We purchased a national parks admission pass called America the Beautiful, which allows free access to all the national parks for a year at the cost of $80. This will pay for itself in no time, given the abundance of national parks in the USA.
We started off at Crater Lake National Park in Oregon, a volcano which erupted thousands of years ago and caused the collapse of its tall peak, Mount Mazama. The crater then filled up with water from snow and rain, forming the deepest lake in the USA and perhaps the most pristine lake on earth. Whilst we have seen many beautiful lakes on this trip-we have never seen anything like the deep blue colour of Crater Lake and how clear it is. Due to several unique factors, mainly that the lake has no inlets or tributaries, the waters of Crater Lake are some of the purest in the world because of the absence of pollutants. Two islands are in Crater Lake: Wizard island formed from a cinder cone that erupted after Crater Lake began to fill with water, and the smaller Phantom Ship, which has seven trees living on it.

On day one, we drove around the rim of the crater-stopping at numerous viewpoints along the way and did a couple of short hikes. Everywhere we stopped had a different, stunning perspective of the Lake and its vivid colours. On day two, we hiked to the highest point in the national park, Mount Scott-where we were treated to a panoramic view of the whole Lake. We also hiked down to the Lake and dipped our toes in its cool water.

We then headed towards the Humboldt Redwoods national and state parks, home to the largest remaining old growth redwood forest in the world. On the way, we stopped at Crescent City where we had decided to free camp for the night in Walmart`s car park. Well, what a barrel of laughs that was! We arrived late after having our tea in a scenic lay-by where we met James, a fellow Brit who now lives in California who loves landys! He spotted Ruby and pulled over and we had a great chat about landys, travel etc. When we arrived at Walmart at about 8.30pm, we were followed in by 3 police cars who began searching the bushes next to the car park with flash lights! Shortly afterwards, as we left the store-the security guards were chasing a couple of shop lifters. We hesitantly set up the roof tent and fell asleep. We were only awoken twice in the night-once by a female screaming at a car as it screeched away " don`t leave me here" and another time by another alleged shoplifter shouting at the security guards! Bleary eyed at 6.30 am the next morning-we wound down the roof tent and made us of Walmart`s clean bathrooms and good wifi!

Humboldt state park was simply breathtaking for the sheer size of the trees.  The park is famed for its coast redwoods, many of which grow to over 300 feet (91 m) in height. Over 100 of the 137 known trees over 350 feet (110 m) tall—all coast redwoods—occur in Humboldt Redwoods State Park. It is home to the 4th-tallest measured living redwood, Stratosphere Giant, which was measured at 112.94 metres (370.5 ft) in 2004. Stratosphere Giant was the tallest known living redwood until the discovery of three taller trees in Redwood National Park: the tallest, Hyperion, measuring 115.55 metres (379.1 ft) in September 2006.
Before the discovery of Hyperion, the tallest redwood ever measured was the Dyerville Giant, also in Humboldt Redwoods State Park. It was 113.4 metres (372 ft) high when it fell in March 1991. It was estimated to be 1,600 years old. The Dyerville Giant can be seen on Founders Grove Nature Trail, which honors the creators of Save-the-Redwoods League. Also in this grove is Founders Tree, which is 346 feet (105 m) tall with circumference of 40 feet (12 m).  As we headed down to the Redwood National park-we saw all of these trees and did some hikes among them. We visited Fern Canyon, a location for the film Jurassic Park 2:The Lost World, and wandered up the floor of the Canyon. The walls were covered in wet moss and ferns and the canyon contained fallen trees, which we had to clamber over. We drove down the Avenue of Giants- the world famous scenic drive of 31 miles, driving by the most outstanding display of Redwood trees in the world. We stopped many times to take short walks through the forest and gazed upwards in awe at the height and girth of the trees. We had never seen anything like it before and it is one of our favourite places.

We were in Redwood State park for the total eclipse, and shared the 90% coverage with many others, all of us staring at the moon covering the sun, in awe, whilst wearing our protective glasses! This was  great experience surrounded by the majestic trees and watching nature at its very best. We also met a couple of lovely Aussies here-Jen and Pat-who are on vacation on the US.

