At Sea Tierra del Fuego Cape Horn
Buenos Aires Rio de Janeiro Bahia Amazon
After we quick visits to Jamaica, Columbia and Costa Rica, T/SS Stella
Solaris steamed through a warm sea to the canal's northeast entry port
early the morning of January 23rd. Evidently passenger ships get some preference
as there were a dozen or more freighters waiting to cross through the canal.
The eighth wonder of the world.
Nazca
the tuna boat
The French made the first attempt at digging the canal in the 1880's
under
the worst type of conditions, but abandoned the project after 300 million
dollars and 20000 lives had been lost to malaria, yellow fever, accidents
and other diseases. Just passing through the humid rain forest on
a hot day was enough. I imagined what it would be like just to survey
the canal's jungles, rivers and wetland swamps.
The first lock raises ships 85 feet in a series of 3 locks. The first ship passed through the canal in 1914, but it is safe to say that the canal will never be complete. It includes 2 parallel sets of 6 locks, a 164 square mile lake, and the 9 mile long Gaillard cut through the continental divide, dug with steam shovels and locomotives a century ago. Today “Panamax” ships up to 1000’ long, 40 feet of draught, and 108 feet in width traverse the canal, which is 110 feet in width, in 8 hours. The Stella Solaris, at 14000 tons and 70’ in width, had room to spare, so we traversed the locks with "Nazca", a US owned tuna fishing ship with a search helicpoter on its pad, probably based in Ecuador.
We traversed through six locks up and down 85' from the Caribbean to
the Pacific via a great lake on the isthmus of Panama. We arrived
3 hours late in Balboa and there was a lot of confusion on the part of
the Panamanian authorities, the ships Pilot (who guides the vessel through
the canal) and the Captain (who commands the ship) about where to dock.
As a result we ended up sideways (our ship is about 700' long) in
the channel accessing the Canal and there was a lot of hoorah on the bridge
(where they drive the ship). Tugs came out of nowhere and tied huge
ropes to the ship and whisked us out of there as a tanker went past while
from the bridge just above we heard not-quite hysterical pilot talking
about collisions and running aground.
Nazca
in the Panama Canal
When we landed it was at an abandoned US military base. It was evening already and the boat sails at midnight so we dashed out to the dock with Charlie and Judy, our New Yorker boat friends, to find an enormous Panamanian fellow named Juan who had a "special taxi". In broken Spanish I did manage to make arrangements for him to take us to Panama City. Juan the taxi driver showed us the gate, the barrios or slums of Panama City, and the sky scrapers. We had been a bit put off originally, but Juan was very protective and we ended up at a nice restaurant where they had Talisker whiskey and we ended up telling stories about our trip to Skye in 1984 and talking to a waitress from Ohio who somehow had ended up here with her son, and here they were as pastry chefs in Panama City!
The Canal was relinquished to the Panamanians on December 31, 1999.
The Americans packed up and left. Juan seem the think that the Panamanian
in the street was a bit sad about the Yankee departure. The US had kept
things organized, and Panama City is a far cry from that.
Stella Solaris arrived in Manta, which from the water looked like a dry, glorious coastal town on a cape with its hill “Monte Christo” gradually sloping to an attractive peak which gives a backdrop to the town. The port was bustling with tuna fishing industry, canneries, wooden boats under construction and we were welcomed by the town band and costumed dancers with a hail of a thousand balloons. Manta doesn’t see big ships very often and the arrival of Stella Solaris was a big event. The band played and the girls danced in yellow and red indigenous costume.
Barbara and I walked into town stopping to talk with the fishermen and
the various people along the long stone breakwater. Town was bustling
with taxis, people trying to sell trinkets, and begging children ranging
from street urchins to obviously well- cared-for 10 year olds, all chanting
what quickly became a familiar chorus “one dollar” with a hand out.
The "sucre" now trades for something around 30000 to the dollar and the
value of a greenback dollar quickly became very apparent. After a
visit to the bank, post office and the internet shop we ran across ship
friend Jeff McLucas (from San Rafael and Zimbabwe) and stopped at the street
café for a beer while I befriended several children who were still
interested in us even after they had given up hopes of the dollar.
