Day 1 : Santiago, Chile
We arrive in Santiago this morning. With the soaring Andes as a backdrop, Santiago makes a spectacular and welcoming first impression - as does our hotel, the Hyatt Regency Santiago, located in a gracious residential neighborhood. The morning is free for resting up or seeing the city on your own. Santiago is an intriguing blend of European, Spanish Colonial and innovative modern architecture. It's sun-mellowed facades and stately palms invite walking - one of your options as the morning is all yours, to do with as you wish. After lunch, we'll have the opportunity to see the city on a panormaic tour, including city locales such as the Presidential Palace and the historic cathedral area. We'll we'll head up into the San Cristobal hills for a spectacular city view, sure to excite the photographers in the group. After an interesting afternoon in Santiago, we return to the Hyatt for a relaxing dinner.
Day 2 : Santiago/Ushuaia/Embark Ship
The morning's flight to Ushuaia offers some fascinating and rare views along the way - as we fly over the vividly rugged terrain of Patagonia before landing in Ushuaia, Argentina, the southernmost city in the world. This windy and desolate outpost is awe inspiring in its starkness. As our luggage is transferred to Endeavour, we'll head to nearby El Restaurante Relincho, for a 3-course lunch, including Argentina's traditional barbecue.
Tierra Del Fuego National Park at Lapataia Bay is our afternoon destination. Bordering the Beagle Channel, it is home to a whole array of plants, birds and animals that are rarely seen anywhere else in the world, including the Tierra del Fuego red fox and the chungungo otter. After a walk around this interesting park, you'll return to town and board the MS Endeavour, to get acquainted with your seafaring home for the next ten days. As you step aboard, surrounded by Ushuaia's soaring mountains, you'll be aware, in an exciting way, of the fact that you're a long way from home. Settle into the ship and enjoy your first dinner onboard. It's time to start steaming toward Antarctica.
Day 3 : Drake Passage/At Sea
We leave Ushuaia with Argentina on our port and Chile on our starboard and head to the Drake Passage. Lying between Cape Horn and the Antarctic Peninsula, the Drake holds a unique place in maritime lore and legend. It's the one place on our expedition where we might encounter rough seas, and where time on the Bridge watching our skilled Captain and officers navigate these historic waters is definitely interesting. Sometimes misty and gray, other times calm and clear, crossing the legendary Drake Passage is unforgettable - a milestone in any adventurer's personal travel history.
Endeavour's library, gym and e-mail station will be welcoming haunts. And watching for seabirds on deck in the fresh air, socializing in the Lounge, as well as attending lecturers given by the many naturalists onboard, are among the many opportunities that make this otherwise passive time at sea into an active and engaging preparation for the adventure ahead.
Days 4-5 : Falkland Islands
Our first landing in the Falkland Islands is West Point Island, which lies off the most northwestern point of the mainland. Formerly known as Albatross Island, West Point is home to one of the most spectacular bird colonies in the Falklands. A dramatic, cliff-edged promontory called Devil's Nose shelters nesting black-browed albatrosses and the stout, little rockhopper penguins. This otherworldly setting of 400-million-year-old sandstone sculpted by wind and sea looks like frozen ocean waves of rock. Even though it's just a two-mile hike uphill to view the birds, a Land Rover shuttle is available, compliments of Roddy and Lily Naier, the generous owners of the island. At noon, we'll pull anchor and move on to New Island to get a look at another dramatic colony of birds. After lunch, we'll explore this beautiful sanctuary by Zodiac. Get a look at one of the rarest birds of prey on earth, the indigenous Striated Cacacaras. They often stand guard as we disembark our Zodiac. Known as "Johny Rooks" by the islanders, they are extremely intelligent and keenly observant.
Day 6 : Port Stanley
See the colorful houses of Port Stanley. Visit the Britannia House Museum and the Cathedral.
Days 7-8 : At Sea
Endeavour's library, gym and e-mail station will be welcoming haunts. And watching for seabirds on deck in the fresh air, socializing in the Lounge, as well as attending lecturers given by the many naturalists onboard, are among the many opportunities that make this otherwise passive time at sea into an active and engaging preparation for the adventure ahead.
Days 9-12 : South Georgia
We're also at the famed location where Ernest Shackleton landed in 1917 after the most famous navigational feat in history - an 800-mile open ocean crossing from Elephant Island in a mere 22-foot boat. Seeking help for his stranded crew, he and two of his men traversed the entire mountain range of South Georgia in just 36 hours, reaching the whaling station on the other side of the island. He ultimately saved all 22 men he'd left on Elephant Island.
Famous footsteps are part of the appeal. Teeming wildlife and breathtaking scenery are another part. Imagine approaching the shoreline in a Zodiac, coming face-to-face with hundreds upon hundreds of young Antarctic fur seals. These curious, fun-loving animals will literally crawl over one another as they swim out to the boats to get a look at their human visitors. At St. Andrew's Bay, you may come upon 100,000 king penguins with their yellow-crested heads. Picture white, black, steel blue and orange bodies covering every inch of an enormous beach. Some of our guests find that the only way to photograph the enormity of this scene is to hike up onto a hill, looking down on the multitude of penguins. Look closely for reindeer or two. Sometimes they graze among the penguins. Dramatic skies abound on this island rife with wildlife and rich in seafaring history.
