ANTARCTICA- Penguins

The penguins are definitely the star attraction of any Antarctic Cruise and it is easy to spend hours watching and listening to them.     

It was simply entertaining to watch then move, whether it was walking

sliding on their bellies

or jumping

The  most active are the Adelie Penguins and the Chinstrap  Penguins (48 cm/19" in height) The Adelies have black faces and beaks 

                                              

The Chinstrap Penguins have shite faces with a black strip under their chin. 

The Macaroni Penguin stands out with it's funky yellow hair and is slightly shorter at 45cm/18". 

This solo Macaroni has been hanging out every year with a colony of Chinstraps. At one time there were a few Macaroni couples on the island, but in the last several years this guy has been on his own. 

The Gentoo Penguins have orange beaks and grow to 53cm or 21" in height. They were the least active and were mostly sitting on eggs. 

The largest are the Emperor Penguins that were featured in the movie, "March  of the Penguins" 

Although we were unable to visit the Emperor Rookery, we did see a lone male on an ice floe. 

Two others were spotted but dove into the water before we could move in for a closer look. 

This is the season for mating and sitting on eggs.

We still saw many penguins singing for their mates or young penguins singing to attract their first mates. The ability to built a nice nest and having a nice song is what the female penguin look for in her mate. 

There were couples still in the process of building nests 

                                                                      

In the act of coupling.

      

 

And attentively warming the one or two eggs on the nest. 

The males and females take shifts sitting on eggs. When they are not on the eggs they are in the water eating krill and fish.......and getting clean in the water. 

We were not supposed to get any closer than 5 m from the penguins, and our guides enforced this rule rigorously. However, nobody informed the penguins!

             

ANTARCTIC AHOY

We arrived at the airport in El Chalten 1.5 hours before our flight as recommended. We stood forever  in a line that grew ever longer with no sign of any airline staff to check us in. Thirty minutes before our flight we were reconciled to the fact that there must be another Aerolineas Argentina's strike of some description. We were feeling thankful that we have given ourselves two days to arrive in Ushuaia. THEN....suddenly there was some action and movement. We got checked in, on the plane and it actually took off on time. We were very happy to see Ushuaia from the air.

At the port we saw the G Aventures Ship anchored waiting for it's new engine.It is the red ship.

We also saw the St Christopher wreck and hoped that our trip woudl have a happy ending.

One of the things that we did in town was to find parkas to rent. On our original trip, parkas were provided. We found some for US$40 each or at the blue rate US$28 each for the 10 days.

We spent our days in Ushuaia hking. The first day we hiked in Tierra del Fuego National Park

The second day we hiked to the Martial Glacier for views of town.

In one hour we board our ship. We will have no internet for the next 10 days. Steve will try to send out a few SPOT messages but the SPOT has had some issues sending messages. Here is a view of the ship . It is the closest ship to the shore on the left of the dock.

Argentina - Fitz Roy last week, Antartica Tomorrow!

We have had quite a couple of weeks. We started in the town of El Chelten. It is a very amazing little town - it was first constructed in 1985. The water for the town water is pumped straight out of the river. There is no contamination in the river so it still requires no treatment. A local guide told us that before the streets were paved they used to walk around wearing ski goggles to prevent getting sandblasted by the gravel.  A local dude welds together junk to make litter baskets that look like climbers.  

Or Jedi Knights!

There is also a chapel in town that was moved brick by brick from Austria. It is dedicated to the many climbers who have perished in the area. 

The wind is always very strong in Patagonia!

The big attraction is views of Mount Fitz Roy. 

We started a

five day trek with a trip to Laguna Torre, the lake below Cerro Torre. The winds here sometimes knocked us off of our feet! We actually managed to see the top of the peak one day!

There are a lot of amazing hanging glaciers in the Fitz Roy area. 

Because we had so much time, we were able to traverse along the entire Fitz Roy massif. 

When we returned to town, we found out that our Antartic cruise had been cancelled due to an engine failure on the ship. The next 24 hours was a frenzy of work via very slow internet, but we managed to find an alternate voyage - and our new ship has a helicopter!

When we managed to make the last change, we celebrated at a local wine bar. 

Yup, Jackie is in love with Malbec! They also have some mighty fine beer!

Our last days in El Chalten we did an amazing trip to the Glacier Huemel. Because the environs are sowind blasted and arid, there is not a lot of wildlife, and the band that is habitable ecosystem is very thin. 

We went to the glacier on a shuttle, which took us upwind. The winds were so strong on the return that at times we had to use our brakes to keep from going too fast! On one flat stretch, Steve went five minutes without pedalling!

Engines do blow up, apparently

Yesterday afternoon we returned to the cute little mountain town of El Chalten after five days / four nights of back packing around Mount Fitz Roy. 