I practiced my Spanish and learned a bit about their lives. When I tried
to buy them a coke they opted for “hamburguesas”.
Hamburguesas
all 'round -- Jeff
The Panama Hat Ladies in Manta
Manta was too big to walk so we hired an ancient taxi with an entirely unagressive driver, who gradually warmed to the idea of giving the tour as I further exercised my spanish. He showed us the government housing, the panama hat factory in nearby Monte Christo, the factories, markets, the country, the roads. We became good friends and talk turned to politics, economics, the new government and the feelings of the people. We never learned his name. Driver deposited us at the end of the day later at the “playa”, the beach, beaming with his take of the day—a 20 dollar greenback. We ended up with a group of Ecuadorian surfers at a surfside cafe talking about California surf. I realized they thought I was young so I took off my hat, and everybody laughed at my shiny head.
And then it was time for the ship to set to sea, so we ran back past the tunafish and climbed aboard the Stella Solaris and our steward Stamos (the Greek) served us local Mahi Mahi for dinner and we ate it with sterling silver cutlery as the lights of Ecuador faded over the horizon and we are headed for Peru.
First stop in Peru is Trujillo. Its Port Salaverry is not used
to seeing the likes of the Stella Solaris. Despite warnings to take
extreme caution we had no problems. The remarkable part of the Peruvian
coast is that, a thousand years ago, it was home to perhaps the largest
population in the world! We visited Huaca del Sol, Huaca de la Luna,
Chan Chan, ancient cultures who left behind vast cities and palaces in
the desert, plundered by Spanish conquistadores, vulnerable to climate
change and dominated by the Incas who controlled the flow of water from
the Andes (which somehow we felt but never saw—a great excuse to visit
again!). Decorated with the backdrop of Andean foothills and rushing rivers,
the coast of Peru is full of gardens, friendly people
Salavery
ChanChan 
Charles, Tom and Barbara at the Lima party
with wide faces of native American heritage, and poverty. The Andes
slope down into the Pacific through a huge desert dune where the rivers
empty into the ocean great hand dug irrigation ditches water the fertile
plains which grow everything from watermelons to dahlias. It never
rains yet the summer air is heavy with greasy humidity. People survive
on whatever they can.
My Spanish is improving. Each day brings new taxi drivers, new street vendors, new accents, vignettes of interaction with Peruvians as curious about us as we are about them. We visited a great Peruvian celebration in courtyard across from the Cathedral and I couldn’t get away without becoming the foolish gringo who danced with the Peruvian women the the cheers of the crowd. We escaped into a street market where I couldn’t resist trying the food that the street vendors were selling, it looked like fried cocks’ combs but I think it was tripe. I ended up sharing it with two young and hungry street urchins who enjoyed the meal. Lots of smiles.
Overnight aboard ship from Salaverry to Callao, the port of Lima, and a huge city, home of at least a third of the 20 million Peruvians, opened up to us. We received a great welcome with bands, balloons and speeches from local officials, and ready taxicabs. The varied group on the Stella Solaris disembarked in every direction to find a city as extreme as Mexico City.
We were stuck by the quality of what must have been life a hundred years ago and the impacts of the European culture. Lima is a city of extremes—the Spanish architecture, huge cathedrals, bull fights, street vendors, the poorest beggars and diesel fumes. A car stopped for us along the street and we engaged its driver Ruben to take us to Pachacamac, another culture of the Chimu. The ruins of Pachacamac a vast city of yet another vast Peruvian culture, people living in cardboard barrios, a huge port full of activity 24 hours a day, containers going in and out.
The Museo del Oro was extraordinary. A private collection of gold, ornaments, precolonial Chimu, Inca and artifacts spanning thousands of years and of such extraordinary quality you wonder if somehow the world missed the cradle of civilization.
Barbara and I stood at a bus stop and for one nuevo sol (30 cents) were treated to an extraordinary excursion around Lima, through the desert mountains with political slogans painted on the hills, past the markets, the portrait painters, the soldiers and the bands, the street vendors and the thousands of publicos, small private buses, going everywhere, amid the mass of culture and humanity that is Lima, so disturbingly out of balance with the ecological sensitivity of its surroundings that one does take pause to wonder what sort of civilization this millenium will create there.
