I think the reason I picked this stateroom on the port side of Volendam was because I remembered being on the port side of Prinsendam 10 years ago, waking up in these waters, opening the window drapes and saying “Oh Wow!” or “Holy Cow!” or something like that.

Yesterday the Captain told us we would be sailing trough Glacier Alley at about 9:15 but at ten to nine I looked out the window and said “Holy Cow!” or “Oh Wow!” or something line that. We were at the face of the German Glacier that spilled into a waterfall that went into the channel. A few minutes later the captain came on the PA system saying we would soon be passing the Italian and Dutch Glaciers. “Holy cow AND oh wow!” You will notice in one of the pictures from our balcony the Captain in the bridge wing looking out at Glacier Alley.

Following our transit of the alley we crossed the border into Argentina and sailed info Ushuaia with its beautiful skyline of mountains with new snow. The local guide we had there told us it had fallen in the last two days, an Argentine variant of Alaska’s Termination Dust (TD) which heralds the end of summer and the rapid onset of autumn. Like in Punta Arenas in Chile, school starts for the kids here on Monday.

And the Prinsendam that I mentioned? It was in port with a different livery as Pheonix Reisen’s MS Amera sailing from Ushuaia, which claims to be the world’s southernmost city, to Porto Williams, across the Beagle Channel in Chile, which is south of Ushuaia but, according to the Argentines, doesn’t count because it isn’t a city, it is a town. Puerto Williams calls itself a city, it has 2,800 residents, Ushuaia has 82,000. You make the call. Below is a shot of Prinsendam leaving Ushuaia taken from the beach of the Terra del Fuego National Park.

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