Embry’s mother, Louise Martin, loved to travel. When she was a little older than Embry is now, she made one of her last excursions to Rio and then to Iguassu Falls, the massive waterfall several hundred miles south of Rio. Unlike our experience in Rio, the weather there for her was perfect. The falls, however, were totally fogged in, which it turns out is not all that unusual since they are located in the rainforest, where Brazil, Argentina, and Paraguay all come together. In any event in honor of her mother, Embry was determined to visit these famous falls, which her  mother could only hear and not see. They are listed among the seven or eight  natural wonders of the world. So she had put it on our itinerary and had booked us into the national park hotel on the Brazilian side of the falls.

Now if you have been following my blog you will recall that Embry was brought up a Presbyterian and I, an Episcopalian. There is a big difference between the values, life styles, and world views of the members of the two denominations. Presbyterians always go for the cheapest option or the best deal even though they can afford much more. Episcopalians always go first class even though we can’t afford it. That is why I assumed that the national park hotel Embry had booked must be like one of our modest, rustic, national park hotels in the U.S.  No problem for me, however, since I have made the necessary adjustments in expectations when Embry books a hotel or an Airbnb.  I was resigned to toughing  it out and figured if the falls were half as impressive as Embry thought they must be, it would be worth suffering through meager accommodations.

The tip off for me should have been Embry’s off handed comment, “Oh, by the way, you are paying for this one.”

Our plane landed at a one-horse airport that was  at the edge of the rainforest. We were easily able to get a cab, which took us along a two-lane road for maybe five miles through the sweltering tropics, past a few junky-looking hotels and tourist shops and deposited us at the gate to the national park. Not knowing what to do next, we wandered over to the small office where we were greeted warmly by the attendant, who said something like, “Oh, you are the Howells. The van is already here and will take you to the hotel.” We piled in with five or six other passengers and began our half-hour ride through the three-level rain forest on a straight, two-lane road with few signs that humans had ever ventured here.

Well….

 The forest suddenly opened up to the grounds of the hotel. Perched alongside a steep bluff providing breathtaking views of what certainly must  be the widest water fall in the world, the pink,  Colonial-style, Belmond des Cataratas Hotel was about as far removed from a rustic national or state park lodge as you can get. It was as if someone had picked up the Greenbrier or the Homestead resort hotel, shrunk it a bit, and dropped it down in the middle of a vast three-layer rain forest, next to one of the most impressive natural wonders on the planet.

The hotel was built in the 1950s though with its colonial style it seemed much older; and it was every bit as elegant and tasteful as the Greenbrier or Homestead. There was no golf course, but everything else was there—the understated elegance, the manicured grounds, the large pool, the fitness center, tennis and volleyball courts, billiard room, stunning dining venues, paneled bar room, verandas providing glimpses of the falls, and , of course, the gracious and attentive service. It was the only hotel that I have ever stayed in where the attendant at the check-in desk insists on giving you a personal tour of the hotel before escorting you to your room. I handed her my credit card, and being the Episcopalian that I am, never once looked at the bill. I have no idea what our 24 hours there actually cost. Whatever it was, it was worth it.

Now you may think that describing the hotel before describing Iguassu Falls is putting the cart before the horse. You are correct except you must understand that it is impossible to do the falls justice either in writing or photography. The falls are not as high as Niagara Falls but much wider, so wide that it is not possible to see the entire falls at one time. Mist rises up from the bottom, and rainbows appear and disappear depending on how much mist is rising and the angle of the sun. About a mile downstream below the falls there is a large Sheraton Resort Hotel on the Argentine side; but other than that, there is no visible sign of human habitation, a far cry from the commercialism around Niagara Falls, most of it hideous. Since the only place to stay in the park on the Brazilian side is the Cataratas Hotel (which though it appears much larger has only about 200 rooms), it is like you have these falls to yourself.  Buses, however, do bring in other visitors, who are staying at the mostly junky hotels outside the entrance to the park. The afternoon of our arrival when we viewed the falls from the main viewing areas outside the hotel, there were no more than 20 or 30 people around; and the next morning when we got up around seven and made the two-mile, round-trip hike to the base of the falls, we saw only two people going down and three coming back up.

So, yes, Iguassu  Falls gets my vote as one of the top wonders of the world and deserves its place. The hotel is certainly among the top five I have ever stayed in. Maybe not Shangri-La but close to it. It was certainly worth the diversion en route to Buenos Aires, our final stop before heading home.

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If Rio is not located in the most beautiful setting in the world, I do not know what is. You  probably have seen the photos of the harbor, Sugar Loaf Mountain, the huge statue of Christ the Redeemer atop another mountain, and the long, wide Copa Cabana Beach. You may have seen  video clips showing Rio’s famous Carnival, which happens every year  before Lent. There is simply no city like it, in fact nothing that comes close.

But do not let the natural beauty of the steep, luxuriant mountains and sheer cliffs, rising about white sandy beaches and luxury apartments and pricey hotels fool you. All is not perfect in Paradise. It never has been.

The day we arrived we took a cab from the port to our hotel—about a 40-minute ride. The hotel was  located on the beach in Ipanema, a beautiful beach about two miles long just south of  the famous Copa Cabana Beach on the other side of a steep hill, which separates the two beaches. Ipanema is a fairly large, upscale neighborhood with lots of restaurants, fancy shops, bars and cafes. Most high rise apartments and residential buildings are surrounded by gated fences, some with barbed wire. Our hotel, the Sol Ipanema, was small and intimate (only 90 rooms), very European, sleek and minimalist. 

To get to the hotel from the port, our driver took us through a  whole bunch of neighborhoods which were anything but upscale—trash on the streets, graffiti covering the street-level walls of most buildings, many depilated. It was our  introduction to a city which is a showcase for the vast disparities between the haves and the have-nots, the rich and the poor, those with and those  without.