After free camping at another casino for the night (we had  a little flutter!), we made our way to the famous Yosemite national park, where we camped outside the boundaries for 4 nights. We explored the park over a couple of days. Yosemite is internationally recognized for its granite cliffs, waterfalls, clear streams, giant sequoia groves, lakes, mountains, glaciers, and biological diversity. On day one, we caught the shuttle bus in the park, the length of Yosemite valley, doing some short walks along the way. At El Capitan, a vertical granite rock formation, that is one of the world`s favourite challenges for rock climbers. There are many climbing routes up the sheer granite face, all of them arduous and many requiring 2 or 3 nights sleeping  on the rock. We met a lovely couple of lads from the UK here, Joe and Sam, who were climbing it the next day. We loved meeting them as they were down to earth, funny and inspirational and we resolved to come back and watch them climb it through the telescopes that the park sets up. On night one of their climb, we received a message from them on Facebook about what they were having for tea on the side of a vertical rock face! We went into the park the next day and found them through the telescope, telling everybody at the bottom about them so they could all have a peak! We heard through Joe`s Dad that they reached the top on the 3rd day.

Just a little aside here about the wonderful American people we are meeting on a daily basis. They have such a genuine interest and curiosity about our car and our trip and we are stopped by them at least 3 or 4 times a day, as they ask about the car, our travels etc. This has been the most interest people in any country have shown so far, and we have really enjoyed chatting to people and sharing stories with them.

We left Yosemite to head towards Utah and our next workaway placement. We drove into a heat wave when we stopped in Bakersfield, the temperatures pushing 111 degrees!! We had a very hot night in the rooftent and got up early to head ever closer to Utah. That was until Ruby had other ideas! She decided to stop whilst trying to turn right at traffic lights and we were stranded in the middle of the road! A lovely lady, who must have been at least in her 60s, jumped out of her car and helped us to push the 3 tonnes Ruby to the side of the road!! We were amazed!

To cut a long story short-it is clear that Ruby wishes to seek fame and fortune in Los Angeles, as she has had her head turned by all the interest she has had in her! So we are driving her there to a mechanics tomorrow- and will probably leave her there whilst we do our month in Utah, hiring a car (air conditioned!!) to take us to Utah in time to start our work. Ruby, meanwhile, will be in LA, daaaarling, so watch out as she may be on a screen near you, sometime soon!
 
 

We left Seattle and headed to the Mount Rainier National Park, where we camped for 2 nights. Ascending to 14,410 feet above sea level, Mount Rainier stands as an icon in the Washington landscape. It is an active volcano, and the most glaciated peak in the U.S.A. (outside of Alaska). Subalpine wildflower meadows ring the icy volcano while ancient forest cloaks Mount Rainier’s lower slopes. On day 1 we visited an area of the park called Paradise and it was so beautiful, particularly the superb views of ice clad Mount Rainier and the meadows covered with a variety of colourful subalpine flowers. It was one of the prettiest places we had ever been. We did 2 short hikes here to admire the views and then hiked a short trail nearby called the Grove of the Patriots, where we walked through massive thousand year old trees. The following day we went to Sunrise, another area of the park where we took another couple of short hikes and saw the Mountain from a different angle.

Ruby is quite the attraction in the US, with numerous people approaching us to ask about her, admire her etc. The people have been brilliant-very friendly and curious. We met a lovely lady called Jo (Patti) who was hiking past our camp spot with a friend, we have since received such a kind email from her wishing us well on our trip and sharing some of her own history with us. One man kept walking past for a look at Ruby and when we stopped to talk, he said (in a deep southern drawl, imagine Forest Gump`s accent) " that`s about the sweetest car I ever did see"! Well I could swear that Ruby batted her headlamps at him in delight!

From Rainier, we made our way to Mount St Helens, another active volcano which erupted violently in 1980, with its north side collapsing and triggering a lateral blast that devastated 150 square miles and sent up an eruption column that reached the stratosphere. It also caused the largest landslide ever. We visited the Mount St Helen`s Forest learning centre, which showed a short film about the eruption and had some excellent displays about its impact and the regeneration work that has gone on since. We also visited Johnston ridge observatory, which had spectacular views of the volcano and surrounding area. It was so interesting to see how the once conical volcano, had a gaping space on the side where it blew and how the valleys have been shaped by the eruption.