More on that later. 

We were looking forward to a hot shower, a real bed and a meal that was not pasta. Steve decided to take a quick look at his email when we got in. 

You do NOT ever want to get an email from a travel agent that has "I truly regret to inform you" as part of the title. Apparently, our Antarctic ice breaker / cruise ship blew an engine! Our Antarctic voyage, which we have been thinking about for the last six years, was cancelled. 

The last 24 hours we have both been on our iPads constantly. Internet access here is verrrrrrrrrry slow, and on top of that we found out late on a Friday afternoon,which is a holiday in the USA (their Thanksgiving, a holiday devoted to shopping orgies) where many of the booking agents are located. 

Fortunately, we found an amazing trip with a Dutch company. Their booking agent works from home, and we have been in touch with her constantly over the last 24 hours. Our new tour leaves 3 days earlier ( December 5), and is couple of days shorter than the one that we originally booked. We are getting 1/3 off for booking last minute, and we got the VERY last cabin on the boat. The boat travels to the same remote region of the Antarctic that we wanted to see (the Weddell Sea). The one difference:

This ship carries 

A helicopter!

We get to spend three days flying to remote Emperor Penguin breeding grounds in addition to making many other shore landings via zodiacs. 

In the last 24 hours, we booked accommodation here in El Chalten, evaluated 6 potential new cruises, changed our hotel reservations in El Clafate, got our laundry done, booked our new cruise, dealt with a credit card problem, completed our booking documentation, found a hotel in Ushaia, booked a super cool mountain bike trip for tomorrow and spent an hour on the phone trying to change our El Calafate - Ushaia flights (we are certain that will get resolved on Monday). 

Phew. 

We don't get to do the second planned backpack trip south of the Fitz Roy group, but we are thrilled that we are still going to the Antarctic, particularly since everybody else on our ship is likely scrambling to find alternative voyages as well. The original cruise company does not even know when their ship will be back in service, so future trips may be cancelled as well, which will make other last minute trips very hard to come by. The new trip sounds perfect for us - not quite as luxurious as the other boat (no gym!) but very focused on adventure and exploration in an area that very few ships travel to. 

And they have a HELICOPTER!

We figure we should celebrate tonight!

Argentine - Perito Moreno Glacier

Wow. That is what I kept saying. 

We took a bus from El Calafate and then a boat to see the advancing face of the glacier dump into Lake Argentina. 

There are also boardwalks that were constructed to provide a great view of the other side of the glacier. 

There was lots of action with 50 m high search dropping into the water. Spectacular!

Today we are off to El Chalten for views of Fitz Roy and some back packing. 

South America - Buenos Airies

Without any hesitation, the guy reaches into his desk and passes us a brick of cash an inch thick. 

"You should count it if you want" he says in pretty good english. We figure after trading him 10 US bills for this wad, yup, sure, we will definitely count it, even though it will take quite a while!

Argentina is kind of a first world country, but their economy has been totally messed up by their government. They defaulted on their government bonds twice in the last few years, so their currency is in a free fall. Inflation is very high. The official government rate for currency exchanges is 8 pesos to the U.S. $. Yesterday we traded money on the "blue" (not black - EVERYBODY in the country uses the blue market) for 13 pesos to the USD. We went to one of the shopping districts, haggled with a couple of guys, went to a small office in a strip mall, counted out our US cash (which we have been hoarding) and then the guy dumped a brick of money on his desk.  The biggest bill in Argentina is 100 pesos = $8, so when you change a thousand bucks, you get a wad about an inch thick. Hilarious, but it's saving us a ton of money in Argentina! 

Buenos Airies is a beautiful city. We are here in their spring, so there are flowers everywhere, along with many people out running, cycling or doing a kind of cross exercise thing using little plastic cones on the grass. 

Wine is very good and CHEAP! Almost mandatory to have a little champagne with lunch!

Across the street from our hotel is a cemetery that is hundreds of years old. 

Apparently, Evita Peron is buried here, but we could not find her mausoleum. 

It was super cool to arrange to meet our friends John and Shelley for dinner. They had just come back from an Antarctic ski trip. 

We will be hiking and camping for the next three weeks. We collected our sleeping bags and tent from Argentina post yesterday - we were worried about that they would not hold them, since Canada post told us that it would take 6-8 weeks to deliver them, and they arrived in 6 days. Argentine post was supposed to send them back home after holding them for a month (I.e they should have shipped them back to Canada about 5 weeks ago). Fortunately, they are inefficient, so they were still being held at the post office. By the time we took taxis, stood inLine, got tracking numbers, stood in line, paid import duties, stood in line and had our stuff inspected , it only  took us 5 hours to collect them!