The highlight of our three days in Rio was a half day tour of one of the favelas. That is the word Brazilians  use to describe what  in the U.S. we call slums. Our guide was Chiago, a 38-year old, very sharp guy with a bachelor’s in finance and an MBA, whose pervious job was representing Brazilian companies in China. Two years ago the Brazilian economy  went into decline, and here he is now doing tours of favelas. He took us and nine other tourists to two favelas. The first  was   the largest and oldest of the more than one thousand communities like this in the city.  Over one million people live in these communities. The first favela  was started in the early Twentieth Century and  has an estimated population now of over 120,000. The second was much smaller, around 2,500 people, and somewhat poorer but was getting more attention from the government. Both communities were located on steep hills and within a stone’s throw of very wealthy, gated communities. The difference between the upscale communities and the favelas could not have been starker. Adjacent to the clean streets of the upscale neighborhoods, in the favelas you find trash in the streets, graffiti, jury-rigged electrical wiring around utility poles, and make-shift housing with units stacked on top of each other. 

I had two conflicting reactions.  The first was the obvious: Why is the world this way and what is wrong with this picture. The second, however, was more positive. Embry and I have been to “informal settlements” like these in Peru, India, and Africa, which I recall being more squalid and desperate. I found myself actually being quite impressed with the vitality and the human spirit of the people who live here. And there has been progress. Now most favelas have water and sewer and electricity. The first favela now has public transportation and at least limited police protection. These are relatively new and happened just before the Olympic Games. Most adults according to our guide have jobs, albeit low paying ones and commerce has flourished inside many favelas. We saw all kinds of shops, bars and  cafes, even a bank. Crime and violence remain problems, however, and Chiago admitted that most favelas remain off limits to tourists for safety reasons.  The Rio favelas we visited  represent the tenacity of the human spirit and the human will to survive.

Our guide went to some lengths to try to explain the favelas, beginning with the legacy of slavery and dominance by Europeans for hundreds  of years. For the past half century he places blame mainly on corrupt politicians, especially the military and right wing dictators who tried and often succeeded in rolling back the reforms made under more progressive governments. Progressives in those days were Leftists and tended to be Socialists. Both of his parents had been jailed during the right wing military junta during the 1960s and 1970s. These governments in his view were controlled by thugs. They also were aided by the U.S. during the Cold War period because they were anti Communist. 

 Chiago believes that the move toward repression  is happening  again. In his view Brazil has a corrupt, right wing, strong man leader who is  fiercely anti immigrant, homophobic, and racist and is hell bent on developing the rain forest. But he has a strong base of support among many in the working class. 

Any of this sound familiar? One could make a  case  that the similarities between the U.S. and Brazil are a lot greater than you might think.

The only disappointment for us in Rio was the foggy weather, which persisted until we departed on Thursday, November 21, keeping us from seeing the tops of the mountains and the soul of Rio—Sugar Loaf and Christ The Redeemer. Fortunately we had gotten a peak on the ship as we entered the harbor. We spent most of our time walking the neighborhoods and the two famous breaches, Copa Cabana and Ipanema, which were packed with people, mainly locals, who were on holiday our last day there. 

We also caught a little of the impeachment  hearings. It now appears that the House will surely impeach but that the Senate will not convict. Learning about  the stories of the dictatorships in Latin America, most of which involved curtailment of the press and free speech and jailing dissenters, I suppose we should feel fortunate that Trump has not done more damage than he already has. If he gets another shot  at being president as appears  possible right now—and perhaps even probable given the support of his base and the lack of a strong Democrat opponent–who knows where we will be headed? I know it is still early with lots of drama still to come, but still I am nervous.

So we are headed south again, first to Iguassu Falls, then back to Buenos Aries, both by plane this time. Then back home the day before Thanksgiving.

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The cruise out of Buenos Aires began on  Saturday, November 14  at 6:00 p.m.  In  early morning, Sunday, November 17, we  arrived at the port city of Santos, Brazil. The two days at sea were stressful as always—having to choose between  so many breakfast and lunch options, which events and activities to attend, the terrible choice between whether to order a cappuccino or latte, or a donut or muffin, Cutty on the rocks or a martini before dinner, and what to say to someone at dinner whom you have never met and will never see again, without mentioning Trump or Brexit. I mean it is tough, but we are slogging through it.

Brazil is the Big Kahuna of the South American Continent. It is slightly larger in land area than the U.S. and has a population of over 200 million and is larger than all the other countries in South America combined. It is also the home of the engine that pumps oxygen into the air we breathe. No nation will be more important than Brazil in determining the future of life on this planet.

Coming into Santos at sunrise was quite a treat with the bright sun casting long shadows and creating a dreamy atmosphere as the Zaandam glided along a narrowing channel leading into one of the largest ports in South America. Santos is only about 70 miles from Sao Paulo, Brazil’s largest city with over 12 million, and is its closest port. The city of Santos has a  population of only around a half million but seems a lot larger. It wraps around the base of several tall, green mountains that experience rain forest conditions during the rainy season, which is happening now. Luxury, high rise apartments and expensive hotels line the longest urban beach in Brazil (considerably longer than Rio’s Copa Cabana or Ipanema). Behind those impressive buildings there are some fancy single family neighborhoods and then on the mountainsides, informal settlements and make-shift neighborhoods decorated by colorful graffiti with streets lined with trash and houses made of decaying wood and tin roofs, stacked on top of one another. 

