Golfo Corcovado Channel

There is much unhappiness in the kingdom. Well not really the whole kingdom, just our cabin. And not the whole cabin, just me.

The card in my video camera was full, so yesterday I downloaded all of the film onto my external hard drive. I checked that all the videos were there on the hard drive, and with great confidence I deleted everything on the card.

I spent yesterday afternoon on the arduous task of editing the footage, and was feeling quite pleased with myself. However, just before we went to dinner I noticed that the video of the penguins and glaciers had gone missing. I was most upset, but Brian is very good when I experience technical difficulties, so I knew he would be able to find my penguins again.

He could not. They were nowhere to be found. So an hours’ worth of sleeping penguins was gone. Gone forever. No glaciers in the rain. I could not believe it. I was not happy at all.

Then things came into perspective this morning.

We slept in, and when I awoke I noticed that we weren’t moving. I went onto the balcony to see if we were stopped to admire the view. We were in a beautiful channel with tree-covered islands in the foreground, and barren hills further away. However there was nothing spectacular in sight. I turned on the TV to watch the bridge cam, but nothing stunning there either. Then the Commodore made an announcement that he would be sounding the ship’s whistle to thank the Chilean Naval vessel for assisting us in the medical evacuation, and to say farewell to our departing passengers. Wow, that really made me feel grateful that we were safe and sound, and healthy on the ship, while some unfortunate passenger or passengers were heading into the unknown territory of a foreign medical system. It really does put things into perspective.

Due to our late awakening we missed Maureen Ryan’s talk. Hopefully I will be able to watch it on the TV later today. After breakfast we stopped by to chat with Kim and Deirdre from the Virtuoso Travel Group. Kim told us that although there were only 1700 passengers on board, there were no available cabins. This was because there were so many single passengers on this voyage. That might account for why the ship feels so empty, especially after dinner. Apparently 900 passengers will be disembarking in Valparaiso.

Next we went to the theater to hear Richard Cowley’s talk on “Rivers of Ice and Mountains of Fire”. I love glaciers and volcanoes so had really been looking forward to it. However, the Daily Progamme was wrong, and his talk was actually on “The Devil’s Admiral”, Lord Cochrane. Lord Cochrane was like someone out of one of those historical ship novels Brian enjoys. He led an amazingly colourful life, and was quite a character.

During his noon announcement the Commodore had said that we would be passing by several snow-capped volcanoes on the starboard side. Certainly the passage through the channels, also called the inland sea, has been magnificent, and to have the Andes Mountains in the distance on our right is amazing. We have passed several snow topped conical volcanoes, both dormant and active. None are currently erupting however. I am surprised that they didn’t advertise this in the itinerary; it has been such a wonderful day. Also for those passengers who had been having problems with the rough seas yesterday, the calm water must be a relief for them. There were loads of seals bobbing about in the water, and 2 blue whales were seen from the Bridge, but not by me.

Just as we were about the pass the highest of the volcanoes we went into a fog bank. I though it would pass quickly, but no such luck. Two hours later we were still going through thick fog, foghorn blasting away every 2 minutes. The fog was so dense that you couldn’t even see the ship’s front mast from the Commodore Club. It is so frustrating because we know that there are towering snow capped mountains close by, but we can’t see a thing.

Finally we emerged from the fog, and were once again able to see the magnificent snow capped peaks. This has certainly been one of the most spectacular days of cruising that we had ever enjoyed.

Tonight was another formal night, and the Valentine’s Day Ball. I had bought a bright red dress to wear for the evening, and it was great to see many of the other passengers in red too.

Before dinner we had this segment’s World Cruise cocktail party. It was also the passengers’ opportunity to welcome the Commodore on board. I thanked him for our spectacular day of cruising, and mentioned that I was surprised that it had not been included in our itinerary. He blushed slightly, and told us that it was not actually in the itinerary, but was something he had chosen to do himself, and he hoped that head office would not be too upset by the extra fuel we had consumed. When he made his speech he also mentioned this, and you could see that all of the passengers were appreciative of the change in itinerary.

When the photographers had gone out in the rescue boat to photograph the Pio Xl glacier, they had brought back a lump of glacial ice, and it was in display as you entered the Queens Room.

There were great hors d’oevers and pastries, and another beautiful looking World Cruise cake, but I understand that it was not for eating, just admiring.

Neil Kelly, the entertainment manager, announced that the world cruise concierge, Juliana, would be leaving her position as concierge. She has been promoted to an officer. We all congratulated her, she certainly deserves this promotion. She is so hard working and is always on top of things. She has been able to sort out all the small glitches we have had in a very efficient way. We will miss her.

One of the things I love about formal nights is that it gives people the opportunity to showcase their national costumes. We have our men looking splendid in their kilts. There was a Japanese woman at the party wearing the most beautiful kimono, and two Indian ladies in sparkling red saris. We met up with a lovely couple from Nigeria in their national costume. They looked fabulous, and we took a picture with them.

Then out of the blue a gentleman with a rather snazzy burgundy jacket handed me a fork. I wasn’t quite sure what to do with it. He smiled at me, and gave Brian a button proclaiming that Brian was now a member of the Duckling Club. It was Terry Waite! I had read about him and his Duckling Club in Maggie Thorpe’s book about her world cruise adventures, and seen the You Tube video of her dancing with a plastic duck between her legs, so I was thrilled to meet him in person. I let him know that I had heard about him through Maggie, and he said how much he enjoyed her and her husband, John Thorpe, MBE.

We then headed into dinner, but not before 2 small éclairs had suddenly found themselves on my plate.

As we entered the dining room each lady was handed a long stemmed red rose. Very classy. When we got to our table our waited placed mine in the vase on the table, to sustain it during dinner. Alas that didn’t help. By the end of dinner although the petals were still looking fresh, the leaves had all died and shriveled up. I’m not quite sure how this happened. The roses are very interesting; the stems are totally thorn free. I was trying to work out whether they are born thorn free, sort of a variation on seedless grapes, or whether someone painstakingly pulls all of the thorns off. Anyway, not worrying about getting attacked by the thorns was a definite plus.

We had another great meal; I do love the menus on formal nights. Then as it was the last formal night of the segment there was the inevitable parade of the chefs and napkin waving.

The show tonight was Hollywood Rocks. It was excellent. The Royal Cunard Singers and Dancers really are a very talented group of performers. They sang and danced to music related to movies over the years, including Mamma Mia, so I was in my element. The costumes were beautiful, and I still don’t know how they manage to change so quickly. The whole show was very professional. I do admire them. It was the 3^rd show they had done today (a full rehearsal, the early show, and our one), and they still were bursting with energy.

In the lift going back to our cabin a woman pointed out to me that the leaves on my rose were dead. I absolutely had no idea how to respond to that observation, so I just smiled at her and wished her a good night.