GeorgeCharlie

We were in Coquimbo (La Serena), Chile in the early part of last December. When researching the port stop, we found there were basically two tours normally taken. One is driving inland, along with visiting La Serena, on a full day tour, or taking a half-day tour of La Serena. Besides the opportunity to see some of the countryside, the full day tour normally includes a visit to a Pisco Distillery, and a visit to see the City of Vicuna's square and church. With a number of the sites being closed on Mondays (day we were there), we saw little value taking the full day tour, so we opted for the half-day La Serena tour. I am in the process of doing a review of our cruise and will be reviewing our stop in Coquimbo fairly soon. You can see my review at: https://boards.cruisecritic.com/topic/2902718-‘just-back’-from-31-day-south-american-cruise-on-the-oosterdam/#comment-64566093

In a condensed version, we found the ship to be ill prepared for the cruise. We were told over 40% of the passenger-facing staff were new. Not only new to the ship, but new to HAL, and in many cases, new to the position they were placed in. In addition, the ship was understaffed in most areas we saw. We ate at all the restaurants and only found the Canaletto to be somewhat enjoyable. Most of the Pinnacle Grill tables were vacant, likely due to staffing, and we found the atmosphere to be one of pressuring us to eat and leave asap. The quality of food was dismal. Selection was to a large extent based around pasta, and/or spicy food. For us, pasta soon becomes tiresome, and neither of us enjoy spicy food. The entertainment and drinks were as a whole very poor in both selection, and/or quality. We had already started seeing small improvements by the end of our cruise, so I would expect things will have reached a somewhat acceptable state by the time you board.

We ended a cruise in BA on Dec 19th & 20th and had a very good local guide by the name of Tomás Hughes. We arrived in BA just as Argentina had won the World Cup, so the city was in total chaos and very difficult to get anywhere. Although on our first day, he did manage to show us some parts of the city and gave an excellent river boat tour of the delta. On the second day we used his services to get us from the cruise terminal to the airport and with the day being declared a National Holiday to celebrate the World Cup win, that trip was an adventure on it's own!! We found his rates to be very reasonable and he speaks good English. You can find out about what he offers at: https://www.bonaventuratrips.com/our-excursions

We then visited the downtown area of Montecristi. First a church. Then the town square. There were a number of street vendors selling clothing and regular household goods to locals. Including clothing you would not expect to see in a coastal town in the northern part of South America, but being Christmas time, I guess they may make a good gift. Lynne bought her 'Panama Hat' here - actually a Christmas toque! Best to leave sleeping dogs lie.

Just noticed Roca Souvenirs also has a Facebook page. https://www.facebook.com/rocasouvenirs/

Yes, it is likely difficult to find souvenirs of the Cape Horn statue in Ushuaia, Argentina, as the statue is actually located in Chile. This is due to the ongoing political differences between the two countries. We were in both ports-of-call, while on a cruise last month, and visited a number of souvenir stores in Punta Arenas, all which had Cape Horn souvenirs. Because we wanted something sturdy, but light weight, we purchased the following souvenir. It is made out of wood and is about 6 inches square. It also separates into two pieces, which makes for easier handling. We bought in from Roca Souvenirs. Their website seems to be non-functional right now, but they say they provide delivery, so maybe try writing them. Their address is: Address: Pdte. Julio A.Roca 973, 6200000 Magallanes, Punta Arenas, Magallanes y la Antártica Chilena, Chile It cost 10,000 Chilean Pesos.

Montecristi is famous for being the birthplace of the Sombrero de Paja Toquilla, more commonly known as the Panama Hat. In the 1850's, several Ecuadorians went to Panama to sell their straw hats at the busy trade centers. As people from Panama travelled to California for the gold rush sporting their straw hats, they were often asked where they got their cool, breathable, shady sombreros. Since the hats were purchased in Panama, people started calling them Panama Hats even though they originated in Montecristi, Ecuador in the early 1600's. A lady demonstrating the traditional way Panama hats are made. Our guide and shop owner showing the different qualities in Panama hats. Molding the crown of a Panama hat. A statue commemorating women making Panama hats.

Not sure what blog you are referring too, as we didn't go to Antarctica?

In regards to what's happening (and has been happening) have a look at this link.

We have found in most cases we did not pay for independent tours until we took the tour. We just completed a 31-day South American cruise on HAL and the only ones we had to pay in advance were tours we booked through HAL. Plus, when we cancelled one of the tours, it took multiple trips to the Shore Excursions desk to get the errors they made straighten out.😠

If you are interested in seeing SpaceX's Starlink constellation, have a look at this active map. https://satellitemap.space/# I am a early Starlink beta user and I'm located at the outer edge of their service area. Their service area is limited to location of ground stations and this will remain a limitation until they get their satellite-to-satellite laser communication links working - hopefully within the next year, or two.