The excursion for the day was a bit disappointing, I suppose largely because there are few typical tourists attractions and few tourists go there. We saw  an aquarium, a coffee exchange, and the soccer stadium/museum of the Santos futbol team, which Pele played for and is considered one of the consistently best teams in the world. On the way back in the bus, our guide apologized for taking us to the soccer stadium since apparently several in the group had complained but went on to add that while you might not like futbol, you can’t appreciate Brazil or South America without understanding how much futbol means to the culture in this part of the world. She added that times are especially hard right now in Brazil; and while she did not want to get into politics, the politics in her country  now, she feels, are very scary. She was referring to Jair Bolsonaro, the Trump-like president who was elected in 2018 on a populist platform and among other things has encouraged massive development in the rain forest. Like Trump, Bolsonaro is a climate change denier. You could say that Bolsonaro  holds the whole cards on the climate front. So goes the rain forest goes the planet Earth.

Since Brazil became a republic in 1889 due to a military coup against Emperor Pedro II, it has had three dictatorships and three democratic periods. Some are afraid that Brazil is moving toward another dictatorship.

The  Zaandam cast off late afternoon just as the sun was setting and we were treated to the most stunning sunset of the entire cruise. We arose at 4:30 a.m. the next day on Monday, November 18– Embry’s birthday– so we could witness arriving at Rio de Janeiro, considered by Kevin, the tour director on the ship, to be the most dramatic and most beautiful city in the world. As we got our first glimpse at dawn, the silhouette of the city appeared below the towering peaks—Sugar Loaf, the Christ Redeemer statue, Copa Cobana and Ipanema beaches—there it all was in front of us like a dream.

November 18 was important for another reason: This was the last day of the cruise. At 7:30 the Zaandam was tied up, and we passengers departed to go our separate ways. We were told that Brits accounted for almost 35 percent of the passengers, Canadians 30 percent, Americans 25 percent, and the rest from Australia, New Zealand, and other countries but mainly Germans. We found the 30 or 40 people we dined or conversed with to be interesting, engaged and polite. Most had cruised a lot more than we had, and most seemed older than us though it is hard to tell about age. Also there were a whole bunch who appeared to me by the size of their girth  to have eaten their way through too many cruises, but, hey, what do I know?

The odds of seeing any of them again are low.

We said good bye to the two Indonesian young men who had taken such good care of our room. It felt almost like the end of a summer camp experience.

So did it feel good for the cruise to end or were we anxious for more? 

The former, thank you, but I will have to say that I do not think it could have been much better. The downside of a trip like this is that during the days at sea, cabin fever can set in—which if truth be told, is probably the main motivation behind my blog posts. Also the exposure to the different countries is too short and impressionistic. The best you can hope for is a taste and perhaps an insight here and there. But what are the alternatives? At our ages, trying to see this extraordinary continent by car is out of the question. So a small taste is better than no taste. And I seem to have developed an interest in this continent far exceeding anything I anticipated. It has been sitting here right under our noses and has a history so different from ours. How did this happen? Why did this happen? What is going to happen next? These are the questions that I am asking after 35  days at sea, eight countries, and  covering  over eight thousand nautical miles. 

But the adventure is not over. Four days on our own in Rio, two  at Iguazu Falls and then three more in Buenos Aires still to come.

Next post: Rio.

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The Zaandam docked in the massive container port in Buenos Aries before dawn on  November 14. Since we will be here only a day, we  plan to fly back to Buenos Aries after the cruise is over for a few more days. It is kind of hard to learn everything you need to know about a city in one day with an urban core of over 4 million and a metro area of 14 million. It will take two days, maybe even three. Which, of course, points to the principle dilemma of a tour like this. In a best case situation you are skimming the surface. One who suggests that you can even begin to grasp the significance of a country, any country, in one or two days, of course, is a fool. This personality type is illustrated  in the “Howell Personality Matrix,” which demonstrates that there are really only four personality types: smart and arrogant, dumb and humble, smart and humble and dumb and arrogant. The world traveler that thinks he or she can figure out a country in a day or two is Category Four in spades: dumb and arrogant. Count me in.

But on the other hand I recall an experienced world traveler make this comment when we were touring India a decade ago: “You can spend a day or two in India, maybe a week, and conclude that you have a pretty good idea of what the country is all about. You can spend a month or two in  India and start to have doubts. You can spend a year or two and realize you are on shaky ground, or a decade or two and have no earthly idea what this country they call India is all about.”

Now that you have been forewarned, you can put my first impressions in context: Buenos Aires is world class. As Hank’s comments point out in my last post, the city feels more European than any other city in the Americas, North or South. It boasts the world’s widest boulevard with 24 lanes, many separated by slim, green promenades. Some have estimated it takes the average pedestrian over an hour to get from one side to the other, a bit exaggerated but impressive just the same. The city has its green parks and lush gardens with the blue-blossomed jacaranda trees in full bloom, plazas, its “Obelisk,” which looks like the Washington Monument, monumental government buildings, luxury hotels, ancient, elegant apartment buildings with fancy shops on the ground level, restaurants, cafes, museums, and the bumper-to-bumper traffic you would expect. The sidewalks are packed with pedestrians. Clusters of 50 and 60-story, sparkling skyscrapers now dot the skyline. Energy and vitality are ubiquitous. 

Its mix of old and new remind me a bit of  Melbourne or Sydney or Barcelona.

There is a heavy Italian presence here due to immigration and a passion for the tango and for futbol, the two national pastimes. 

Like all of the other countries in Latin America, Argentina has had its ups and downs. The two eras you hear most about are the Peron Era—especially the importance of  Evita—and the oppressive dictatorship that followed when thousands of artists, journalists, intellectuals, professors, clergy and supporters of the opposition disappeared, never to be seen again. This period—from 1976 to 1983 marked a low point in the country’s rich history.   Financial issues and near bankruptcy doomed the country following that in the early 2000s, but were resolved by 2010. Recent years have been strong by comparison with a fairly robust economy and an expansion of the social safety net. Storm clouds, however, appear to be forming again on the horizon, as inflation is running rampant, and concerns mount as to whether the country can afford to  continue to provide generous social benefits. Issues of income disparities are surfacing here as elsewhere.  International finance experts  probably have Argentina on their Watch List. More will follow when we return to the country in about a week.

