CHILEAN FJORDS & DUTCH LUNCH

How better to enjoy the beauty of the mountains and glaciers of the Chilean Fjords than with a glass of wine on our verandah?! Our weather has been amazing because most of the rainy, gloomy days are when we're at sea. The first of our two days cruising the fjords was overcast and showery, but the next day was beautiful. We saw isolated homes with large landing rafts from time to time -- the only way to get to them was by boat or plane -- some of them might have been bed and breakfast hideaways.

An interesting thing happened on the second beautiful day ... we had to stop the ship because hundreds of tiny krill and shrimp had clogged the filters, propellers, air conditioning systems and motors of the ship!! The captain later told us that they collected over 5 buckets of these tiny fish. They were very plentiful and whales and other fish feed on them. The Chilean pilot on board contacted the local fishermen to guide us to an area where there were no krill so that we could flush out all of the systems. Our crew worked from 1 a.m. until 6 p.m. to finish this task! Happily we were able to enjoy the sunshine as we floated leisurely while the crew worked frantically. We could not have continued into the channel and on to Puerto Montt without doing this clean up. We occasionally saw the spouts of feeding whales and the sun glistening off of their backs as they rose to start a new dive.

We were treated to a special Dutch Lunch buffet -- excellent dishes followed by wonderful desserts. This is the life!

Chile is the longest and narrowest country in the world, and has a spectacular combination of landscapes. The country is rich in minerals, along with oil and natural gas. The central region is filled with orchards, vineyards, wheat fields and lovely green pastures where cattle and sheep are raised. Chilean wines are considered among the best in the world. The Andes mountains mark a fault in the earth's crust which causes frequent volcanic eruptions and earthquakes. We witnessed some of the devastation of the results of some of these earthquakes.

After 2 days resting at sea, we were ready for a new adventure in Puerto Montt.