How To Journey To Antarctica – Hand Baggage Solely

February 28, 2023

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One of many greatest questions we’ve gotten is about how we travelled to Antarctica so I figured I would as effectively present you the total journey we took from London (our dwelling metropolis) to Antarctica. Plus, it takes me proper to the very begin of this journey so it’s a great way to begin this story, I suppose. 😁😁😁😁

Proper so from London we booked a direct flight to Buenos Aires in Argentina. There are oblique flight choices which join in different cities on the best way to Buenos Aires however even a direct flight is like 14 hours so we determined to only restrict journey instances by going direct.

Additionally, on the time once we travelled when you check constructive for you understand what, you’ll be able to’t board the ship to Antarctica so we determined to restrict our publicity to individuals and figured ready round in a connection airport in all probability wasn’t the perfect thought for this journey.

So yeah, we booked British Airways flight direct to Buenos Aires for the January the 2nd however that flight truly received cancelled by British Airways and our reserving received moved to New Yr’s day as a substitute.

Factor is, we’d initially booked the journey on the 2nd of January as a result of we have been planning on nursing a New Yr’s Eve hangover on the New Yr’s day however because of our choice to isolate earlier than travelling we truly ended up doing nothing for New Yr’s Eve anyway.

To be sincere, we’d already began isolating even earlier than Christmas. We’d been planning this journey for years and it had truly been postponed a couple of instances already so now that we had confirmed plans in place, we needed to do our highest from our finish to strive to not check constructive.

Oh, and we’d additionally made plans to reach in Argentina a couple of days early to discover the cities we might be in earlier than boarding the ship to Antarctica however we’d completely forgotten that as a consequence of isolation, we wouldn’t be exploring these metropolis earlier than our journey both.

Anyway, so quick ahead – we arrived in Buenos Aires on the morning time and went over to our resort – The Alvear Palace resort.

Fortunately, although it might usually be too early to verify in, we have been allowed to verify in and with out skipping a beat, we promptly fell asleep for the subsequent 9 hours.

The remainder of the time in Buenos Aires was fairly chilled. Night drinks on the bar downstairs – extremely socially distanced, I would add.

Dinner of Argentine steaks and Malbec at an unbelievable restaurant subsequent door known as Fervor, which we have been advised by our resort concierge that the Prince of Belgium totally loved earlier that week. She did like to call drop a bit.

There was one exception although. So, native flights in Argentina have a weight restrict of 15kg per suitcase (that’s 33 kilos when you’re not used to Kilograms). That may be prolonged to 23kg or 50 kilos however you do should pay additional for that.

We nevertheless arrived in Argentina with 1 suitcase every, each of which weighed a minimum of 30kg every.

Oh and I nearly forgot to say, in case your suitcase is any greater than 23kg, it needs to be despatched by cargo which implies it’s going to arrive many days after you arrive at your vacation spot.

So we determined we had to purchase additional suitcases and cut up our baggage between our outdated and new suitcases. To purchase a brand new suitcase although we wanted to get some money out.

Seems you’ll be able to’t simply take money out in Argentina simply. That’s a complete story for one more day however after hours of making an attempt we managed to get simply £7/$10 out of a money machine, however that price is a £7/$10 cost for the withdrawal which means taking £7 out truly price us £14 in whole.

So, we have been offered with another choice – sending money to ourselves by way of Western Union cash switch. The speed is definitely good – you get twice the quantity of native forex in alternate when you do this.

However to do the Western Union switch, we wanted to have a neighborhood telephone quantity. So, we went out to search for a neighborhood sim automobile however that meant we wanted money to get one and so this cycle of continually on the lookout for one thing new simply continued.

Finally, because of the £7 from earlier, we finally received SIM playing cards however they wanted to get activated. The method is a complete dance during which we needed to ship messages on Fb or Twitter, sending passports over, then take pictures of ourselves with our passports and extra.

In spite of everything of that, the SIM playing cards then didn’t work and finally, whereas making our method by way of city in seek for suitcases, we made it to a cell phone store which is the place we have been advised that it might take a minimum of 4 days for the SIM playing cards to be lively so there was no level in anticipating that we might be capable of use them at any level that day for the Western Union switch.

It was a complete ridiculous dance and that is genuinely how we spent the higher a part of a day in Buenos Aires. Ethical of the story – arrive in Buenos Aires with money.

And no, not Kilos, that received’t be a lot use, Euros are barely higher however American {dollars} is vital! Take {dollars} with you. In the event you alternate money, you may get that unbelievable double alternate price I discussed earlier which means your cash is actually price twice as a lot as when you’d paid with a card.

The following leg of the journey concerned a flight to Ushuaia, the southernmost metropolis on the planet… and the inspiration for the title of probably the most well-known golf equipment in Ibiza. Once more, in Ushuaia, we determined to maintain very low key and stick with our resort (apart from a stint on the town to buy sea illness tablets).

For dinner and drinks, we caught to our resort, the Wyndham Backyard Ushuaia Resort del Glaciar, which to be truthful, had a reasonably respectable wine listing… which we proceeded to work our method by way of.

From Ushuaia, we might then should cross probably the most highly effective sea convergence on the planet and probably the most treacherous sea voyage on the planet – the Drakes passage. That is the place the Pacific Ocean, the Atlantic Ocean and the Southern Ocean and the waves right here might be as much as 12 metres / 40 toes excessive. And that’s earlier than winds of as much as 50 knots. (I don’t truly know what that actually means however I’m advised it’s quite a bit).

Or you’ll be able to have a fairly calm crossing – all of which is completely depending on the climate.

For that crossing, and the important thing cause why we got here to Argentina to start with, we received on board the Ocean Victory ship by Albatros Expeditions.

Ocean Victory is a model new luxurious ship and completely defies the expectations you could have of going to Antarctica. Years in the past once we began planning our journey, we have been anticipating to should do it in a tough core expedition kind vessel with restricted facilities.

We weren’t anticipating a ship with a spa, gymnasium, pool, unbelievable eating room, attractive social areas and exquisite bedrooms. Suffice to say, the second we came upon about Ocean Victory, it was such a straightforward sure.

I’ll present you all about what that’s like within the subsequent episode however yeah, that’s how we received to Antarctica.

When you’re accomplished with the Drakes Passage, the subsequent cease is Antarctica – the place your cruise ship will likely be your house for nevertheless many days you’re selecting to spend there, with a lot of alternatives to get off the boat and go cruising or go on land to fulfill the locals of Antarctica.

Catch you within the subsequent put up for all of that.