We visited Iceland on the Zuiderdam in 2018 and you can see our views on Iceland in my review of that cruise. As you will notice, we used independent arranged tours and strongly recommend them over cruise ship tours. We have cruising all over the world for some 40 years now and see little value in the cruise industries scare tactic of not leaving passengers behind. They are just as likely to leave people behind as private operators are - because, in most ports, the tours they are offering are by private operators in the first place!! All you have to do is read about people they left behind lately, such as, the storms in Central America last fall and the current unrest in Peru. Yes, the passengers in these cases did manage to catch up with the ships at another port, but that was because the tour operators managed it, not the cruise ships. We have found the small tour operators provide, on average, a much better tour and at a much reduced cost. We have taken a number of extended shore excursions in countries where people would normally have travel concerns (India, Cambodia, Miramar, etc.) and we have seen people who booked through the ship, were with the same tour company we had used - just at 2-3 times the cost. Plus, there are cases of where you can only get see some sites by a private operator, e.g. our visit to Falkland Islands last month.😎

After the visiting the lighthouse viewpoint, we drove over to Montecristi, a small town on the eastern side of Manta. On a hill overlooking the town is the local Civic Center building, which contains a museum. On the grounds of the Civic Center is the Mausoleum of José Eloy Alfaro Delgado, who was born in Montecristi. He was president of Ecuador from 1895 to 1901 and from 1906 to 1911 and the leader of the Ecuadorian Liberal Revolution. He credited for finishing the construction of the railroad connecting Guayaquil and Quito, the separation of church and state, establishment of many public schools, implementing civil rights (such as freedom of speech), and the legalization of civil marriages and divorce. Inside the Mausoleum. Outside the Mausoleum is the steam engine brought to Ecuador in 1907, which once operated along the railroad traversing the Andes Mountains, linking the once disconnected highlands to the Ecuadorian coast. The Mausoleum is the red building behind the front end of the engine. View of Montecristi from the Civic Center.

We booked about a year in advance, as their service capacity is very limited. Max 3 people per trip and number of trips they can make depends on how long the ship is in port. We were there from 8am - 6pm and I understand they made 3 trips to Volunteer point and 3 trips to see Rockhoppers, which I understand is about the max they can currently do. I know some people on HAL's Grand SA cruise tried to book many months ago for their Feb 06th visit to Stanley and were unable to.

Last month we were very fortunate to be able to appreciate penguins in their natural habitat. Firstly, that it was a nice day, so we able to get ashore in the Falkland Islands – which is normally an achievement in itself! And secondly, that we were able to use Falklands Helicopter Services to easily get out and see the penguins. This meant, rather than spending 2 plus hours getting to Volunteer Point in a 4x4 vehicle, the trip by helicopter was about 20 minutes. King Penguin nesting site at Volunteer Point. King Penguin chick still in it's winter coat. Then, seeing we still had lots of time, we were also able to fly out and visit a colony of Rockhopper penguins. Rockhopper - "The penguin with an attitude". By the way - the cost to fly out to Volunteer Point, was the same as what the ship charged to go by 4x4!!

I missed mentioning about something else regarding the Pacoche Wildlife Refuge. There is a roadside restaurant beside the entry to the refuge park. While we were standing around waiting for a guide, I noticed staff coming out and getting things out of concrete vault with burning wood on top of it. So I wandered over to have a look at what they were doing. It seemed it was acting as a warming oven for food wrapped in leaves. The temperature was not high enough to cook as they were able to remove the food packages with bare hands.

Thanks. Now if I could just find the time to do more work on it.🙄

From there we drove over a restaurant near our next stop, the San Lorenzo’s Lighthouse viewpoint. Lunch was included in the tour cost and consisted of deep-fried fish with rice. On the beach in front of the restaurant there were a number of fenced off turtle nesting areas, where turtle eggs had been laid and now waiting to hatch. From there it was a short drive to the viewpoint. The walk over to see the lighthouse was apparently very strenuous, so none of our group went any farther then the to top of the first hill.