We decided to head to Portland, the capital of the State of Oregon, as we had read about a land rover mechanics there and Ruby (the sweet thing!) was in need of some TLC, in particular we were leaking oil out of the rear wheel hub. We had met the great family in Alaska (Stacey, Ryun, Paton and Heath) on the cruise who lived in Oregon, so we messaged them and they immediately invited us to stay with them. We had such a great 2 nights with them, playing pool, listening to music and chatting away to them. Whilst we were there they told us about the Tillamook county fair, on the coast, which was due the following weekend. When Gav heard that there was a race at the fair that involved people racing Ford model T cars whilst holding a piglet under their arm, we were destined to go there!

We took Ruby into the wonderful PDX British garage and met Francis, the owner and his wife, Elsa. They showed us such tremendous kindness, taking us out for lunch, having such an interest in our trip and ultimately not charging us for the 4 or so hours of work they did on Ruby. We loved meeting such kind, interesting people and hope to see them some day on the road.

Off we went again, arranging to meet our Oregon family at the weekend. We headed for the Oregon coast and highway 101, one of the most scenic coastal roads in the US. We started out at Cannon beach, where we camped overnight next to the beach, earning us a telling off at 7am the following morning when a ranger pulled up and told us we should not have camped there! Cannon beach was a beautiful sandy beach, with dramatic shoreline rock formations, such as Haystacks, which is home to puffins and other birds. We visited it early in the morning at low tide, where you can walk right up to it and see the birds and the marine life in the rockpools. It was beautiful. We visited Ecola park, which had wonderful views of the beaches and rock formations and hiked into the forest which hugs the coastline. We drove the coastline on the way to the Tillamook cheese factory, stopping at the numerous viewpoints to see the sandy beaches, the forests, and the caves. At the cheese factory we tasted some of the lovely cheese (the best we have tasted this trip!) and their glorious ice cream!

We stopped by at Astoria, visiting the tower and the County jail, where part of the Goonies was filmed. It is  now a film museum and we spent a great hour in here, as you can act our short scenes from films that have been filmed in the area. We threw ourselves into this with gusto, earning a few looks from other customers, none who wanted to join in! We did scenes from The Shining, Point Break, Twilight  and Kindergarten Cop. The best was Twilight where Gav had a long wig and crown and I thought I was wearing a unicorn hat, which was actually a broken Viking hat!

We met some characters whilst camping in the RV park at Cannon beach. Bob was a lovely gentleman in his mid seventies, who would come and chat a few times a day and give us good advice on places to visit in the US. He made me smile when he asked me what I did for a living. When I told him I worked with people who got into trouble-he made a firing gun gesture and said "I'd shoot them all"."So you`re a liberal then Bob?! I teased him. He was a super gentleman in spite of our differences of opinion on certain matters, with a genuine curiosity in our trip.

The weekend dawned and it was time to reunite with our Oregon family to go to the Tillamook fair. We met them at their beach house (amazing terrace with sea views) and we headed off. We had a great day there, looking at the livestock, eating the best fried food (corn dogs and chips) and betting a couple of dollars on the horse racing. The highlight was undoubtedly the Pig n Ford world championship finals, which are world famous. It involved the driver collecting a piglet from a pen, cranking up their ford model T car and driving it around the arena,  swapping piglets each lap! The commentator said it is one of the most redneck things you will ever see! There was also a demolition derby which was equally as entertaining.

We spent the following day with the family, crabbing in their small boat and chilling out together on their wonderful balcony. In the evening, we played poker and had a fire with s`mores! We really hope to meet these guys again one day.

Saying goodbye on the Monday, we headed off again down the coast and spotted numerous grey whales close to the shore along the way. We camped at a casino overnight which offered free RV camping. We had a little flutter in the casino and made use of the free sodas and coffees, and the immaculate toilets! We stayed for one night in Sutherlin in an RV park and met a wonderful lady in her 70s who asked me where I was from. When I replied "England" she came over and, in all seriousness, asked me "what does the Queen think of Trump?!" she followed it up by saying "because I think he`s a Motherfuc...."! (you can guess the rest!). "I think that`s probably what the Queen thinks too" I spluttered! The RV park was originally the location of a drive in movie theatre and it still has its huge screen. The owners have invested in a huge projector and a sound system. we asked whether they were showing a film that night and they told us we could choose one! Gav chose the Goonies, as we had just passed through where it was filmed and we spent the evening on the grass, watching it on the big screen. It was brilliant!
Our next stop is the beautiful Crater Lake National Park, where we will spend a few days before heading towards Utah and our next workaway placement!
 