The story of the day was the drug deal. Well, it was not really a drug deal, but it sure felt like one. We worked out an arrangement with the owner of the Airbnb where we will be staying when we return for us to leave one big piece of luggage with him now so that we could travel light in Brazil. That meant we had to go through customs with the bag, then flag a cab to take us to the apartment. When we got to the customs area, a workman pointed us to a door to the right, which opened into a huge, dark warehouse area with no one present. So there we were standing alone in a vast, deserted area wondering what to do next. It was exactly the kind of setting where two guys in trench coats, wearing fedoras and dark glasses, and carrying concealed weapons come out of the woodwork with a suitcase full of cash. 

We looked around, spotted an exit sign in the distance and bolted for it before the gangsters could catch up with us. We thought we had made it out until apprehended by the authorities, handcuffed and interrogated in the police department. No, this is fake news, but it sure felt like that could have happened. All that did happen is that the port patrol guys ran our bags through the x-ray machine, smiled and wished us luck.

As they say here in Argentina, no problema.

And speaking of fake news, yes, we are following, when we can, on the ship’s fuzzy television, the live impeachment drama on MSNBC where we know we can get totally unbiased news (also the only network available to us that is carrying it). When you follow Mr. Trump, you can’t help making the comparison to the scores of dictators that have left their mark of tyranny and oppression on every single country on this continent. You ask how could this could have happened?   How could a continent which is so close to the U.S. have had such an unstable, tragic, and different history from our  own? Why have we in the U.S. never had to deal with anything like the dictators and scoundrels that they have had?

 Well, guess what, we may not be so different after all. Trump is made out of the same cloth as these South American despots and if successful could make us part of the club. The Republican Party has caved, having morphed into a personality cult. The big question is whether our Constitution—and our voting public– will prevent  Trump from taking us down the road to disaster that has plagued so many nations to our south. 

Jury out.

Stay tuned. On to Brazil! 

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After two days in chilly weather and fresh breezes the Zaandam arrived in Montevideo, the capital of Uruguay, on November 13, docking at seven a.m. When we opened the door to our balcony to welcome in the early morning sun, it felt balmy. At last, back to mild weather!

Now to be honest, I knew little about Uruguay before we arrived. Actually that is incorrect. I knew nothing about Uruguay except that it was located somewhere  in Latin America. After almost a full month at sea, covering several thousand miles and visiting so far some seven countries, I am embarrassed to admit how I ignorant I have been not only not to know anything about South America, but, frankly, not to care. In that regard I suppose I am not all that different from most “Americans,” as we call ourselves, an arrogant term we use to describe  the United States, which accounts for only a portion of the Americas and not even a majority. Carly Simon’s song, “You’re So Vain” immediately comes to mind. We in the U.S. tend to think that every song is about us.

Uruguay poses a particular challenge because it is so small, the second smallest in South America, with a population of only 3.5 million or about half as many as live in the Washington metro area. And more than half the population—over 2 million people– live in  in Montevideo. The country is noted for its lush, mostly flat interior and its beautiful beeches along the shore of the Rio de la Plata, where it joins the Atlantic Ocean. A little over a hundred miles upstream is Buenos Aires, our destination the next day. Our excursion took us into the town center, the old town, and along a vast ocean front with white beaches lined with fancy high rise apartment buildings. We also spent time inching our way along narrow roads through single family neighborhoods with large houses and manicured lawns. While parts of the city are showing their age, dating back into the 1700s, overall it was in pretty good shape and definitely has a charm. The street  life seemed more European than, say Lima, or Valparaiso, but  it is hard to say exactly why. One reason may be that over 88% of the population is considered white, in contrast to countries like Peru or Ecuador where it is much lower. After the bus tour Embry and I ate our first meal of (delicious) Argentine/Uruguayan beef and walked through the old town area with its small shops, cobblestone streets, street art and, of course, graffiti. 

What is most instructive is the country’s reputation as the most progressive and stable in South America. Excuse me? As I scan its history on line, I note the same period of Spanish oppression, then a period of brief independence in the early Nineteenth Century, then a period of authoritarian rule, then a long period of stability and democracy from the early 1900s to 1973 when there was a coup, martial law, curtailment of the press, and jail for dissenters, lasting until the mid 1980s. Does this sound like an enlightened, progressive historical past? The answer is that compared to most of the other Latin American countries, well, yes. There have been fewer killings, less brutality; and since the mid 1980s, the country has been able to hang on to its fragile democracy and pass a lot of progressive legislation. Everyone is required to vote, freedom of the press is guaranteed, gay marriage is allowed, the social safety net is pretty strong, and selling cannabis is legal. The fruits of the most liberal democracy in Latin America have been a relatively large middle class, reduced income inequality, and robust dialogue on national issues. The country has won a bunch of awards from the United Nations. So let’s hear it for Uruguay!

But what also stands out about the Uruguay story is the relatively low bar it has jumped over. It has experienced the same ups and downs as every other Latin American country-just not as extreme and for the time being it is holding it own. You definitely get the idea that  what it is holding onto is a gentle  thread which could snap at any time.

So what is it about these countries located not all that far south of us that have had unrelenting changes of fortune, that have experienced ups and downs often resulting in thousands of deaths and suffering beyond anything experienced in the U.S. except for our Civil War?

