Looking down at my small packet of plain biscuits and litre box (yes box, got a problem) of wine I start to feel like a heroine addict moments before being dragged into a rehab clinic. How am I to survive four days of making idyll chitchat with over 60 strangers, some of them middle-aged for Christ sake, on a solitary box of wine? Fear quickly turns to constructive self analysis: “What the fuck have I done?” I’m sure I read there was a bar on the boat. Shit, shit, shit! Of more pressing concern, although this thought takes some time to wade through the throng of brain cells celebrating the possibility of a reduced alcohol intake for four days, is that in addition to all this food and alcohol each passenger seems to be taking on large quantities of water, enough water to last them for, if I am to guess, four fucking days! Surely there’s water on board. There has to be water on board. What do the navy do? Does each sailor have to bring on their own bottle of Evian – maybe they do. I rush to the waiting room kiosk (not since my father referred to a haphazardly organized pile of wood, mettle and ball bearings as a go-cart has a word been used so loosely) to buy the last 1.25 litre bottle of fizzy water, an act akin to a parachuter tightening the straps on his helmet moments after realizing his parachute is enjoying the free fall from the comfort of a window seat in the plane above.
Tired from the overuse of analogies to illustrate a point, I board the boat. And straight away I am reminded why I hate over prepared travellers. The boat is huge. Part car and cargo ferry, part cruise liner it has everything you need - including a bar with a dance floor (and obligatory disco ball), a huge kitchen and dining room with presumably both food and water, and well equipped sleeping quarters - without being extravagant. Needless to say I shouldn't have worried. After settling into my sleeping quarters, which I am surprised to see includes a window (not something I had bargained on given I had purchased the cheapest ticket available), I adjourn to the dinning room for an introductory briefing from our guide.
Our guide, a native Chilean, swaps between Spanish and English so haphazardly that she manages to confuse each language group in equal measure. It’s like a verbal version of ‘Find a Word’. After explaining what services are available on board, including where you can find an endless supply of cool, fresh, glacial water, she moves onto the weather forecast for the next four days. During the little research I did before buying a ticket I had read a few comments from previous passengers who either loved or loathed the trip. It seemed that the weather was the main factor determining which group you fell into. To their credit my ears took up the challenge of finding the English words amongst a rapid flow of random sound bites and heard that we were to be “having a lot of lucky with the weather over the next few days”.
For me the other factor that determines whether or not you have a good trip is the people and so it was with another healthy dose of ‘lucky’ that I fell in with George, Barney and Beth. George, a softly spoken South African, is in the midst of a six month journey through South America before moving to Hong Kong for work. Barney, a quick witted Welshman who apparently once bored a guy out of fight, is traveling with his wife Beth, who amongst other things speaks Welsh as a first language.
And so the four days pass with an endless supply of interesting conversation from international politics to South America’s obsession with eighties music (a category in which Beth excels). The conversations however are often interrupted by the shear beauty of the landscape that passes before our eyes, sometimes literally metres away, as the boat meanders through a labyrinth of fjords. Like celebrities popping down to the corner store to buy milk, wildlife (one whale, a couple of seals, and an endless variety of birds) make fleeting appearances to the delight of the paparazzi keeping vigil on the upper deck. In between animal appearances there are other sites that are worthy of filling the camera lens: icebergs that have broken off nearby glaciers, cascading waterfalls (is there any other type) and towering mountains. The further south we travel the wilder, and as a consequence, the more stunning the landscape becomes (see pictures below). While our eyes feast on this visual smorgasbord, our stomachs are loaded with three large, passable meals a day, washed down with excellent beers (the bar is stocked with beer from a local micro brew run by German immigrants) and of course my box of wine, which is unhealthily combined with very little exercise.
Getting there: Taken from the bus as it made it's way down from the Chilian side of the Andes.
Leaving port: The tug boat works extra hard due to all the extra food and water brought on board.
We were to be having a lot of lucky with the weather.
A mountain growing out of the sea, or so it looked like after a few beers.
Sunset on the first night.
Settling down to a night of cards and conversation.
It was often difficult to photograph the wildlife as they moved so bloody quickly, rarely giving me time to exit the bar, grab my camera and snap off a shot. Anyway, the photo below is of a humpback whale (or any other animal you'd like to imagine).
Sunset from my cabin.
Navimag's proud history was there for all to see. This boat was operational just last week.
No doubt the dolphins and whales are putting on a real show behind my back.
A cascading waterfall
We stopped at this beautifully located but isolated town for a couple of hours so the locals could pick up supplies.
Locals coming out for supplies: This guy above rowed out for a sack of potatoes, no doubt he had a hankering for bangers and mash.
Iceberg!!! Captain there's an ICEBERG! Turn to the starboard side!!! ICEBERG......Fuck we're close, I don't think we're going to make it! Everyone overboard!!!! And then I turned around.....
The aptly named White Channel is covered in small icebergs that had broken off a nearby glacier.
The Chilean navy sends a reconnaissance team ready to engage at the first sight of an Argentinean flag.
On arrival in Puerto Natales the captain just runs her aground and we depart, many kilos heavier.
More photos at Chile by bus and Chile by boat
