Navimag - day 1
Trip Start
Mar 01, 2006
1
310
551
Trip End
Dec 01, 2007
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Canales Patagonicos,
Chile
Saturday, March 31, 2007
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At 5h20 I woke up: the engines had just been started. Old conditionned habbit from my stay offshore as a maintenance staff: as soon as there is a change of vibrations I wake up. Even the air ventilation stopping used to wake me up, as it was a sign that something had gone wrong.
At around 6 the boat left from Puerto Natales, and headed north. I got up at 6.40 to go see the manoeuver in the narrow White pass. It was still sunrise, the light was beautiful, and to the east the clouds were yellow. As I got on the top deck a cormoran was flying with the boat, just a few meters above our heads.
The pass was indeed narrow, 80 meters at the narrowest point, and he boat had to make 90 degree turns to follow the canal (and it was a 100+ meters long boat).
One good and pretty unusual thing on this boat, was that everybody was welcome to visit the bridge (piloting cabin). There we could see all the instruments and follow the operations.
Normally a young officer is in charge, and the boat sails on autopilot.
But for that maneuvre the captain was there, and an older pilot too. The captain was giving orders, executed by the pilot, with verbal crosscheks and confirmations all the time, like in the films.
Later with the young officer we were able to ask questions about all the instruments, the boat, anything. The boat is not a cruiseboat: it is a freight boat upgraded to take also passengers. The things to do were very limited, and the places to hang around.... as well! Apart from the rainy outside decks, there was only the lounge, and the rooms were very small.... so everyone was cramped into the lounge.
But the crew was friendly, allways answering questions, seemingly enjoying to have passengers onboard.
An information meeting at 10, followed by a lecture on indigenous populations. Lunch. Afternoon documentary film. I went for a nap.
As often as possible I went to the pilot cabin, and outside, to try to see wildlife, and just enjoy the surroundings. I did not really mind the bad weather, on the contrary it helped to imagine the sailships that were taking this route under the worst of conditions, so far from anywhere.
There were lots of cormorans, either flying around, or diving to try get out of the way of the ship. I saw a lobo, right on our path, jumping out of the water as it was swimming out of our way, then stopping to stick its head out of the water and check what was that big thing coming, and eventually diving for good as we got closer.
Some people saw tonina dolphins too, but I wasn't there. And we were told that in some parts of the trip, we might encounter whales.
Also, as we were still in high season, a detour was made to an adjacent canal to go near a glaciar that falls into the water. The weather was still terrible, but we were sheltered from the wind in that bay. There were ice blocks floating all around, white and blue, and in the thick clouds, we could see the glacier over the water. Like with the other glaciers, evaluating the size of it is impossible if you don't have a reference, so I couldn't know how close we were or how big it was. The mountains around were wrapped in clouds too, very much like a mysterious fog: you would see nothing, and then come across the ice in the water, and more ice, until through the fog the white-blue mass appeared distinctly, contrasting with the dark mountains.
I tried to spend my time writing a bit, and studying my spanish, but most of the time I was outside and/or socializing.
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