While we from the U.S. don’t pay much attention to what happens in South America, one good friend does—Hank  Ackerman, a retired journalist,   whose career with the Associated Press took him all over South America as bureau chief in Lima, Buenos Aires, and Caracas. Here are some comments he made  regarding my question to  him as to what to expect in Uruguay and Argentina:

The history of Argentina and Uruguay is much different from the rest of South America. Boiling it down, Argentina and Uruguay were an afterthought to the Spaniard conquistadores since neither had gold or silver — just a vast amount of agricultural land and a small population of natives. So, the two countries only became of importance when wheat and later beef could be profitably produced for the European markets.

 Starting in the 1850s, railroads largely financed by European concerns, principally the British, began to be pushed across the Pampas opening up the market for exports. The railroads were largely built by Italian labor, accounting for the extraordinary influence of Italian language and culture in Argentina. Argentines speak Spanish with a decidedly Italian flavor, and Argentines for all of the above reasons were viewed in the rest of South America as being different. And, with the huge volumes of exports in the 1890’s, the phrase “rich as an Argentine” became widespread. As the nation grew wealthier, its ties to Europe ( and certainly to Great Britain) became stronger such that Buenos Aires looks and feels like a European city more than any other metropolis in the New World. 
When you get to Brazil, you’ll see why it under the Dutch and then Portugal developed in a different way largely based on the huge import of slaves to work the massive sugar cane and cotton plantations in the northeast. 

Thanks, Hank. Hope there is more where this came from.

Next stop: Buenos Aires.

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Ah, Cape Horn, the southern most tip of Tierra del Fuego, the Holy Grail of long distance sailing and circumnavigation! The Zaandam rounded the Horn on November 9 at just after seven in the morning under gray skies, drizzle, and near freezing temperatures. Winds were not howling—only around 20 knots, and the waves of the following seas were manageable compared to what we had experienced a few days before. Just as we passed the tip of the cape, the ship’s horn sounded a long blast, and in the crowded Crow’s Nest the hundreds of passengers who had gotten up early to witness this historic moment, watched in reverent silence.

 So just how big a deal was this?

Short answer: not much. Just anther big, gray rock with jagged edges, rising just over a thousand feet into the sky. A small house and chapel are positioned at one end where there is also a famous statue of an albatross. The island is on Chilean land, not Argentine, and it is staffed 24/7/365 where a lighthouse attendant is on duty for three months at a time. If the island was not at the end of the Earth, few would even know that it existed.

But wait: Being at the end of the Earth is what this is all about. Starting shortly after the time when the elusive passage to the Far East was discovered and rounded by a Dutchman in 1616 , it  transformed world trade. Between that time and 1914 when the Panama Canal first opened, it was the preferred route for trade between the East and West and safer than the Straight of Magellan, which is too narrow for a vessel under sail to manage easily. Over a thousand ships have been lost trying to make the rounding. Over 1,500 sailors have perished. This is a sailor’s graveyard. You tell  someone who has rounded under sail that it is not a big deal and see how far you get.

Tradition has it that any sailor who makes the rounding earns the right to wear an earring in whichever ear was closest to the Horn (East to West–the right ear– is the upwind and more challenging rounding.) and to eat dinner with one leg resting on the table. If he (or she) rounds both Cape  Horn and the Cape of Good Hope, it is two earrings and two legs on the table.

So yes, this is a big deal—even for us docile passengers sipping our morning coffee and seated in the cozy Crow’s Nest, peering out the window. And we actually were lucky to be able to round in fairly decent weather, not the experience of many vessels. Gales are present about ten percent of the time in summer and a third of the time in winter when it is not unusual to experience wave heights of over 100 feet. You try telling anyone on any vessel that has crossed under those conditions that it is no big deal and see how far you get. We passengers aboard the Zaandam were lucky on November 9, 2019.

When the horn of the Zaandam blasted, we were suddenly in the Atlantic Ocean. Good bye to those huge Pacific swells and frigid currents and as far as I was concerned, good riddance—except, of course, there was no magical change in conditions as the ship changed course and headed northeast toward the Falkland Islands.   After another full day at sea we arrived at Port Stanley– the capital of the Falkland Islands and its only settlement– anchoring almost alone except for one other cruise ship about our size.

Talk about isolated! The Falkland Islands consist of two larger islands and several hundred smaller ones. Antarctica is 800 miles to the south, Argentina about 350 miles to the west. The total local population is under 3,000, the vast majority living in Port Stanley. If there is a tree on this lonely, desolate island, I did not see it. Outside the port area where several hundred modest houses are clustered, there are rocky mountains, most under a thousand feet, and vast areas of open tundra and grasslands—perfect for sheep and, as it turns out, penguins. The Falklands is home to over 500,000 of the former and more than a million of the latter.

I have never been to Scotland but imagine that part of the world to look a lot like what we saw in the Falkland Islands, which may explain why the island is part of the British Commonwealth.  It was not until the early Nineteenth Century before anyone lived on the island; but as shipping grew, it was  ideally positioned to assist, provision, and repair  vessels coming to and from Cape Horn. People started moving there, mainly from Great Britain. 

During the early years several countries claimed sovereignty over the islands including Argentina and the U.K. This dispute went on for decades as both stubbornly claimed sovereignty  even though the people who settled there were English speakers. If you did not know where you were, you would swear you were in an English or Scottish village. The dispute continued on again and off again for more decades until the famous war of 1982 when the Argentine navy invaded the Falklands on April 2 and occupied the islands, declaring the Falklands belonged  solely to Argentina. That lasted for only 74 days, the time it took for the British to get down to the territory and retaliate. In a matter of days the Brits arrived with superior air support, British warships, and several thousand British troops. Two and a half months later the Argentines surrendered and withdrew, their tail between their legs.  Several civilians and almost a thousand military personnel had lost their lives—two times as many Argentines as Brits. 

