Day 25

Friday, February 16th

Crossing the Drake Passage: Day 2

After breakfast this morning, we were given a bonus!  We made good time through the Drake Passage so the Captain got permission from the keeper at the Chilean station to do a ship cruise of the area and so we sailed around Cape Horn!  It is a beautiful sunny day!  Many times it is very windy and there is fog in the area but we were fortunate today.  In the distance you can see the lighthouse, station, and monument that is dedicated to the thousands of sailors lost on more than 800 ships that were wrecked sailing around this landmark!

After our morning out on the decks of the ship, we had several presentations from the expedition team.  Jimmy did a talk about Orca whales.  Then Sam did a presentation on “Southern Ocean Seabirds and Conservation”.  He suggested that we explore the WWF (World Wildlife Fund) website.

Abbey conducted a disembarkation briefing.  We can’t believe that our time together is almost over. 🙁

This afternoon the 16 kayak passengers met with our kayak guides, Tara and Todd for a champagne toast and a kayak slideshow that they put together for us!  It was a nice way to end our paddling time.

During our daily debriefing, Ali, our expedition leader, presented a slideshow that highlighted our daily adventures!  It was so much fun reliving every day of our Epic Antarctica trip.  The pictures that passengers shared to the photo computers on board and pictures that Nicky, our onboard photographer took, we have access to and can download any pictures.  This is great if you didn’t have a camera or had camera difficulties.  Click on this link to see Ali’s final recap:    Epic Antarctica Expedition Leader Final Recap 16 Feb 18  Ali’s visual slideshow ended with Farewell cocktails with the Captain.  He said “you NOW know the difference between an expedition and a river cruise!”

During our farewell dinner all of the kitchen and hotel staff were introduced and dessert was a buffet of amazing chocolate confections!  We wish we had taken pictures of the two tables filled with desserts!  They even had some gluten free brownies, mousse, and chocolate rice krispie treats!  While the desserts were being consumed, Nicky, the ship photographer, put together an awesome movie of our expedition trip. All of us appreciated her hard work!  Tomorrow is our last morning on board the Ocean Adventurer which has been our home for three weeks!