked. I feel so grateful to have experienced Antartica, it alone was worth the price of admission. 

I will post a pdf file with all of my tour information and reviews of each tour specifically once I whip up a quick blog page. I hope to have that completed before I leave for the K’dam on 2/13. 

I also have the cutest videos of penguins to share. For some reason I can’t share videos here on CC.

And of course, I’ll be spilling tea that can’t be spilled here without getting me tossed in time out…….so that should be fun :). 

Thanks to those who were also onboard contributing to this live. Diversity is the spice of life (I’m still not reading a book on Elephant Island) 🤣. Thanks to my many new found friends, I hope to sail with you again. 

Most importantly, a great big thanks to everyone who followed along. Your kind words, likes, and laughing emojis really made my day and gave me the energy to continue. I feel like I’ve made some online friends and, for me, that’s the greatest benefit to any blog.

Until we meet again (probably next week), 

Cheryl (and her Sherpa)

Ps- if you have any questions  I will do my best to answer- pinky swear. 

PSS- just book it.