 

We camped for a couple of nights at Lake Ki, North of Seattle whilst we prepared for our cruise. We headed to a huge outlet park to buy some decent clothes to wear on the ship for "Gala nights"! I purchased a frock and Gav got some decent trousers-all at a massive discount so we were happy! After 14 months on the road-our clothes have a permanent grubbiness about them and we did not want to let the side down on the ship!

The day of the cruise dawned. We were heading off for 2 weeks down the inside passage of Alaska, on a mid size ship carrying about 1300 passengers. We parked Ruby at the car park on the docks and boarded the ship. It was massive compared to the Fram, our wonderful boat that took us to the Antarctic. There were 9 floors for passenger use, which contained a few restaurants,2 swimming pools, bars, lounges, shops, an art gallery, cinema and casino! Our room was lovely and had a big window with a sea view. It also had a comfy seating area and flat screen TV, which we became glued to every night watching American politics! It made us feel slightly better about British politics!

Well this cruise turned into the longest 2 weeks of our trip so far! Whist we loved Alaska and really enjoyed the wonderful staff and food aboard the ship, we soon realised the cruising life is not one for us! There was a huge emphasis on shopping and gambling and much less focus on the places and wildlife we would be seeing. We met a lot of lovely people on the ship and also met quite a lot that were rude and greedy. More of that later!

Gav and I were super excited on the first couple of days on the boat. By 9am on morning 1, we had: been to the gym (at 6am!!!); had breakfast and lost $10 in the casino! This was our first and last time in the casino and we were gobsmacked at people who seemed to be in the casino day and night, feeding the machines and tables. One man told us he would not care if the boat never stopped at ports-so he could play in the casino all the time!

Now to Alaska, the biggest state in the USA although one of the least populous. What a beautiful, wild and remote place. We sailed past miles and miles of rugged, mountainous coastline covered with thousands of fir trees, saw numerous whales blowing in the sea and floated past some spectacular glaciers. wildlife is in abundance here, bears, bald eagles, moose, elks, salmon, and many more. Our first stop was Ketchikan, a small Alaskan town, where we did our own walking tour using a great visitor`s map. The ship docked at the edge of town, so we literally got off and were in the middle of things. We visited the totem heritage centre, which holds a world renowned collection of original, unrestored totem poles from the 19th century. We also visited the very picturesque Creek Street, which was the red light district from 1902. More than 30 "bawdy" houses lined the creek over the years. With prohibition, some became speak easies; rowboats slipped in at night on a high tide and liquor rose through trap doors. Now the houses had been converted to small shops and cafes all built on wooden stilts over the creek.

Our next stop was Juneau, the capital of Alaska, but not possible to reach by road! It was a pretty, small City with the water on one side and mountains behind it. Juneau was originally inhabited by the Tlinglit  people who hunted and fished along its shores. It then became known for gold mining, and grew to be one of the most elaborate gold mining operations in the world. We took a tour here to the nearby Mendenhall glacier, Alaska`s most accessible glacier. We took a short walk to Mendenhall lake where a huge waterfall crashed down and we could also view the glacier. Alaska has 100,000 glaciers covering 28,000 square miles, equal to 5% of the state. Mendenhall glacier is one of the 38 large glaciers that flow from the 1,500 square mile expanse of snow and ice known as the Juneau ice field.  As the glacial ice accumulates seasonally, gravity pulls the ice down valleys. Slowly and steadily the glacier scours bedrock, grinding everything to powder or transporting huge boulders on its 13 mile path to Mendenhall Lake. Nearby, were short walking trails which led to salmon spawning grounds-a prime place to see bears! We saw none on this day-but did see massive red salmon flipping and jumping out of the water which was an incredible sight! We also saw a porcupine up a tree. We spotted a lot of electric wires and a TV camera. Mum had already told us that the BBC were going to filming wild Alaska live over a few days. We spotted a camera man checking the equipment so we rushed over to him, and told him that we were from England and loved the BBC! We had a little chat about the programme and he told us who the presenters were and where they were filming. It was due to go out from that spot live, the following evening in England. After the glacier, we returned to town and caught a cable car tram up Mount Roberts. The views from the top were great, of Juneau, Douglas island, Gastineau channel and the Chilkat mountains.

