MS National Geographic Explorer
Layover in Ushuaia
Wednesday, January 20, 2010

    The photo for today is an image I took of Ushuaia last night about midnight while the N.G. Explorer was tied up to the dock.

    This was an interesting day. It began early, as usual, and there was a lot of activity onboard. Following breakfast, all the guests (except me, of course) were running around preparing for their departure at 8 am. The crew and staff were running around getting passengers’ bags carted from everyone’s rooms to the vans that would take them to the airport. The bridge crew was busy overseeing the re-provisioning and re-fueling of the ship and coordinating with the port authorities. I was the only one on board with nothing urgent to do. I offered, pleaded actually, to be given a task to perform, but was refused.

    By about 8:15 am, all the other passengers were off the ship and the staff and crew were busy on the “hidden” decks down below and behind the scenes. It was a very eerie situation to have the ship to myself. It was so quiet, empty, and seemingly cavernous – very strange.

    During the day, I was able to review my photos from the expedition so far and make my primary and secondary backup copies. I was allowed to have lunch down in the bowels of the ship in the officers’ mess, slipped in a 45-minute nap, and took a short walk into Ushuaia with Bob Smith. About 4 pm, the luggage for the new guests arrived from the airport and the staff was again running around delivering the bags to each of the cabins so that it would be waiting for the guests when they arrived about an hour later.

    The next eerie sensation came at 5 pm as the new batch of guests arrived. The feeling was “who are these strangers invading my private domain?” As the evening progressed, I met and had short conversations with several of my new fellow travelers, so things should feel more normal by the time we get across the Drake and arrive in Antarctica.

    We are anticipating a rougher trip across the Drake this time, so I’ll get another test of whether I am susceptible to sea sickness or not. So far, I’ve never suffered from motion sickness, a situation that I hope will continue.