Punta Arenas, Chile

March 13^th, 2024

Much to my dismay, my eye is still not back to normal. It is healing, and I don’t think a visit to the medical center is necessary, but it is still very frustrating. I hate it when there are distractions when I am on holiday.

We have been to Punta Arenas previously, so we thought we would have a leisurely day looking around the city rather than going on a tour.

We had watched the port talk yesterday, and I saw that there was an interesting cemetery there. I love exploring cemeteries so I suggested that we should make that our first stop.

Brian looked at me quizzically and said, “but we have been there”. Well I haven’t so I let him know. He was totally convinced that we had been there, and I was equally convinced that I hadn’t.

He started describing it, and we looked at photos of the cemetery, and sure enough it was just as he described it. This was quite the mystery.

On our previous visit to Punta Arenas I had gone on a day long penguin tour (of course) and Brian had gone on a day long hiking trip in the Andes, not leaving any time for sight-seeing. I distinctly remember getting off the tour bus, going into the gift shop at the pier and buying a little penguin, and then going back on the ship.

Brian suggested that I should consult my blog for that day. Ah ha I knew there was a good reason to keep a blog. Sure enough there was no mention of a cemetery for the day we were in Punta Arenas. I would not have left something like that out. I did not go there.

Still somewhat bewildered we went ashore. At the cruise terminal there is free wifi so it was crowded with folks intently typing away on their phones and iPads.

We had been instructed to bring our customs forms along with us, but no one asked to see them. They did X ray our backpack in search of fruit, and I noticed there were a couple of oranges on top of the X ray machine. Clearly someone failed to understand the instructions that it was forbidden to take food off the ship. Or maybe that was just part of the customs officer’s lunch. They looked like nicer oranges than the ones we have on the ship.

We went in search of a cash machine. That wasn’t difficult. There were about a dozen banks along the main street.

Our next stop was in the main plaza which is a lovely grassy square with tress, statues, and fountains. We meant to come back here to take photos, but our desire to find the fish market and a restaurant led to this being forgotten. The tourist information office is in a kiosk in the square, and the very obliging gentleman there gave us a map, and showed us where to go. It is so much nicer having a real paper map in your hands than squinting at Apple maps on your phone.

The weather was very confusing it was freezing cold in the shade and the wind, but beautifully warm in the sun. I was glad that I was dressed in layers. It reminded me of March weather in England, and that great Charles Dickens quote from Great Expectations: “It was one of those March days when the sun shines hot and the wind blows cold: when it is summer in the light, and winter in the shade”

It is about a 15 minute walk to the cemetery, and we went by some shops with fabulous fabrics and lovely clothes, but I was able to resist the urge to go in.

We passed the huge church of Maria Auxiliadora on our way to the cemetery.

Brian was convinced he had walked along there before, and kept on pointing out landmarks. The only explanation I could think of is that he went to the cemetery in a past life. He poo pooed this theory, but then how else do you explain it? He then went on to point out that he would not have gone to the cemetery by himself, he would only have gone there because I wanted to go, therefore I must have been there as well. I liked this theory, it meant we had also been together in a past life. He gave me a weird look, and the purchased the 5,000 Chilean pesos tickets so we could visit the cemetery.

As cemeteries go, it is quite interesting, but nothing on the scale of Recoleta in Buenos Aires. Still we did spend a long time looking at the mausoleums

and interesting looking graves. It was a good way to spend the morning.

The most impressive mausoleum, which even had its own garden, was that of Sara Baum who was a society lady and philanthropist.

Brian remained convinced that he has been there before, and will look on one of his old external drives to show me the photos. I didn’t like to say that that might not work If the visit was in a past life.

After the cemetery we walked through the center of town to the fish market. There are some really lovely Belle Epoque buildings, and in general the town seemed to be very well cared for, although there were also some graffiti covered abandoned buildings in the center of town as well.

Initially we couldn’t find the fish market, but we did find a restaurant which looked like it might be a fish restaurant. It was 2:45 and the restaurant closed at 3:00. So we thought that we should go there in case all of the restaurants closed at 3:00.