Days 13-14 : At Sea
After four days in South Georgia, the days at sea are relaxing. Naturalist presentations on whales and geology are interspersed with hours of watching the ocean and the changing skies. Seabirds continually thread their way above us. Our crew and expedition leaders know this area better than anyone since they are true experts in travel through this region. Eager to share their knowledge and enthusiasm, the days at sea are a perfect time to ask them about anything you'd like to know. Our naturalists and undersea specialists are here to explain, guide or enlighten every step of the way.
Day 15 : South Orkney Island
Since they're so isolated and often icebound, the South Orkneys are rarely visited. As we enter the vicinity, the shapes and shades of ice are endless. Although it is such a cold and frozen world, the wildlife is surprisingly abundant. Penguins float by on icebergs. Leopard seals pass by, as well. Snow petrels and pintado petrels make the skies come alive as they weave through the sky, seemingly curious about our shipboard activities. Sea birds such as shethbills fly alongside our ship for extended periods of time, allowing us to get a special, longer view. While we're out exploring on the Zodiacs, sea birds actually land on our boats, finally coming to rest on the floating ice. The knowledge of our leaders make these island once known as the "Inaccessible Islands" accessible to us. In their capable hands, we are able to experience South Orkney's remote and rugged beauty.
Day 16 : At Sea
Days 17-20 : Antarctica
With nearly 24 hours of daylight at this time of year, we are able to turn our six days into what feels like much more, as we explore the Antarctic Peninsula and the surrounding islands. And what a light it is - ranging from brilliantly blue-skied to the famous "golden hour" light prized by photographers, and the shades of gray, from pearly to pewter, you'll only ever see here in Antarctica.
Our expedition style of travel means that our schedule is completely flexible. Out there, alone, amid the splendor of the ice, surrounded by penguins and distant black snow-capped mountains, our ship will freely roam in the most spectacular, magnificently uncluttered environment on earth. Our expedition team is a veteran one, and their knowledge of Antarctica's waters enables us to take advantage of prime conditions as we find them.- perhaps to explore an inlet this year that was blocked by ice last season, or drop kayaks in a small cove for a more personal, "penguin level" expedition. Sometimes we're even able to take you places where no one has ever been before - places for which our Captain and Ice Master might make a "mud map" that will eventually be published by maritime authorities as a guide for other mariners. We may also be able to enter Lindblad Cove, named in memory of Lars-Eric Lindblad, a pioneer in Antarctic tourism, depending on where the ice is this season.
We'll see the famous Antarctica sights- sailing at a majestic pace through the incomparable Lemaire Channel, also known as Iceberg Alley, where bergs of such beauty and scale drift by that a cathedral-like hush falls over everyone as we watch from the deck. Cruising through the bergy bits in Zodiacs to make landfall on Deception Island, where we'll walk along the beach, in the shadow of high black hills, through the spectral ruins of an abandoned whaling factory which once employed 100 men in the days when whale hunting was an industry. And visiting such high points in the history of Antarctic exploration as Elephant Island, a name known to anyone familiar with the story of Ernest Shackleton, the wreck of his expedition ship Endurance, and his legendary feat - bringing every member of his crew safely back home after a two-year ordeal.
As we voyage, we'll see all the creatures that inhabit this austral world. Seabirds of all stripes - from pintado petrels to albatross with their magnificent wing-spans. We may see orcas and minke whales, Weddell seals and fearsome leopard seals, that prey on penguins. And we will definitely see what so many yearn to -penguins. We'll see Gentoos, Adelies and Chinstraps in unimaginably large numbers, visiting their colonies and observing their antic hunting, gathering and parenting behavior first-hand - and up-close.
Our undersea specialist captures amazing images with a camera or video microscope. She may record the sounds of marine mammals with a hydrophone or use our ROV (an underwater camera in a metal cage piloted from the surface) to get a close up look at places human divers could never go - such as under an iceberg. The seas surrounding South Georgia Island stay just at or just below freezing. As we move further into this area, we're able to have a look at the mostly unfamiliar creatures living in these seas such as giant isopods (one of our crew described them as "woodlice on steroids") crawling on 14 legs over red algae. We view these forays on the TV monitors in the lounge, bringing the undersea world as much to the forefront as the world outside our own personal cameras.
Days 21-22 : At Sea
Day 23 : Disembark in Ushuaia/Santiago/Return Home
Disembark the Endeavour in Ushuaia for your flight to Santiago. The steps you are retracing look familiar, but feel entirely different coming from a land where penguins number in the tens of thousands and the sun shines 24 hours a day. In Santiago, you'll connect with your flight home.
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