As the Captain had said yesterday, it was a little bumpy overnight last night as we started the Drake Passage crossing to return to Ushuaia. The seas were not terrible, but it was rough enough for our large window to constantly make a rubbing noise, which was a little irritating.
Since we did not have any excursions today, I was able to sleep in until about 7:30 AM, before I woke up, and tried to get the window to stop making noise by lowering it a little and then raising it fully closed. It helped for a while, but the noise came back.
At about 8:00 AM, I got up and showered. Afterwards, I went to the World Cafe for some breakfast. The ship was really moving, people were having difficulty walking without looking like they were drunk, maybe some were…..
After breakfast, I went back to the cabin and Stephanie was awake. She wanted to do a load of dark clothes, so we pulled those together and I took them to the laundromat. Luckily, there was one washer open, but obviously other people had ideas of doing wash today as well.
While the wash was going, we headed up to the World Cafe for Stephanie to have her breakfast, and I had some coffee. It was time for the washer to be unloaded, so we both went back to the laundromat and we had to wait on a dryer to be able to dry our clothes. After about 15 minutes, a dryer became available and we put in our clothes to dry.
Waves Crashing In The Hide
We decided to go to the Hide in the bow of the ship on Deck 1 to see if the waves were crashing against the glass windows. It is supposed to be pretty spectacular if it happens. We sat there for about 45 minutes, and occasionally, the windows would be full of blue water from crashing through the waves. We both tried to capture it on our phones via video. It was difficult because it only happens occasionally when the ship and waves are in the exact right position.
Stephanie headed back to Deck 3 to get our clothes out of the dryer. I headed up a little later to get the GoPro camera to film the waves crashing against the windows, it was easier than using my phone. There is a video of the crashing waves listed under the Video Menu at the top of the blog.
Stephanie worked on uploading a Facebook Post for yesterday while I was in the Hide. She came down in a bit and we headed to the Aquavit Bar for a Bellini and Bloody Caesar. We only had one today because it was already 1:30 PM, and we needed to eat some lunch before it all closed.
Time To Collect The Expedition Boots
As the rooms were cleaned, the Cabin Stewards were placing everyone’s expedition boots out in the hallway for collection, another sign the cruise was coming to an end.
The lunch was really good today, they had a great Weiner Schnitzel and several other items that were tasty. We had some wine with lunch and just sat there for a while enjoying the rough ocean. From there, we headed to the Explorer’s Lounge, and it was almost empty. We did run into Robert, and today was his 65th birthday. Stephanie had bought a postcard earlier as a birthday card and she headed back to the cabin to get it.
When she returned, we got Piro, the bartender there, to sing happy birthday with us to Robert. We were not sure we would see him later, he told us he and his wife Martha have reservations for Manfredi’s tonight for his birthday dinner.
We did not stay much longer there before heading back to the cabin for Stephanie to nap while I worked on the blog posts for yesterday and today. I also downloaded pictures from my cameras, trying to keep them in order by location. We are not posting any pictures to the blog photo albums since the internet is so slow and it would take a long time. The slow internet connection is likely due to the rough seas, but certainly the overcast skies do not help, as well as our position this far south.
Stephanie got up from her nap and showered, While she was getting ready, I headed back to the Hide to see if the seas were as rough as this morning. There was not as many waves breaking as earlier, so I headed back to the room.
We went to the Explorer’s Lounge for a pre-dinner beverage and then headed to the World Cafe for dinner. There have been several Facebook posts for this cruise discussing how good the food is in the World Cafe, which is basically the buffet. However, with the “Grill” station, you can get steaks cooked to order and then there is also the sushi station and the fresh seafood station available. The “buffet” area usually serves the same dishes as they are serving in The Restaurant, but you have the ability to see what you want to eat. Maybe at times it is not as fresh as the food served in The Restaurant, but on these expedition ships, you need reservations to eat there, so it takes the flexibility out of going there when you want.
The Restaurant was serving a “surf and turf” and that was also being served in the World Cafe, but the filet was already cooked. However, we went to the Grill area and had them cook us two filet mignons and two fresh lobster tails to order. They were really good.
Expedition Crew Members in the Explorer’s Lounge
After dinner, we headed back to the Explorer’s Lounge and spent some time visiting with some of the expedition crew who had come up there after a gathering that was held upstairs, they had been singing old sailor songs in The Library Bar. I happened to see one one performance as I was heading to the restroom, it looked like everyone was having fun.
We really enjoyed discussing some aspects of the trip with the few expedition team members that were at the Explorer’s Lounge. We stayed until about 10:30 PM, the bar was closed, and a person came from the Bridge to tell us that the lights were going to be lowered to help their night vision, the bright lights in the bar apparently reflect up to the bridge above off of all of the white painted surfaces outside on the open decks.
When we got back to the room, all of our disembarkation information was on our bed, and it really hit us that tomorrow will be our last full day and night on the ship. There were also some small dessert items in the room which were quite tasty.
We headed to seep at about 11:15 PM, it had been a bumpy day on the ship with the rough seas, but not as bad as it could have been. We were glad that we were not affected. Many people were having issues, and many people were wearing patches for motion sickness. Once again, we will take our “SeaBands” home unused, they have travelled a lot of miles with us, but thankfully, never have been needed.