It turned out to be a very local restaurant, no one spoke any English, but my restaurant Spanish came into its own, and we were able to order and consume a very tasty meal.

After lunch we found the fish market but it really wasn’t up to much.

Maybe we were there too late in the day. There was some salmon, but no exotic looking fish. The market seemed to have mostly tacky looking souvenir shops so we didn’t spend too much time there and wandered back to the ship, stopping to take a photograph of the statue of Bernado O’Higgins, one of Chile’s founding fathers.

We stopped by the craft stands next to the cruise terminal. There really was some beautiful stuff there, but we have no room in our suitcases or indeed our home for anything more so I resisted the impulse to buy anything. Although if there had been a hand made woolly hat I may have been forced to take it home with me.

The tender ride, or water shuttle, as they like to call it, was not too bad, and we were treated to a pod of dolphins who decided to swim alongside.

We were due to sail at 7:00 PM, and just as we were bundling up to go out on deck to watch us sail away, the captain made the announcement that we were not in fact going to sail today. The weather ahead was looking horrendous, and it would just not be safe for us to leave. Be that as it may, I was reminded of the quote attributed to John A Shedd :“A ship in a harbour is safe, but that is not what ships are built for”.  Often when we are on Queen Mary2 and she is so stable despite the fact that we are in tremendously adverse conditions, I think about that quote, and those weather conditions are exactly what Queen Mary 2 is built for.

Well probably not so much the Sapphire Princess. I am sure the captain knows what he is doing, and if heading out of our safe anchorage this evening will put us all at risk, I am quite OK with us staying put. My only concern was whether they would lower the tenders again so we could go into town for a steak or crab dinner.

No, the tenders were going to stay firmly attached to the ship, no going ashore. What’s more, because we will not be sailing until 7:00 AM tomorrow, we will miss the Amalia glacier (oh no!), which I think is the most spectacular glacier I have ever seen,  and we would also miss our stop in Puerto Montt, and we will be heading straight to San Antonio.

I was really looking forward to the tour I had set up in Puerto Montt, I immediately sent off an email to Denis Purtov who had arranged the tour to give him the bad news.

When we were getting ready for dinner I closed our bathroom door because that is the only way to access the shelves in the closet. Somehow by closing the door it had locked itself. Now the one tool Brian doesn’t have with him is a screw driver so he had to think of another tool to get the door open. I suggested calling maintenance. My scissors and nail file were locked away in the bathroom, so we had to come up with something else. Eventually Brian got the door open, and we could continue to get ready for dinner, but now we have to be careful not to close the door from the outside again. This is going to be quite a challenge!

Intending to make the most of being in Chile, I went to the Crooners Bar in search of a Pisco Sour. No such luck. It turns out that no bars on the ship do a Pisco Sour. I hope the situation will change before we leave South America.

Tonight we ate dinner in the Savoy restaurant, which I think is my favorite. The menu is the same in all 4 main restaurants, but the décor is different. The Savoy has dark (fake) wood paneling and it reminds me of what I imagine a fancy London Club would be like. Maybe it looks like the Savoy in London.

We had a lovely waiter from Zimbabwe, Farai, and it was great chatting to him. In general the wait staff in the dining rooms are very good, the ones in the buffet aren’t great.

I was still full from our large lunch, so I just ordered soup. However when the dessert menu appeared, I couldn’t resist ordering an ice cream sundae. I had ordered a straightforward sundae, but Farai saw to it that when my sundae appeared it had all sorts of extra chocolate chips and sprinkles, and extra hot fudge sauce. I love it when waiters do things like that!

On our way to the theater after dinner we stopped by to watch the dancing in the atrium. Initially it was line dancing,

But that turned into anything goes dancing.

They do make good use of the atrium for activities, I just don’t see the same thing happening on the Queens. The beautiful flowers on the table would fall over, and the piano may suffer as well.

The magician tonight was good, he didn’t really do any new or amazing tricks, but he had a great presentation style, and judging from the audience response his actions, appealed to the very international crowd in the theater. Not an easy feat.

We are still safely anchored just off Puerto Arenas, so no pitching or rolling tonight. Let’s see what tomorrow brings.