The worst part of the legacy of this war were the  more than thirty thousand land mines that the Argentines buried in an effort to halt the British invasion. Though most land mines have now been removed or disarmed, some remain including  mines still buried on some of the island’s most beautiful, white sand beeches, making them off limits.

The 1982 war continues to be a very big deal for the residents of the islands. Several statues and memorials have been erected  in Stanley, and there was much talk about it from people we talked with or listened to while we were on land. Several years ago when there was a referendum in the Falklands regarding preference for rule by the U.K. versus Argentina, sticking with the  Brits won 99.8% of the vote. Following the vote, two of the three who voted for Argentina later recanted explaining that they did not understand the question. Case closed, at least for now, or so it appears. Argentina, however, still refuses to acknowledge the validity of the Falklands as a British territory, and U.N. resolutions continue to call for negotiations between the two countries. There are 1,500 British military permanently stationed on the islands just in case.

Despite its starkness, there is a beauty about this place, and you definitely get the idea that people who live here love it. Though it is hundreds of miles north of where we were at the southern tip of South America, the climate is similar with high temperatures the day we visited not getting above the mid 40s. So the decisive factor would surely not appear to be the weather. Perhaps there is something appealing about the isolation and being part a small but stalwart community, hunkering down and surviving the challenging conditions. Wimps need not apply.

And they have a role model: the penguins! There are over a million of these stoical creatures on the island. While Embry  went on a hike,  I joined one of the many penguin tours, this one to a remote location accessible only via four wheel drive vehicles.  I boarded a minibus with about 20 other tourists (Most were Brits from the other cruise ship anchored in the harbor.). We rode for about a half hour  along vast, empty fields of rock and tundra and then turned onto a dirt road where we hopped off and piled into five Land Rovers, which sloshed and bounced along through pastures where sheep were grazing alongside their small lambs. About fifteen minutes later we arrived at Bluff Cove, where there were several Gentoo Penguin rookeries and one King Penguin rookery. All totaled I would guess there  were several hundred birds nesting and half again as many standing. The ones standing would occasionally poke their beaks into the air, make a kind of gasping noise, flap their arm-like wings, then calm down and wobble around a bit, before returning to their position next to their mate, awaiting their turn on the nest. 

Now is this a hard life or what? Sitting or standing there in the  cold  waiting for an egg to hatch and then risking your life in the frigid  ocean searching for fish to bring home to your mate, while realizing you could be lunch for a hungry sea lion just waiting for you to jump in? Are they having a good time? Do they actually enjoy this? What about when the gale force winds come or when it starts to snow? How do they do this, day after day, year after year, lifetime after lifetime?

Well, hats off to them! Like the human residents of the Falkland Islands, they tough it out, hunker down and live the life they were programmed to live as best as they can. In that regard you could say they are kind of like us humans—except a whole lot cuter.

At the end of the day, the Zaandam weighed anchor and headed west. In two days we will arrive in Montevideo, Uruguay. We are now on the last leg—only a week left on the cruise.

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Around noon on Friday, November 8, under mostly blue skies, and with chilly temperatures and strong, gusty winds, we pulled into the port of Ushuaia in Argentina, the southernmost  town on the planet Earth. At a latitude of about 60 degrees, Ushuaia is about the same distance from the equator as southern Alaska or Iceland. The remote town has a population of a little over 100,000  and is situated on a hill below a snowy mountain towering over 5,000 feet above the  Beagle Channel, leading to the Pacific Ocean and Cape Horn, over a hundred  miles due south. The town, which has a definite alpine feel to it, seems more European than the Chilean cities we have visited, with its colorful, mid-rise buildings and few overt signs of poverty. The closest port to the South Pole, Ushuaia is where many expeditions to Antarctica originate, and two of these smaller cruising ships were docked near us. 

The highlight of the afternoon was our excursion aboard a large catamaran to several tiny islands– more like very large, desolate rocks– to observe scores of sea lions basking in the sun, and one large colony of Imperial Cormorants. The scenery was stunning with snow-covered mountains all around us and whitecaps decorating the choppy, blue waters. The last few days have been all about extraordinary natural beauty and pristine wilderness. The Beagle Channel was a fitting conclusion to almost a week of wonder.

The highlight of the evening was Che Guevara. Remember him? The infamous South American revolutionary from Argentina, who was a key participant in the Cuban Communist Revolution in the 1950s, and in the 1960s was killed, according to most reports, by the CIA. The Motorcycle Diaries, a 2004-acclaimed, coming-of-age film, was the ship’s movie of the day. Based on the journal that Che wrote when he was a 23-year old medical student about a motorcycle adventure, riding with his buddy through several South American countries in 1952, it is not the typical movie you would expect to see on a cruise ship. More of an art flick than a popular movie, it paints a very sympathetic portrait of Che, who grew up in a comfortable, middle class family and became a revolutionary mainly because of the glaring societal inequities he witnessed on the road trip. 

The big takeaway for me was how the more things change, the more they stay the same. The inequities that made such an impression on Che are still present throughout South America and the world. In fact in some respects they are getting worse. Communism is no longer the silver bullet it was thought to be by some intellectuals and idealists in the early part of the last century. In fact you could argue that   Communism not only failed to deliver, it made things worse. And the inequities remain.  Life is just not fair. There is too much suffering. Yet there are big question marks as to where we go from here. 

And you don’t have to go far to see glaring inequities. Just look in the mirror.  Here we are on a fancy cruise ship, in what could easily be described as Exhibit A of  over-the-top, self-indulgent living. I would argue that few of us passengers on this cruise ship “deserve” this experience. Few  have “earned” it. It is not our “reward for success.” It is due mostly to luck and circumstance—what country we were born in, what kind of family we were born into, how we were treated as infants and toddlers and what kind of support we got growing up. It is due to the education we received, who our friends were,  the mentors we had, the status  of our physical  and mental health , the kinds of jobs available to us, and the opportunities that came our way. Sure, we had to make something of these opportunities, but still….

