Author: cjrobbins11

My nephew Mitchell is quite a hiker. He has completed the Pacific Crest Trail and the Continental Divide trail. In April 2023, he is heading to New Mexico to camp out on a piece of land he bought. This land is strategically placed to greet south-to-north Continental Divide hikers leaving the deserts and entering the… Continue reading Shameless Promotion

I have wanted to go to Antarctica for a long time. And, now I’ve been there with my sister Marilyn. Ushuaia, Argentina is the point of departure for many expeditions to Antarctica. Our ship arrived there on Day 32 (February 15). At least six other ships were docked in Ushuaia on that day, all heading… Continue reading Antarctica

Then we entered the Chilean Fjords to travel south for two more days. This is an extensive inland waterway, which reminded me of the inside passage going to Alaska. But it is like the inside passage on steroids, more extensive, more of a remote wilderness and breathtaking. The highlight of this trip was sailing by… Continue reading Super Fjords

The Southwestern part of Chile is impressive. On Day 28 (February 11), we were headed for Puerto Montt. This involved a long sail through a wilderness channel way inland. By the next day, we were in Patagonia, with mountains and more inland waterways as we sailed to Puerto Chacabucco. We walked in a rainforest, a… Continue reading Patagonia

We arrived in the north of Chile on Day 21 (February 4) and will be sailing south off the coast of Chile for almost 2 weeks, stopping in seven ports. I now know that Chile is the longest and narrowest country in the world, 2,700 miles long. The first two ports we visited in northern… Continue reading Desert

On day 11 (January 26), we pulled into the port of Acajutla in El Salvador. I joined an excursion to the city of San Salvador. We visited the cathedral where Monsieur Oscar Romero presided before he was murdered in 1980. Today the (now Saint) Romero’s pictures are just to the right of the altar. His… Continue reading A Potempkin Village?

Sprung is the word that filled my mind when I was allowed out of my cabin on Day 8 after isolation because of COVID. When I first looked the word sprung up in my online dictionary, I learned that it is the past participle of spring, as in “you can get a more conventional and… Continue reading Sprung

Here is my home for the next six months. Comfortable, compact, with light coming through the window. Little did I know . . . two days into the cruise, this cabin would become my world. I tested positive for COVID yesterday, and will now be in this room for at least the next five days.… Continue reading Welcome to Your Cabin

I have been doing a lot of what feels like leave-taking lately. Saying a permanent goodbye to a house that was filled with dreams and memories was a start. Then, I downsized enough to move my remaining belongings into a 10 x 15 foot storage facility. And then, there has been an extended time of… Continue reading Leave-Taking