We crossed through the Canal to Pacific again, welcomed by whales on
the water and dramatic swells on the ocean creating blue and white lines
on the water. How fine to be at sea for 56 days. It puts your
body on a different schedule and time is measured in our progress, the
latitude and longitude and distance from the Peruvian and Chilean coastal
towns, and the number of whales we sight from the boat deck where we can
walk or run in endless circles around the ship, pushing into the wind,
watching the boobies and the gannetts and always looking for whales, ships
and land. We have three days and four nights headed south at sea
from Lima to Valpariso. The Southern Cross rises in the sky each
night and the milky way broadens as we reach the southern sky. As
we leave the tropics the sea changes its blue and the winds freshen.
Sunrise to sunset to brilliant stars, on deck is the place to be.
With over 800 people on this ship, the best places mostly seem deserted.
One of my favorites is the top of the ship, over the bridge up by the smokestack.
As we head through the swells the panorama of the ocean rocks and I can
see everything.
Nobody goes to the top deck
The Stella Solaris Dancing Girls
T/SS Stella Solaris is a medium sized Greek ship at about 18000 tons. Built in 1953 it is one of the grand old ships, and today one of the oldest afloat. The Stella Solaris was a hospital ship during the Vietnam war and was refitted in 1974 for passengers. There are about 550 passengers and 300 crew—mostly Greek and Philipino. There are ships officers at the bridge, stewards in the dining room, cabin stewards and their assistants below, maintenance workers constantly painting, engine room workers shoveling coal (just kidding!, it's an oil powered steam turbine), a Latvian entertainment staff of 22 musicians and dancers, bartenders, cooks, laundry people, rug cleaners, electricians, a doctor and a chaplain, and others doing the host of other jobs to do aboard ship—all to indulge pleasure of the passengers. It’s a funny concept a village floating far out at sea, but it didn’t take long to get used to the routine.
Barbara and I are up at sunrise and we walk and jog the promenade deck. Seven times aroundand it's a mile, but who's counting? Then there’s tea and a shower. Water is made from sea water and is drinkable, but we found Andean spring water in bottles and that is good water.
Masked
Boobies
There are lots of people we’ll never meet, but the ones that we do meet
are friendly and interesting. Mostly retired Americans we are among
the youngest passengers aboard! There is a variety of French, Canadians,
Swiss and other nationalities. The Stella Solaris has quite a following.
Some of these people have been on the ship twenty times. There’s a good
balance of adventure for everyone. We survive from happy hour to
happy hour, watching for a green flash.
Dave and Mary
Tablemates
Judy and Charlie --Tassos
Meals are served seemingly non-stop. On formal night I have to
donn my polyester blue suit and head for the nightly feast. The plastic
bag effect of the polyester suit is muted by the captain via his cocktail
party preceeding the event. The Greek specialties are always good—lamb,
moussaka, Greek salads, olives, melons, ouzo and retsina. Our table
mates Judy and Charlie from Poughkeepsie, New York (where we used to live)
have become great friends. In the morning breakfast and lunches and
served buffet style on the “lido” deck aft, around the pool. It’s
not as fancy as the dining room, but there you are in the open air with
the South Pacific all around as the band plays on. I study my Spanish
textbook and speak French with my Belgian friends. Happy hour is
at 6. We watch the sunset and always look for the “green flash” (as
the sun sinks below the horizon—we never see it. Dinner is 8:30 to
10:00--although we're accustomed to being in bed by 8:30 at home we opted
for the late sitting and then there's a show (the 22 entertainers, remember)
and I usually go to the upper deck to see the stars as the wind whistles
and the Stella Solaris steams toward the horizon at 18 knots.
Speaking of the horizon, how far is that? Dig out a little geometry and trigonometry and it was easy to calculate yesterday--about 11 miles from the upper deck.
Today the computer spreadsheets seem to have eliminated the charm of the old ships—the promenade decks are now the balconies of expensive staterooms. There’s nothing outside because the cruise lines want people and their Visa cards in shipboard shops and casinos for short cruises. But this is a ship and we’re here for 56 days, all around South America with the charm of the high seas, pulling into port and the band plays on.
