Reflections on the trip to Antarctica

[fbhjr]

We had never been on a cruise before and it is not clear to me how different this one is from the other ones all over the world.
Everyone tells me these "expedition" cruises are very different, and they may be right.

One of the things that surprised me a lot was just how much time we spent waiting for things.
All the passengers were split into 10 groups. We were in group 10 of 10.
A great many things on board were done in group order.
So, for covid testing, getting or returning items, doing paper work, or anything else like that, we were almost always last.
And, that means we were often sitting there waiting for our group to come up.
It started going to the charter plane for the flight to the ship. We were in the last bus to the airport and waited for all the others. I hadn’t know it would be a pattern.
It did mean we missed the drinks and lounge before the flight because by the time we got there they were "We’re running late, go right to the plane!"

The wait was the worst for the first time we went ashore.
The first three had all been cancelled due to the weather.
They were going ahead with the 4th, but warned us that the weather was borderline and they could cancel at any point.

It takes about three hours to go through the whole ship for the shore excursions. And, it is in two big groups. If you’re in the second half, you have to wait for everyone in the first half to go and come back before anyone in the second group goes.
For three hours we waited, watching the weather, sitting in our room right above where everyone got on the boats to shore listening to them cheer for finally getting to go.
Snow storms moved past. Waves got bigger and smaller. Clouds came and went. I was very worried things we get cancelled before our turn rolled around.
It didn’t. We got to go ashore. But, that was a long three hours.

And, the whole ship is dedicated to getting folks to shore and back when it happens. So, there are no talks, the bars and restaurants are closed and nothing else is going on.
You can watch TV. But, that isn’t why I was there.

After that first time, groups 1 & 2 went to the back and we moved up. If we had done all 10 landings that are targeted, we would have gotten our chance to go first by the end.
But, 4 of the 10 were cancelled, so we only made it to the first half by the end. All the other times we were in the second half.

Twice in that we got back so late that we didn’t even get to go to the briefing for the next day’s events as it was held before we got back to the ship.
This made it challenging to plan for the next day as we didn’t get to hear the plan. After the first time it happened they started putting the briefings on the TV channel for the ship. So, the second time we were at least able to see what the plan was.

From talking with others it seems like the number you get is based on when you bought your tickets. And, since our first ship was cancelled two months ago and we had to rebook on this one, we were pretty late. Most of the rest of group 10 also said they had been on the other ship and moved over when it was cancelled.
One of the naturalists said "Ships are never ready on time, I’m not surprised that one got cancelled."
That made me think it might not have been as much of a surprise to the company as it was to me.

Another thing that wore on me was the relentless push to take other cruises. Every day there were at least 2 presentations on other cruises. I got the time of one of the nature talks wrong one day so we did sit through one.
And, don’t get me wrong, they sound fantastic. But, I’d rather we heard more about whales, seals or polar birds than other cruises. And, they did have at least 2 lectures a day on those things too.

It’s good I had 35 years of saying no to alcohol before we got on that ship. Champagne when you get to your cabin. Drinks when you walk into the auditorium. Wine and drinks with every meal. A zodiac handing out champagne as they float you around the coast.
The first few nights the wine waiter was shocked we said no. The first time he really seemed to think it was a joke of some kind.
Even by day 10 they were asking if we were sure.
They want you well lubricated for it. Maybe that would have helped the waiting, but I doubt it.

From talking with others on the ship, it sounds like we didn’t make much use of the butler that was assigned to us.
He did drop off more diet Coke every day. He did take our temperature for the Covid monitoring every day. He got us more masks when we ran out.
But, that’s about it. We never had him bring us food or set us up anything. Others told us they did.
My wife and I aren’t big on folks in our space. So, even the room cleaner we felt bad when she picked up our stuff for us.

The cruise company seemed much more interested in getting us to the ship than getting us home afterwards.
When we were talking a long time to go through all the testing when we arrived in Chile, they sent two folks into the secure part of the airport to find us and make sure we got to the hotel.
When we got to Santiago on the way back they told us on the plane "There will be a cruise company representative in the luggage claim area that will help you get to your next stop."
There was not.
I ended up going to someone from the airport information booth who didn’t speak English, but had Google translate on their phone.
We did finally find a cruise person after we had figured out on our own where to go. And, they only told us "go stand in that line", which wasn’t a huge amount of help as they didn’t even send me to the correct line. (We had upgraded to business class tickets and got to go to the express line.)
If we had done what they told us to do, we would have missed our flight. As it was we only just made it.
So, I’m not impressed on their post cruise help.

I’m told that the best time to see whales and seals is February. It would have been nice to know that as I like them more than penguins. Granted, I didn’t have the extra time of a holiday break then, so probably would have gone now anyhow. But, it still would have been good to know to set expectations a bit better.

I’m told we had much more snow than normal. The places we landed had more than my height of snow, some places double my height. Normally, it is mostly exposed rock.
This impacts the penguins as they like to nest on rocks, not snow.

And, I guess there is a krill shortage right now, which is why there were less whales than normal.

I know you can’t do anything about the weather, how much snow there is or krill.
And they are very, very clear that it is an environment with lots of changes and no predictability.
But, it does sound like we got a worst case combination.
They told us to expect 20-30% of excursions to be cancelled, but for us it was 45%.

I would have been more sad if we had picked the cruise before this one that went out to see the eclipse. It was cloudy for that, so all you saw was it get dark during the day. That one cost 50% more than ours. I would have been very sad to just get darkness on board.

But, we did see fantastic things. The places we went were amazing.
I am very happy I got to walk on Antarctica.
I am very happy I got to see what I got to see.
And, it was a great adventure that I am not sure we’ll ever top.

Comments

[threemeninaboat]

I've known 2 other people that went on the Antarctica cruise. 1 does tons of these types of cruises and his experience was similar.

The other, their ship did not make it to Antarctica :(

[fbhjr]

They didn't get there at all?
That would have made me very, very sad if it happened to us...

[threemeninaboat]

They were crushed. They had saved for over a decade.

[chris_warrior]

omg, that makes me so sad. there really should be _some_ sort of at least partial refund if you don't even get to go ashore _once_.

[chris_warrior]

the waiting might have made me absolutely bats, so it's not just you. some of my friends have done cruises (albeit up to Canada from NYC and down to Caribbean from NYC) and _might_ have mentioned all the alcohol. i bet you're right, and that pleasantly-drunk people wait better. of course, were i them, i'd be more concerned about the not-pleasantly-drunk people.

the mess at the airport in Chile is annoying. getting you home should be part of the service.

but yay getting to see amazing things and yay coming home safe after. <3