Anderson South American Adventure Day 11? - Cruising the Chilean Fjords "That Sure does not Look Like a Fjord" March 14, 2020

Last night I got all of my camera equipment ready to use so that I could catch the sunrise on the fjords. Rob woke up early and it was still pretty early and dark. I figured that I could get dressed, have a quick breakfast and head out for taking pictures. Then I hear Rob go "Oh no." There was a note under the door from the captain. Never the way to start the day. The Chilean government had closed their ports to cruise ships as of 8:00 am this morning so we turned around and headed back to Punta Arenas arriving at 2:30 am. We are not at the dock. OK, announcement to follow. We are back in Punta Arenas, maybe I can get to that yarn store today. The captain announced later that the Chilean government shut the ports to cruise ships as of midnight. Nice, change the rules. They were negotiating with the government to allow us to dock. This was where our cruise would end, not Santiago. Oh, it must be a lot of fun to find flights out of here. If you booked your flight through Holland America they will re book for you. If you booked on your own, you are on your own. Save your receipts they will reimburse you minus the cost of your original flight. We had flights for $88.00. Rob can find cheap flights. We have free wifi, but we do not know for sure when we will be able to take off. We carried on like normal, but I started to pack a little. Fold the dirty clothes and pack up the photography equipment. We had a Chilean Naval ship guarding us all day. At least after a while they no longer had the guns aimed at us. We went to dinner as normal and had a couple with a friend eat with us. The man talked to us a lot. The two women spoke softly to each other. Just strange. Then one woman took an hour to eat her entree. They kept trying to take her plate. I almost excused ourselves and went upstairs for dessert, but Rob wanted creme brule so we stayed. We had paperwork waiting for us. After everyone on board passed a health check we would be allowed at the dock. We were advised to not book a flight before 1:00 on Monday. Rob got right on the computer and found our flight, it only took two hours to find it and the price went up $250 while this was going on. We will fly out Tuesday night from Punta Arenas to Santiago, to Panama City to Orlando to Cincinnati. It will only take 27.5 hours. I know that sounds bad but we found flights up to 50 hours. A side note. The first day on the cruise I saw someone walking toward me and could have sworn that it was Jason. Here is his picture. Stay tuned as the story changes.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Anderson South America Misadventure Day 27 - In the Caribbean "Plague Ship of the Caribbean" March 30, 2020

We spent a good portion of the night in our transit of the Panama Canal. They had really bright lights shining which I could see under our curtains. I would move the curtains because I wanted to see what was going on. The bright lights would hit Rob in the face, wake him up and he would yell at me. I could hear machinery going and people yelling and there were lights. So I would move the curtain again and Rob would yell again. It was a long night. Then I could feel the ship moving and I knew that we had cleared the canal. That was a big relief. When we hit the open water and the ship started to rock something started to make a knocking sound. Rob got up to figure it out. One of the bottles of wine that we got over a week ago was in the cabinet. Since Rob made me get rid of my water bottle raft supplies the wine bottle was banging around. See, he should have let me keep them. We had the alarm set to wake us up early so that we could do a live spot on Good Morning America. We got dresse...
Read more

Anderson South American Misadventure Day 20 - "Day Two of Confinement and We are Both Still Alive." March 23, 2020

We slept late this morning. I mean why would we get up early? We have nowhere to go. We got up and got ready for our day. We got a schedule of events for the day. Well, we got the schedule for the meals and for events that they would be showing on a channel of the TV. We get to play trivia twice a day. I have a shot that I need to take once a week. It is kept in the refrigerator in the Medical Center. On at sea days the Medical Center opens at 3:00. We were confined to our cabin at 2:15. I called the front desk to explain that I needed this shot, I take it every Sunday. No particular time but sometime on Sunday. By 10:00 I gave up on waiting for it. I called the front desk again at 9:00 this morning to ask for me shot. They transferred me to the Medical Center. The person who answered the phone had to ask what to do. They told him to just bring it to my door. He said that he would be here soon. OK, I am a day late but it is not a huge problem. I called Donna to find out when they got...
Read more

Message to Florida Officials March 30, 2020

To all of my Florida friends. Please use this script to contact your elected officials. We need to be able to disembark. There are sick people on this ship, they need proper medical care. Script for phone calls or emails to elected officials in Florida: As a resident of (city/Florida/the USA), I am (writing/calling) you to voice my support for the docking of the Holland America MS Zaandam in Fort Lauderdale later this week. The ship has over 300 American Citizens on board, none of whom have been on land since March 14, and they need our support now more than ever. Four people have lost their lives because countries along their route turned them away and denied them the medical care they desperately needed. One of those people is an American citizen. Now that the ship has crossed the Panama Canal, we need your help more than ever. We appeal to you to let our ship dock in Port Everglades. The healthy can undergo the necessary screenings and begin self-quarantine. The sick can have acce...
Read more