Date - 3 December
Weather - Sunny, 13 degrees, 20 knot winds
Seas - Calm
Sunset - 4.44am
Sunrise - 21.48pm
This was our last full day on the ship. Overnight we moved closer to the Beagle Channel towards Tierra Del Fuego, South America. We had survived a calm Drake Passage! Our expedition leader, Solan has renamed the Drake Passage as the Drake Lake! He asked those who wanted high seas and a sense of danger to book another trip as they certainly didn't get it on our expedition! The hotel manager told me that it has been the calmest and quickest trip of his ten trips across the passage.
Our first lecture was a marketing one from Quark and was about their range of trips to the Arctic. The trip to the North Pole on the ship called Icebreaker looked an amazing adventure but the ship had 11 decks under the waterline! Other trips include Svalbard, Norway, East Greenland, West Greenland and the Canadian Arctic. It was all are very tempting.
Our eleven o'clock talk was "What Tomorrow Brings - Disembarkation" and we were given the process of how they were organising the 200 passengers to disembark in Ushuaia at eight o'clock tomorrow morning.
We had a lovely long lunch overlooking the calm sea as we entered the Beagle Channel. It was warm outside and many of us took the opportunity to go out on deck and watch the passing channel scenery as well as watching the Argentinean pilot as he boarded our ship to take the it into Ushuaia.
The ship was twelve hours ahead of schedule due to the excellent weather conditions across the Drake Passage.
We received a certificate during the day which read, "Antarctic Expedition. This certifies that Dianne Taylor and Henk Vullers have completed an expedition to the Falkland Islands, South Georgia, The South Shetland Islands and the Antarctic Peninsula aboard the expedition vessel M/V Ocean Endeavour." It was signed by the Captain Nicolay Tililyuk and the Expedition Leader Solan Jensen.
The final lecture was a sobering one titled "Climate Reality and Our Future". Ninety-seven percent of top climate scientists agree that man-made pollution is warming our climate.
Between the final lecture and the Captain's Farewell Cocktails we repacked our bags for our journey back to Buenos Aires from Ushuaia. The Farewell Cocktails was a great occasion where all the expedition staff were acknowledged as well as the Captain. The Captain had to scoot up to the bridge as the ship was coming into Ushuaia. Ironically, after smooth sailing across the Drake Passage we couldn't berth immediately at Ushuaia as a stiff breeze, choppy seas and light rain came up in the harbour. We had dinner whilst the ship sat in the harbour and waited for things to settle. A double rainbow settled over Ushuaia in the late afternoon sunlight and it was a beautiful sight from the dining room windows. After a couple of hours the ship was able to dock.
The fantastic, final evening's after-dinner activities were a fitting end to a great expedition. The crew showed a video with the major highlights of the expedition. It was a great reminder of what we had seen and done over the last eighteen days. The finalists in the poetry competition also read their expedition poems. Apparently there were a lot of entries and it was good to see a number of Australians in the final six including Chris and Cathy. Chris also gave a wonderful tribute and toast to the crew on behalf of all of us.
Our expedition has been an extraordinary operation on so many levels to keep it operating smoothly for all the passengers. This has included the coordination of the hotel staff, the restaurant and galley staff, the sailors and the expedition staff. Together they have given us an unforgettable experience.
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