I am sailing...
I'd like to say that the day of my departure on the Navimag ferry from Puerto Montt to Puerto Natales dawned bright and sunny, but in truth, I'm not convinced it dawned at all! I was woken by the rain pounding on my bedroom window and Carolina's (my host's) face when I answered her question ¿Donde vas? with 'Hoy voy a ir de Puerto Montt a Puerto Natales en Navimag' was a picture! Both of us looked out the window and burst out laughing! The beautiful views of the previous evening had been obliterated by the clouds and rain...! It didn't bode well for my trip!
However, we all know that a little bit (lot) of rain doesn't generally stop me and today was no exception so I duly checked in at the Holiday Inn Express as required and headed to the supermarket for supplies as we weren't boarding for another couple of hours. Now when I say supplies I don't mean food per se. The boat was fully catered (and the food turned out to be pretty damn delicious!). By supplies I mean ginger biscuits, for their anti-emetic qualities to augment those of my Kwells (plan A), and alcohol gel and bin bags should plan B be required (we'd been warned the open ocean part of the trip could be choppy!). I failed dramatically to find ginger in any form so opted for plain crackers should recuperation and bland food be needed!
Boarding initially involved a bus ride to the Navimag loading dock and we were all on board with our stuff stowed in our cabins by 3.30pm-ish. As the boat wasn't fully booked, I only had 2 cabin mates, Lucy and Kerry. Kerry and I got on like a house on fire, she is Australian and took early retirement and having traveled lots had some really interesting stories to tell, just a really lovely lady. Lucy is Canadian and on a last big solo trip before her husband retires and she starts holidaying with him instead!!
Navimag is a cargo ship whose primary purpose is most definitely shipping goods. As passengers we provide additional income and so are fully aware that this is not in any way, shape or form a cruise. Meaning we followed the schedule of the goods being loaded, and not the other way round!
Despite expecting to depart at 4pm, the boat was finally fully loaded and left dock around 6.30pm and whilst we were waiting we went in for our introduction to the onboard team talk and safety video before heading into dinner. Kerry and I soon became friends with Sarah from Boston, Heath from Maine and Johnson from Canada and the 5 of us often sat together for meals. It was a fab group of people on board though and everyone was super friendly!
'So where are the pictures?' I hear you cry, because let's face it, I had promised you some corkers!
Well, I woke up early that first morning and was treated to unbelievable scenery and a stunning sunrise!
It was the perfect way to start the day!
After breakfast, we had a little time for scenery spotting
Before a yoga class with Cristian (Mum and Joanne I have so much respect for you now, it was hard!) and this was followed by the first of a series of talks on Patagonian fauna, flora and Torres Del Paine National Park by Percy, our onboard naturalist. He was amazing, so knowledgable and enthusiastic about his subject! And of course we took every opportunity to be either outside or on the bridge
during a perfect day weather wise to check out the scenery!
I am no wildlife photographer so I don't have many pictures of the birds and animals we saw so you'll have to take my word for it that we saw sea lions during sunrise then dolphins late afternoon and many different birds (which I should know after Percy's talk but don't!). Rather than dolphins I took pictures of the photographers!
Although I did get some penguins!
Albeit a bit far away (this was max zoom!)
That evening was movie night and we watched 'Violetta' the biography of Violetta Parra, and thoroughly depressing it was too! This was also due to be our choppy evening but those of us who wanted them were given travel sickness tablets and luckily had a great night's sleep, no doubt assisted by the drugs and the rocking which really wasn't very bad at all!
The following day the weather wasn't so great and so no beautiful sunrise but we did have another of Percy's fab talks, followed by yoga for the keen people (not me I'm afraid!).
That day we passed the Capitan Loenides, a boat that the captain was trying to sink for insurance reasons by hitting the only rock in a channel otherwise around 2000m deep with no rocks but managed to run aground on them instead. D'oh!
They obviously built them to last in those days as the boat has been there since 1963!
One really cool sight was where salty and fresh water met each other and there was a really obvious meeting point with green water on one side and blue on the other! (Well as green as it gets when it's dull!).
That afternoon we stopped off at Puerto Eden, a tiny community in Patagonia
Here we dropped off people and supplies and picked up people heading to Puerto Natales. It took some tricky manoeuvring to make it in and out!!
Continuing south we passed through some beautiful channels with stunning landscapes and waterfalls
That afternoon we saw minke whales! Not the whole whale, but it's water spray and a big chunk of its body and tail fin. It was so special. We'd seen spray the day before but no bodies!
In the evening we had another talk from Percy and the movies that night were David Attenborough's 'Mammals' and 'Fish' although being so tired I only saw the first one!
We woke up the next morning to the most perfect weather and stunning landscapes
Sunrise
And during our passage through Channel Inglés, one of the narrowest in the region
This photo gives you some idea how close to rock we were!
The most perfect part of that day was seeing a condor. I was hoping to see one of these more than anything else and so I was one happy girl when that happened!
But again, the scenery, wow!
And so with such perfect conditions we found ourselves arriving in Puerto Natales
Pretty much on time. This was such a wonderful few days meeting great people
On a very reliable boat!
I'm so thankful to Haden and Amelia who I met in Pucón and who told me about this ferry as I wouldn't have even contemplated doing this - let's face it, I didn't even know about it before then! So it just goes to show that my very dear friend Mary Sweeney (whom many of you will remember sadly died last year) was right when she used to say 'it's good to talk!'
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