Puerto Montt, Chile
The
Chilean Lakes
Barbara and I have been so busy seeing everything down here in Patagonia
and Tierra del
Fuego that it's hard finding the time to do anything. Yesterday
we went
through the Straits of Magellan (where we are right now) by a great
channel of
glaciers and tundra it was absolutely spectacular. We saw innumerable
seals there,
a shipwreck, some whales, and finally we saw penguins from the ship.
All this wildlife
viewing was not without its cost. We stood on the bridge in the
arctic cold
The
Straits of Magellan
shivering away all day. There were channels, sort of like fjords,
going in every
direction. The scenery was so spectacular that you just couldn't
go
down below so it was an exhausting day. We were frosted over
by the time it was done
and I was numb. I came in and took a hot shower and it took about
ten minutes
before I could feel the water. All this aroused our
interest in penguins so much that after the ship docked at six this
morning in Puerta Arenas, the
world's southernmost city, we went off to visit a penguin colony.
It was truly remarkable.
Home to 3000 penguins some were in molt and could not swim and were
rather disgruntledly
sitting it out on land while their feathers grew. Others were
swimming, raising babies,
hatching eggs, enjoying the sun, or marching around in groups.
Nearby in a vernal pool
in a sand dune there were half a dozen pink flamingos standing on one
leg.
The Glaciers
Darwin
Glacier
A quiet sea south from Puerta Arenas we headed around the west side
of Tierra del Fuego and into
the Beagle Channel, made famous by Fitzroy's voyage of the Beagle.
At 6 am the fog was low
but crystal clear below. The channel banks were close on both
sides, covered in Nothofagus trees and tundra sedges and
penguins and seals were popping in and out of the black water.
We passed a solitary sailing yacht
under power with 3 cold bodies standing on deck.
The clouds lifted and there in front of us was the Darwin Glacier, and
mammoth expanse of ice on
the south side of Tierra del Fuego with its arms reaching down to the
water and delivering
green glacier water in enormous waterfalls cloaked by Nothofagus forests
typical of the southern hemisphere. We stood on deck in the quiet
morning and gazed at the ice in complete disbelief.
Later we passed into Argentine waters and put in at the town of Ushuaia,
the world's southernmost
town, and the take off point for Antarctic expeditions. Another
glacier decorated the mountain
above the village, and all it took was a few minutes of looking at
the place through the
binoculars from the upper deck and it was obvious that this was the
place to go. Barbara and
I took a taxi to a chair lift, the lift to its top, and hiked above
the tree line up the mountain to where the
Martial Glacier was raining boulders and ice, gouging its was through
the schist rock,
and the Stella Solaris was a dot in the distance. Welcome to
Argentina, we arrived there from
the south!
South America eventually ends. We steamed past the Glaciers in the Beagle
Channel on the south
side of Tierra del Fuego and headed to Cape Horn this morning.
At 56 degrees south latitude and
66 degrees west longitude it was grey, windy, rough and frigid place
marked by a rocky cliff plunging
into the water and a solitary lighthouse. Barbara and I woke
at six and went up onto the promenade deck.
Just to walk around the deck it felt like climbing a mountain.
At one point the southwest winds
became so strong we couldn't make it around the bow. Then we
figured out that if you crinkle
up your body so you are practically crawling along the deck, then the
wind resistance is less
and we could make it around.
Cape
Horn
Antarctica is some 400 miles away but we are not going there this trip.
Just about everybody
in the whole world lives north of here. We rounded the horn,
took photos, found a place out of
the wind, drank a toast of French Champagne with our friends,
and the ship headed
north, back up the east side of South America through the south Atlantic.
Puerto Madryn
Magellanic Penguins
Low lying banks on a huge bay where sea lions and whales find refuge.
Peninsula Valdez harbors wildlife of all sorts. Penguin colonies,
and the endless dry scrub of Patagonian Argentina. Perhaps it is
the light that they like because you can spend the day just sitting there
and looking at it.
Yesterday we visited Montevideo, Uruguay, which means we will never
again
be confused about which is Paraguay and which is Uruguay. It's
funny
how going somewhere, even for a short time, cements an image in your
mind.