Manta was our first stop in South America and, seeing we were the first large cruise ship to visit a number of these ports for several years, we encountered some tourism start up hiccups. Here in Manta, our guide was struggling with English, as he had not been speaking it for over 2 years. In addition, there was lack of organization with our scheduled visit to the nature park. Our guide mentioned several times that we had to be at the park at a certain time, as a park guide was necessary in order visit the park. When we got there at the scheduled time - there was no guide. After several phone calls, it seemed no one knew if a park guide had actually been booked and if so, where he was. This required us to wait around for over an hour, before a guide returning from another tour, was able to take us out. And, as he had another group to take out in about an half an hour, we ended up seeing only about a half of what the regular tour offered. Again, even with getting a shortened tour, we found the park guide to very informative and the the park to be an interesting place to visit. The park guide only spoke Spanish and our guide then had to translate it to English. It was here where he was having a difficult time with his English. There were times where the park guide would give a rather lengthy presentation on a particular animal, or plant, and after our guide tried to translate it unsuccessfully - we didn't end up getting much out of it. Fortunately, the park guide sometimes had pictures of he was talking about on his tablet, some with even English explanations. The Pacoche Wildlife Refuge is about 30 minutes from Manta. The facilities were actually reasonably good, with a regular flush toilet and sink with running water. Once a guide arrived, we set off down the rather hilly trail. Some sections were reasonably steep and had crude steps which were difficult to navigate in some cases. The park nature guide describing a tree.

A few steps away from the Fish Market was the shipyard, where the construction and repairing of large wooden fishing boats was done. This is one of the few remaining large wooden fishing boat shipyards in South America. We were there on a Sunday so nothing was going on.

There were also small stands, where you could get the fish you have purchased cleaned and descaled for 50 cents a fish. A short video showing the preparation and sale of some shrimp.

We arrived in Manta, Ecuador, the morning of November 27th. We had arranged a private tour for 10 people with Narwell Tours. The tour was called 'Taste of Ecuador' and covered the main tourist sights in that area of Ecuador. The sights covered were; Fish Market and Shipyard; Pacoche Wildlife Refuge; San Lorenzo's Lighthouse viewpoint; Cuidad Alfaro Museum & Mausoleum; along with a stop for shopping. The local Tarqui Beach was across the harbour from where we docked. This beach is adjacent to where the Fish Market and Shipyard are located. The Oosterdam as seen from the Fish Market. The market is similar to what we have seen in other fishing port towns. The fishermen bring in the fish from their morning catch and prepare them for sale. There is a wide variety of catch here and it is quite a show to watch – especially the birds. There was the expected large number of different birds, all looking for a free meal. The roof of the market was covered with them. Of course, as an open air fish market, you expect to see lax food handling standards. But seeing some large fish laid out in full sunlight on the beach, caused us to question if they were really there for sale as human food. Our guide assured us that people would be buying them and taking them home to eat, or resell. Well, at least the birds had their fill first!! Inside the market building were tables full of various catch. Outside the market was a covered eating area where people were able to have food cooked for them. Nearby, there were several trucks with large ice-filled containers being loaded with fish.

When we were in San Antonio on a cruise last month, we used Puerto San Antonio Tours for a day-tour and found Philipp to be very good. I know he does cruise port to airport/hotel (and vice versa) transfers, but I do not know if he does airport to hotel transfers. You can always check with him. His website is: https://puertosanantoniotours.com/transfer/

We flew out of EZE just before Christmas and we departed from Terminal A, which is likely where you will be departing from. All three terminals (A, B, & C) are closely connected, so movement between them is not that difficult. Although, we had access to a VIP lounge, there appeared to be numerous USB charging stations available at the seating areas of the gates. Besides the large sit-down eateries, there were a number of small bars intermingled with the gates. These bars mainly consisted of a couple barstool tables, which had USB charging ports built into the top of the tables. Of note - we were departing EZE at the same time Argentinians were celebrating a national holiday for winning the World Cup, so most food/drink establishments at the airport were either closed, or at reduced capacity - due to lack of staff. The group of 6 of us decided to grab a bite to eat at the Outback and just after we sat down, they told us they would continue to serve us, but they we switching to take-out only, as they were at shift change and only a couple of staff showed up for the new shift. Needless to say, we drew many angry stares and comments from other people, when they found they could not come in and join us.

We recently returned from a 31-day SA cruise on the Oosterdam, which I believe is the ship you are going to be on for your cruise. Most likely when you are mentioning purchasing Wi-Fi, you are referring to purchasing an Internet package. The Wi-Fi available on the ship is provided free of charge and used primarily by HALs Navigator app for information access on the ship, plus it provides your connection to the Internet. We had pre-purchased the Premium Internet package prior to sailing with the hopes of being able to do a 'Live' review of the cruise. You can find my "Somewhat Live' review here and you will notice my feelings regarding the Internet from my opening comments - along with other comments throughout my postings.😠😠 Overall, the Internet was somewhat usable for basic email functions, but generally useless for sending any amount of data (i.e. pictures). One of the people we were travelling with tried communicating through Whatsapp and his experience was no better then I had with the apps I was using.