In addition to our landings, we had some days spent at sea. On these days, there were activities and talks which you could go to. It became very clear very soon that there was a huge focus on shopping, with a lot of talks about what to buy in various ports and what deals were on at the shops in the ship. I went to some of these talks and experienced some people pushing, in fact one lady pushed me to get to her seat earning a very English " excuse me"! People would also holler for free stuff and almost fight each other to get it as it was thrown into the audience. I also went to the art auctions, which I really enjoyed, as there was also a lot of info given about the art. We also got free champagne. The lovely waiter slipped and knocked a small amount of champagne over a woman sitting waiting for the auction. She jumped up shrieking, (excuse the language) " this is fucking shit" and ran out of the room! She returned a short while later and threw her clothes at one of the staff, demanding that they launder them for her! The other thing we struggled to understand was how much food people would order. We sat with different people every night for dinner and were perplexed when some people would order 2 main meals and 2 starters.  People would also tell us that we must send our food back if we did not like it and get something else or order 2 of something if we wanted to. There was a lot of excess and this did not feel right to us, even though we are both very fond of our food!

We did meet 2 wonderful sets of people. Jurgen and Sharon from Florida, and Jurgen told us wonderful stories from when he back packed around the world for a couple of years in his 20s (he is now in his mid 70s with the same sense of fun and adventure as ever!). Also a great family from Oregon, Stacey, Ryun and their 2 great boys-Heath and Payton. We had dinner with them a few times as they were such good company and they were also great dancers-all of them dancing every night in the nightclub!

We visited Icy strait point, where I went on my best wildlife watching trip in Alaska. I went on a grizzly bear watching tour, with a small group and guide. We drove to all of the areas where the grizzlies were known to frequent, in particular the rivers which were full of salmon, prime bear food. We saw a total of 8 grizzly bears and it was brilliant to see them in their natural habitat. We saw a mother with her 2 cubs ambling after her, and a number of other bears in the river hunting for salmon, whilst we observed from a bridge. One bear came under the bridge we were standing on and was only about 40 feet away at one stage.

Other highlights were Anchorage, where we visited the nearby glacier of Portage aboard a small boat and then went to the Alaska wildlife conservation centre, which provided spacious enclosures and care for its injured and orphaned animals including black and brown bears, wolves, moose, elks, etc. In Homer we spotted a wild moose feeding on the wetlands and a pair of bald eagles nesting. In Sitka, we visited a wonderful place for orphaned bears called the Fortress of the Bear. The 8 bears were housed in 2 acres of space and it was possible to view them close up. They were clearly happy, well looked after and stimulated-2 of them were swimming and playing in a large lake in the middle of their enclosure. The mission at the Fortress of the bear is to rescue orphaned bear cubs, bring them back to full health and provide them with a long enriched life. Other than here, Alaska has no bear rehabilitation programme in place so orphaned cubs are routinely shot for lack of an alternative. They would eventually like to see the law in Alaska change, so that the bear cubs can be released back into the wild, where they belong. We also visited the rapture recue centre which cares for injured eagles and other birds, releasing those which have been rehabilitated back into the wild.

Sitka was also interesting for its Russian style buildings-as Alaska was owned by the Russians until 1867 when the USA purchased it for just over 7 million dollars, the transfer taking place in Sitka.

We spent an afternoon scenic cruising on our ship to the Hubbard glacier, which was spectacular. Although we stopped within a mile of it-it felt really close and we could see and hear chunks of ice carving into the sea.
The last day of the cruise was spent in Victoria, on Vancouver island, a place we were familiar with from our 5 weeks on the island. We walked the harbour path and rejoiced that we would be free again the following day! "Get me off this sodding boat" said Jen much to Gav`s amusement!