There is a long channel into the Port, a busy place, with rusted hulks
adorning the
side of the channel made famous by the 1944 German scuttling of the
Graf Spea. We stared
in disbelief at the two cruise ships there (Seaborn Sky and the Norwegian
Sea or something like
that--floating hotels and casinos, not real ships) and felt a little
bit classy on the Stella Solaris!
An oil tanker pulled up alongside and the Captain filled the tank!
The town was very European, it might have been somewhere in Italy or
France. Uruguay is
a wealthy place, made more so by rich Argentinians who travel via a
Hobart (Tasmanian) built
catarmaran ferry ship to their holiday villas at Punta del Esta.
Joan
and Stanley, also of Inverness, in Montevideo
and some young fellow (maybe 20 years old) spotted my hankerchief in
my pocket and apparently thought
it was my wallet (I was wearing the money belt and had left my wallet
on
the ship). He ran up behind me and grabbed my hankie right out
of my
pocket and ran off. In all my life I've never been pickpocketed
before and
here I lost my hankie! Fortunately I brought two of them with
me.
Buenos Aires is simply grand. The Paris of South America.
Madonna chose the right city to make such an opulent film as "Evita".
Big, fine, fast, rich, expensive and elegant. Great Boulevards,
fine urban parks and neighborhoods, great classic architecture, fine
food, complex culture evolved from a long history, plans for a great
future, and, of course, fresh air.
Eva Peron Presidential Palace
Meat hanging at a Buenos Aires lunch stop
Situated at the mouth of the Rio Plata which is actually an estuary
which flows inland as far as Paraguay, and which is the
delta of a number of rivers, Buenos Aires looked like collections of
modest sized skyscrapers and refineries from the water as we arrived into
the busy port, freighters coming and going narrowly avoiding each other
as we traverse through a 100 mile long channel of green and red marked
buoys. But that image soon changed.
It's easy to spend time in Buenos Aires, and of course we only had 3 days of that so they were busy. We found a hotel in the city with Judy and Charlie Kelly, our tablemates and by now great friends. We lunched on Argentian beefsteaks and beer, and from there made plans for Tango, the sensuous dance of Argentina. Along with the Gaucho culture they become the Ballet Folklorico of Argentina. We went to the "early" show which started at 10 pm. The music was amplified to the point that it defeated the eardrums entirely and all you had to do was relax and get used to it. Tango itself was an acrobatic and visual feast.
We left Buenos Aires and full of culture and fine things. It was
such a magical city, full of Parisian like places and things, good food,
antiques, great places and parks.
Rio
On February 22 we arrived in Rio de Janeiro--an incredible city and
a beautiful place. It was
obvious that the place was pretty special as we sailed into the harbor,
hugh round
dome monoliths arising out of the water and the land. We arrived
and
sprang from the ship into a taxi and off to Copacabana Beach and it
was no disappointment--a throng of thonged bodies and boys playing
volleyball soccer and light waves lapping the white sand beach.
Hot.
We took off our shoes and walked in the water, which wasn't cold but
not
too warm either (probably not the cleanest water we've ever waded in).
We quickly learned the bus system and off we went to the Sugarloaf.
There
is a cable tramway (like the one at Squaw Valley) that goes up there
in
two stages and so we did. What a panorama as the sun set!
Rio. Mums
and I found a restaurant up there and we had dinner overlooking the
lights
of Rio.
The next day it was a city bus tour. First stop was the Corcobado,
the
110' Christ statue which stands atop another dome with open open arms
over the City. At night
it is lit up and looks like the guardian angel against the black sky.
There is a little train that goes up there through the forest park.
(Rio
is full of parks). On to the botanical garden with thousands
of species
of orchids and bromiliads, and then to Ipanema beach. A long
walk along
the beach and another bus ride back to the ship, which is docked at
the
city pier inside the harbor (Rio has a huge harbor, sort of like San
Francisco Bay).
No sooner were we back exhausted and it was time to go to the Samba.
Being the week before Carnival the excitement is growing everywhere
in
Rio. What an experience. A pulsating mass of humanity on
exhibit,
loud Samba music amplified beyond audible levels, you just vibrate.