Now take a look at the 500 persons on this ship who are not passengers but are here to take care of the 1,400 people who are—to keep us safe, entertained, enriched, comfortable, and happy.

When Embry attended the captain’s talk today, there were a bunch of questions to the captain about the treatment of the crew, especially the line employees at the bottom of the food chain—those who clean our rooms, prepare our food, serve it to us, and keep the ship going. They are mostly from Indonesia and the Philippines with a sprinkling from other, mostly Asian countries. These people are courteous and polite, always greet you with a smile and also, as far as I can tell, do what they are supposed to do and do it well. How much they get paid was not disclosed, but surely it is not a lot. What was disclosed is that a 70-hour workweek for them is not unusual. (Apparently there are international regulations that prevent workweeks over 90 hours. Yes, that’s 90!) And the irony is that most of these workers on this ship will tell you they are the lucky ones.

This, of course, is just one example of  low hanging fruit on the inequity scale. But if you think about it, the low hanging fruit is everywhere, all the time. For Che Guevara the answer was a revolution, in fact a violent revolution. Some today may continue to argue that only a violent revolution will level the playing field. As one  who vigorously  would not agree, I also have to admit that I do not have a simple or compelling answer. And if I am honest, I will admit that while I should probably feel guilty about being among the privileged few who   are able to go on a cruise like this, I am enjoying myself immensely. It takes a movie like Motorcycle Diaries to remind me of the way the world really is and that looking the other way is not the answer either.

The more things change, the more they stay the same.

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It is now Friday, November 8, and this marks our 23^rd day aboard the Zaandam. For the past five days we have been coasting along in the fiords  except for one brief stopover at Punta Arenas, the southernmost town in Chile at the 52^nd parallel or about where Winnipeg, Canada, is in the Northern Hemisphere. The weather has been pretty consistently inconsistent the whole time. One minute you are fogged in and can only see silhouettes of mountains at best. The next minute the sun peaks through, the water sparkles, and snowcapped peaks tower into the heavens above you. Then a rain shower comes, then a snow shower, and then suddenly the sky is blue again, and the cycle repeats itself. It was like this  the entire time. The experience is mesmerizing. The spectacular scenery  is never the same, always changing, always surprising you. In fact over the entire fiord experience I have spent most of the time just marveling and taking photographs as we cruise along. The big decisions are do I  marvel from our balcony or the library with wide windows or the Crow’s Nest or the open aft deck. Tough choices. About the only thing that remains constant are the chilly temperatures—highs in the low 40s—and the brisk winds at 25 knots with higher gusts but ameliorated by the protection we have in the narrow channel. 

Why doesn’t the word get out about this extraordinary natural wonder? Why isn’t it on the Top 10 List? Why isn’t it high on everyone’s bucket list?

One of the most amazing things is just how isolated this space is. There is no sign anywhere of any human activity—no houses, no boat docks, no visible paths or roads, no indication than any human has ever set foot on the steep slopes at the edge of the channel. Except for the passage through the Straight of Magellan leading into the town of Punta Arenas, we have seen a total of only six vessels—two tramp steamers, two fishing boats and one partially sunken freighter.  We have seen a few seagulls, cormorants, and a few albatross, but not as many as you might expect. So where is everybody, you ask. You get the feeling that time has been rolled back eons, to a time before there was any human life on the planet, even before there was any animal life. So, you think, this is the way it all looked way back when, way back before we humans had our opportunity to leave our mark. Or perhaps it is a scene out of the future, when we humans are long gone, having left behind a mixed legacy.

Besides peering out of the ship’s windows or shivering on our balcony or the aft deck, we have continued to do the things people do on cruises—enjoying the food and meeting interesting fellow passengers at  the evening dinners from all over the U.S. or Canada or the UK or Germany or wherever, doing our walks around the deck when weather permits, enjoying a cocktail at one of the ship’s many bars, attending the daily, classical music concerts by two gifted, young musicians, a pianist and a violist, or taking in a movie or a show or a lecture about what we will be seeing. Getting cabin fever is a bit of a risk on a long cruise, but on this leg we have been saved by the views.

At Punta Arenas, a back woods port of around 120,000, the Zaandam  paused long enough to  permit excursions during the day. Via a speedy catamaran, we joined an excursion to a small, flat island with over 30,000 Magdela Penguins (of which we saw maybe a hundred) and probably even more huge seagulls. Quite impressive cute little fellows and nice to get off the ship and stretch our legs. Late in the day, the ship departed again, headed toward Argentina where we will anchor at the world’s southernmost town, and then on to Cape Horn, which we should arrive at around six a.m. tomorrow, then toward the Falkland Islands.

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Joe has kindly offered me the opportunity to do a “guest blog,” while we are going through the Chilean Fjords.  I’m sure he will soon be writing to you about the beauty of this remote part of the world.

In the meantime, I am going to write about the thing that impressed me most soon after we got on the ship. That is the prevalence of older couples.  It immediately struck me that we were surrounded by people who looked a lot like us.  This is not what I am used to in Washington, D.C. or most other places we go these days.  I was shocked!  Where did all these people come from?  At the risk of sounding totally politically incorrect, the preponderance of people on the ship look to be older “plain vanilla” types (ie. heterosexual, white couples). They walk around just like we do, holding hands and (looking to be) comfortable just being together for 33 days with not much to do. 