We were delighted to disembark in Seattle and found a camp site on Bainbridge island, a ferry ride from the city centre. We caught the ferry for 2 days into the centre of town whilst we saw the sights. On day 1, we were hijacked by a couple of young lads who were trying to get people to attend a timeshare presentation. They were offering all sorts of incentives and we managed to get them to offer free tickets to all of the sights we had planned to see over the next few days! For this, we were whisked off by taxi to a posh hotel and introduced to our personal timeshare agent, Matt. Poor Matt. We were both very polite and listened intently to everything he had to say. We also answered his questions very honestly, so when he asked us both what our dream vacation would be, I answered honestly ,that I would love to travel to outer space. Well, he went a shade of grey, as I am not sure they are doing timeshares in space....yet! After 2 hours, the poor lad was sweating and bought in the big gun. He spent abut 2 minutes with us and realised we were not going to buy a time share in their luxury hotel chin, and sent us off with our free tickets!

We visited the Space needle and its superb viewing platform with views across Seattle and beyond, the amazing Chiully glass and gardens and did an underground tour of Seattle. My favourite place was free to enter: the Bill and Melinda Gates foundation which displayed in an interactive and entertaining way, the monumental good work they do around the world. One of their goals is to inspire others to make a difference and it this place really facilitated that. Armed with loads of leaflets, Jen marched off ready to try and change the world again!

We loved Seattle and now plan to head to the national parks of Mount Rainier and St Helens. We are so glad to be back in  Ruby!
 

We left Rocky Creek winery after a wonderful 5 weeks and headed back to Vancouver, where we  rented an airbnb whilst waiting for Ruby to arrive. We really enjoyed Vancouver, particularly hiring bikes and cycling around the sea wall at Stanley Park and visiting the fantastic aquarium there. We got the news from Dane that Ruby had arrived safely in Vancouver, and we met him early one morning at customs to clear Ruby for collection. We picked her up on the morning of my birthday and we were delighted to see her! She started first time and clearly could not wait to get going again! That evening we wild camped at Spanish Banks, next to the beach, with Dane, Penny and Wyatt the dog. It was great to see them again after last seeing them in Chile at least 8 months ago. We did not realise that it was illegal to wild camp here and also to drink alcohol in public. Guess what we were doing?! Both! Well suddenly 2 police officers came driving over on their massive quad bikes and by the look on Penny and Dane`s faces, I realised that something was wrong! We went into charm overload. However, they were the nicest blokes you could imagine and had actually come over because one of them really wanted a landrover! After almost an hour of chat and guided tours of Ruby, I cheekily asked if we could have a picture on their quad bikes. They agreed and we had our photo taken with them and the bikes, much to the amusement of people nearby.

We spent Canada day, 1st July, at Canada place where there were huge celebrations for Canada`s 150th anniversary of independence from Britain. It was great to see the patriotism and happiness of the Canadians and we enjoyed being in the middle of it all as bands played and food and drink was served.

Whilst we were in Vancouver, we had another change of plan! We decided that we did not want to clock up almost 7,000 miles return to the tip of Alaska and back, so we have booked another cruise! This time it sounds like a more traditional cruise, with 3 gala nights (we don`t own any smart clothes!) and all sorts of entertainment! It will take us over 14 nights, up the inside passage of Alaska and back, departing from Seattle. When we return we will then head South through the USA.

With this date in mind-we decided to head into the neighbour state of Alberta and the beautiful Rocky mountains, to the national parks of Banff and Jaspar. We made a stopover in the Wine district and camped in Kelona, before arriving at our first Park Canada campsite in Banff. The scenery was spectacular-with beautiful blue lakes, mountains and trees. We were also firmly in bear country and there were warnings and information signs everywhere about bear encounters and how to keep a "bare" campsite! Well, as you know I have not yet got used to the idea of meeting a bear and am fully equipped with my bear bells, air horn and bear spray-all of which I took to bed with me every night! We had to make sure that our camping spot was clean of all food smells, cooking stuff, and anything else that smelled nice e.g. deodorant. Well, we had the cleanest camp spot in the whole national park as I cleaned every last crumb away!! We visited the glorious Lake Louise, which is a turquoise glacier lake surrounded by snow capped mountains and drove the Bow Park highway, again though the most beautiful scenery. There were many places to stop along the way, including Johnston canyon and other view points. We spotted a bear by the side of the road, eating some of its 25,000 calories a day. We did not stop and take its picture though, as the Park Canada staff were trying to discourage this as it is dangerous and stressed the bears out. We saw another 2 bears over the next few days and it was wonderful to see them in their natural environment, just getting on with searching for food.