People
of every age (but with a great majority of teenagers) dancing until
3 in the morning. We had had innumerable warnings, but we felt
entirely accepted and safe. Brazil lives on the edge, but the
rythym
and drama of life is the most important. A few days of Rio and
you
understand.
Sunday Feb. 27. We just arrived in Salvador da Bahia (at the eastern
tip of Brazil).
Barbara and I woke up expecially early and we came into the port in
the
early morning light. The sun rose over the city. There
was the long awaited
Salvador da Bahia. It's churches, its life, its culture, its
history--readying
for Carnaval too. We'll be exploring today while Bahia plays.
Salvador
da Bahia at sunrise
Our happy friend inBahia
Carnaval Preparations
The Mecca of rainforests! The monster of rivers. We steamed
a night and half a day through the
Amazon delta to Belem, and went exploring the extraordinary biodiversity
of the rivers.
186 million people live on the coast, and a few in the Amazon, which
takes up most of
the country. Brazil is a non-conforming land of contrasts.
The ship sailed in to a village outside of Belem, which is
located in a tributary south of the huge island at the delta.
We went ashore
by tender and took a taxi into Belem--a visual feast to be sure.
Lumber
mills, river boats filled with enormous catfish, hawkers selling everything
from oranges and coconuts
to polyester swim suits and used electrical components. The butcher
was killing
the hogs in the back room and hanging the ribs up for sale on a hook
facing the street. Portuguese is pronounced so differently from
Spanish
that there's not much communication between speakers of those languages.
Our taxi driver did not understand where we wanted to go except that
we
wanted a boat on the river. He took us to the ferry to Manaus,
which is
1500 km upstream. I was tempted but it wouldn't work as we had
only 12
hours.
We ended up on a smaller boat chugging through the mangroves and the
canals
visiting a small river community at the edge of the rainforest.
The houses
are all on stilts as the river rises and falls. Everything is alway
wet--during
the dry seasons it rains only some of the time and during the rainy
season
it rains all the time. (Of course it poured with rain while we were
there--I
took off my shirt and tucked in in my hat and then put it back on when
the
rain stopped). The family there had a monkey (which bit poor Charles
when he got
too friendly. They cut down a
big round fruit off their tree and chopped it open with the machete.
The
triagular seeds inside turned out to be Brazil nuts! What a surprise.
They
showed us trees they use for rubber, makeup, cake icing, and medecines.
The
community had no electricity in spite of an high tension powerline
crackling
away overhead--bring power to Belem from Brazil's huge hydro facilities.
The children paddled their boats around the riverbanks, the men hauled
ice
and pushed the great carts uphill with all their strength. Market
boats laden
with common goods paddled from house to house. We were charmed
by
the ability of the people to abide in this wet place and the respect
they
had developed for their forest. We felt the Amazon.
TSS Stella Solaris pulled anchor just as it got dark and chugged out
to sea through the
Delta. At 3:30 a.m. this morning we crossed the equator as the
gps rolled
over from south to north. We are headed for Devil's Island, French
Guiana,
a penal colony made famous by Papillon, its lone escapee who wrote
a book about it.
Belem 
The Belem Tarantula Man
Life on the Amazon
Carnaval preparations in Recife
We pulled into Port of Spain on early Tuesday, March 7 for Carnaval.
The day South America and the
Caribbean wait for had arrived and we had the finest! Boom boxes
the size of trailer trucks. "Ash in the Air".
There's no description. Heat. Bodies. Music. Joy.
Everything stops for Carnaval!
Carnaval Day!
Carnaval
in Port of Spain
Fort Lauderdale rolled up over the horizon. Fifty-six days was over.
Home was no longer the Stella Solaris. We saw South America in a different way. A taste or two of adventure. 17000 miles at sea spanning 80 degrees of latitude. We are different people for the experience, ready to return to our lives on the land. What a way to travel. See you on deck.
Back to work!
Text and photos by Tom Gaman, East-West Forestry Associates. Copyright 2000. All rights reserved.
High quality copies of these digital photos are available from tg@forestdata.com
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