Quite a few years ago Joe and I were invited to the Washington Cathedral to have our marriage blessed among others who had been married 25+ years or more.  At that time (at about age 60) I felt very young, and expected to be surrounded by really old people who had been married for ages and ages. To my shock and surprise, Joe and I (who had at that time been married about 40 years) were called up among the longest marriages in the Cathedral.  That really set me to thinking about what the ingredients of a long marriage consist of.  I concluded it involves lot of luck (to have found the right person, and persevered through some hard times together), to have been blessed with good health, and to have married young.  We were in our early twenties when we married, and during our generation many of those early marriages did not survive. I came away from that service feeling both blessed by the Bishop and blessed by our God-given fortune to have such a (generally) happy and long-lived marriage.  Now, over 10 years later, we will soon celebrate 54 years together.

As I got acclimated to the boat and thought about our fellow shipmates, I began to realize that we were among a lot of people who look and act a lot like we do. It is not surprising that folks who want to spend a fair amount of money to be with someone for 33+ days must be:  retired with the time to do it (therefore aged 60+); relatively prosperous; and happily partnered.  So there was a selection process going that lead to this situation.  Still, it also made me forecast that we were to have some boring times ahead when we met and talked to our fellow shipmates over dinner.  

I am happy to report that the conversations we have over dinner are anything but boring. While many of the couples we sit with are in the “plain vanilla” category, they come from many countries and walks of life.  We have heard fascinating stories of their travels and their past experiences pursuing a variety of occupations.  They come from many countries (mostly the U.S., Canada and Europe).  And, while you have to look a little harder for them, we have met people of a variety of skin colors, some gay couples, and lots of single people (mainly older women). 

Two books I am reading on the trip have given me insights into what makes up a long and happy marriage.  In Don Quixote (LONG but good), written at a time when most marriages were arranged, Cervantes says, “Love and natural inclination readily blind those eyes of the mind that are so necessary in making life’s important decisions; and when it comes to choosing a mate, there is especial danger of going astray, and great caution and the grace of Heaven are needed if one is to be guided aright.“ So true!  I am also reading First Family:  Abigail and John Adams by Joe Ellis. He says he wrote this dual biography to explore the “…startling capacity for a man and a woman—husband and wife—to sustain their love other a lifetime filled with daunting challenges.”  It is reassuring to me to learn that, in our secular world where marriages do not receive as much support from society as they did in the past, we are not alone in this quest to sustain a long-term partnership throughout a lifetime.  Did I mention that I have proposed a voyage around Africa (taking two months)?  Joe is skeptical, but thinking about it.

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On Sunday, November 3, the Zaandam departed the San Antonio harbor in the late afternoon in brisk winds and heavy seas. Our latitude was about 45 degrees, right in the middle of what sailors call the Roaring Forties, where the wind howls most of the time– the kind of weather we were expecting. The sun was out, however, and the sea was sparkling. As the huge rollers hit the cliffs near the harbor, their spray reached 40 or 50 feet. 

When we woke up the following morning, seas appeared calm with  towering cliffs  on both sides, not far from the ship. Overnight we had entered the northernmost part of the Chilean fiords, the first day of what would be three days meandering in these protected waters. As the depth of the channel permitted, the Zaandam coasted along.  I positioned  myself on the  aft deck for almost the entire day taking photographs and marveling at what ranks among the best that Mother Nature has to offer.  The Chilean fiords are right up there with Yosemite, the Grand Canyon, the Yellow Mountains in China, Lake Baikal in Russia and Mount Fuji in Japan. Bucket list material for sure.

Unfortunately, it  was not too long before we made a sharp right turn, taking us due west toward the ocean. As we turned into the wind, white caps started to form, and we could begin to feel the strong breeze. The captain’s somber voice came on the ship’s public address system alerting us to a change in plans. Our original course had us headed out of the channel the next day  in the direction of a major storm to the south, producing gale force winds and seas of over 30 feet high. In order to avert extremely difficult cruising conditions, he had made the decision to cancel our first stop in the fiord in order to get a jump on the storm in order to  make it back  into the fiords before the worst of the storm hit. 

It did not take long to understand why he had made that decision. When the Zaandam  left the protected waters and entered the Pacific, we were slammed by howling winds and huge waves. White caps were everywhere making the sea look like a giant cappuccino. Suddenly it was not all that easy to keep your balance. Sea sickness bags began appearing in common areas, and the captain came on the address system again  to announce that for safety reasons, all doors to the outside decks had been locked and the elevators shut down. All the water had been drained out of both swimming pools.  The captain said that the temperature outside was 46 degrees and the sustained winds were 42 knots gusting to over 50 knots.  Keeping on your feet required holding on to railings.

All morning Embry and I sat in the Crow’s Nest, a bar and gathering area on Deck 9, the top deck, peering out the window through the fog and rain, watching monster waves crash across the bow of the ship with spray at times reaching the window in front of us, some 90 feet above the sea, 

We did finally get some relief from the rocking and rolling in the afternoon when we were able to make the next passage  back into the fiords, just missing the  predicted storm waves of  30 or more feet, almost twice the size of what we had been plowing through. Unfortunately, however, in the afternoon the rain and mist settled in again. All we could  see were eerie, gray silhouettes of mountains and an occasional fleeting glimpse of a towering snow capped peak and  waterfalls draining melting snow into the ocean. 

Then close to five pm as if on cue, the rain stopped, the mist began to rise, blue patches of sky appeared, and the snowcapped peaks showed off their full glory.

About an hour later, the ship paused in front of a glacier, a bluish ice pack about 50 feet deep beginning at the top of a large mountain and extending all the way down to the sea. Even though the rain had started up again and the mist had returned, the aft deck was crowded with fellow travelers snapping photos of the glacier, the snowcapped mountains and the blue fiord. Despite the frigid temperatures and  howling wind, they were asking, I suppose, the same question I was asking: When will we ever see anything quite like this again?

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