We headed towards Jaspar national park, camping for 2 nights at Waterfowl lake which was one of our all time favourite camp sites ever! It was on the shores of a river and in between 2 beautiful lakes. We met Steve and Hilly here, a great British couple who now live in Florida. We drove the Icefields parkway, again through wonderful scenery making many stops along the way to take in the views. We walked to the foot of the Columbia glacier, which has receded drastically over the years but was still a great sight. in Jaspar, we headed to Maligne lake and took a walk along its shore.

I went on a bear walk with the park rangers, just outside of Jaspar! Its purpose was to educate you about bears, to reduce the fear and equip you with the knowledge of how to deal with them. I was so keen I was the first one at the meeting point and nearly got back in the landy when they told me a grizzly bear had been seen on the trail we were taking, earlier that day! The 3 hours spent on this walk, with the rangers, was just great and I was the most attentive and enthusiastic participant ever! They taught us how to use bear spray properly, how to look for signs of bear activity on the tree etc, and how to recognise bear pooh! They also dispelled a lot of myths about bears and taught us how they live, feed and operate. This was such a useful experience for me and it has definitely reduced my daft fears! For the next few days, poor Gav had to listen to my new found knowledge about bears!

We had heard that there were numerous wildfires in British Columbia and that it had been declared a state of emergency. We decided we needed to head back, and if we could not, we were going to drop into the USA and go to Seattle from there. We stopped to camp at a beautiful lake in Clearwater-where we could smell the smoke and saw helicopters with huge buckets of water, attempting to control the fires a hundred miles or so away. We made it back to Vancouver and headed back to Spanish Banks, where we had wild camped on my birthday. Our favourite police officer turned up again on his quad bile with 2 newbies and we again chatted for a while and he told us we were OK there for a couple of nights. We had a BBQ here with Penny and Dane, and said our farewells to them, hoping to see them again one day somewhere in the world. We visited Granville island market and then spent our final night wild camping and Matt from Vancouver joined us, a lad we met through facebook who has just bought a landy and wants to do an overland trip.

We headed off the next day and crossed the border into USA at the Peace arch. It took 3 hours in total, and is known to be a busy crossing. We will spend a couple of days just outside of Seattle, getting our stuff together for our Alaska cruise and trying to explain to Ruby why we are leaving her again!!

We have only scraped the surface of Canada and absolutely love it. The scenery, the people and the lifestyle have been incredible and we want to return one day and see a lot more.
 

We flew back to the UK from Santiago with Air Mexico, via Mexico city, which took us about 2 days with an 18 hour stopover in Mexico. We treated ourselves to the first class lounge in Mexico and spent almost the full 18 hours there, making good use of the shower and complimentary snacks and drinks! We had a lovely time back in England, basing ourselves in London with David, my brother and heading up North to visit my Mum and Dad and Gav`s family. On our last weekend a gang of lovely friends came down to spend time with us-Julie, Sarah, Sue, Lindsay, Lucy and Ros and we had a great time! We spent a disproportionate amount of time in Wetherspoons , even downloading the Wetherspoons app for our phones so we could order from the bar from our seats!! We had a wonderful curry in Brick Lane and a walk around St Catherine`s dock. We also REALLY enjoyed some great British food whilst at home-a full English breakfast, a Christmas dinner,  Sunday dinner and fish and chips!

The time in England flew past too quickly and it was soon time to head off again for the second phase of our trip. We were due to catch the Easybus  to Gatwick airport at 6.30am on the Monday morning. The 6.30 bus did not show and we eventually bordered the 7am one. This got us to Gatwick at 8.50am for our 10.10 flight and this earned us a telling off from the lady at the check in desk, even though we had already checked in on line. We looked suitably ashamed of ourselves (!) and hurried through security and straight to the gate for boarding.

