Back across the Drake Passage (featuring the soaring albatross)

At the time of this writing, we've been back in the States for a week. We're still soaking in what we did, and we needed a little break from posting to start to process everything. Plus, one of us is sick, and the other is nursing a foot with a soft cast. We make quite the pair!

Anyways...

The sail northbound across the Drake passage was rougher than the last time we crossed. But still not bad -- nowhere near what we had prepared for (thankfully). But starting on the evening of Jan 26th, we had two full days before seeing land again.

Fortunately, we chose an expedition with National Geographic -- so we had plenty of experts on board to give educational talks during our time at sea. The daily schedule for those two days looked something like this:

• Please join expedition diver Caitlyn Webster for her talk, Just Krillin'

• Join Captain Martin Graser for his talk, The Building of the National Geographic Resolution. (More awesome than it sounds, as the ship is not your average icebreaker)

• Join naturalist Dennis Cornejo for his talk, Lichen! (More awesome than it sounds, Dennis is hilarious in his delivery)

• Please join naturalist Toby Stephenson for his talk, Evolution of Whales

• Please join our dive team, Anne Hedlund and Caitlyn Webster, for their presentation, Being a Polar Diver

• Please join naturalist Jackie Windh for her talk, The Yagan Canoeing People of the Beagle Channel

That was between the brunches, lunches, afternoon tea, daily happy hour, and dinner (more on the food later, I promise!). All the talks were available to watch in the cabins, so if you were a bit seasick (or, like Beth, just sick with a cold), you could watch everything in bed!

Seabirds (Albatross!) gathered to accompany us for our arrival back to South America on Jan 28th.

In the evening, we arrived off Puerto Williams, where officials came on board to clear us into Chile, marking the beginning of the next stage of our journey – the fjords of Patagonia.

FUN FACT: When you go to Antarctica, you don't get an Antarctica stamp on your passport, -but you get a stamp that you re-entered Chile in Puerto Williams - which is even more south than Ushuaia (southernmost city of the world).