9 hours later and we landed in Vancouver. We caught the skytrain into the City centre and a taxi to our hotel. Our budget hotel. Whilst the hotel itself was perfectly adequate, we had not realised that it was in one of the dodgiest areas in Vancouver, East Hastings Street. We soon realised this when we took a walk. It was incredibly sad to see so many people clustered in a few streets who clearly had a huge range of problems including homelessness, significant alcohol and drugs use and mental health issues. Neither of us had ever witnessed such a sad sight, in such a volume, before. People who were clearly in a desperate state, moving around as though they were zombies due to the nature of the drugs they were taking. This impacted on us so much we read up about the area on line. We walked to Gastown and Canada place, where we watched the sea planes land and saw one of the huge cruise ships that leaves here for Alaska.

The following day, we caught the ferry to Vancouver island which was to be our home for the next 4 weeks. The ferry ride was beautiful-as we headed towards the green, tree clad hills and rugged coast of Vancouver island. We had arranged to do a voluntary placement for 5 weeks at a vineyard in Cowichan valley. Following the ferry crossing, we caught the local bus to Cowichan valley and were met at the bus stop by Mark, our host. He took us the short ride to the vineyard, Rocky Creek, in a beautiful location overlooking the hills. Mark and Linda are the owners of Rocky Creek and we also met Kathryn and Mikkel, 2 other volunteers from Denmark. We were really impressed with Rocky Creek and Mark and Linda`s passion for the wine and their business. They started making the wine in the basement of their last house, before moving to their current location, which they have built up with the help of friends and family. Everything is grown on the island, they have 4 vineyards and the grapes are handpicked, processed and hand bottled on site. They hope to pass the business on to one of their daughters , who is studying wine making at University, one day. They have won more awards than any other vineyard on the island and we were very proud to have worked for them for a short while.

The next 5 weeks were spent working at Rocky Creek and we had such a wonderful experience. We carried out a variety of tasks including gardening, bottling the wine (over 2,000 bottles), working with the grapes in the vineyard (shooting is the technical term!), washing glasses for the tasting room and working at a stall on a huge outdoor market. I got off to a typical Jen start, as full of enthusiasm on day 1, I ended up falling over with the hosepipe, which I switched on and proceeded to douse myself with water! Rocky Creek is a small family owned and run vineyard and in addition to growing grapes and producing a variety of wine, there was a tasting room in the beautiful gardens at the back of the house. Tour groups and individuals visited on a daily basis and we got to meet some of them when working in the gardens. We slept in a caravan at the back of the vineyard and ate in the house with Mark and Linda and the others. Mark was an excellent cook and we were treated to a huge variety of really tasty dinners each evening!

We both really enjoyed the gardening-to the extent that when we visited other gardens on our days off, I was pulling up the occasional weed! We spent some time bottling the wine, by hand, with 4 of us working as a team on the process. This was great fun, my job was to cork the wine after Mark had bottled it-and I used a machine that pressed the cork into the bottle. Gav`s job was to heat seal the bottles. We bottled about 2,000 bottles and it was really satisfying to see them packaged and ready for tasting and sale. We had some great chats during the process and also the occasional dance when becoming a little stir crazy after bottling so much wine!

 At this time of year, the grapes are still in the process of growing and were absolutely tiny. Our job in the vineyard was to work up each row of vines and snap off shoots that either had no grapes growing or not many grapes growing on them. This will then give the other grapes the chance to grow bigger. It was repetitive work and we covered a lot of vines across the 3 vineyards in different locations. We worked in sunshine and absolute pouring rain, with our waterproofs on and our ipods on to distract us from the repetitive nature of the work.

Gav and I spent a day at a Street market in Victoria, staffing a stall for the winery. We both really enjoyed talking to the customers and I (Jen) was pouring small samples so they could taste. We sold quite a lot of wine and I ended up with purple fingers from so much wine pouring! We were also selling the wine that we had helped to bottle a few weeks earlier, which was a great experience.

Canada is bear country and I had already watched some you tube videos when back in the UK, about how to stay safe from bears! Very early on morning 1, when walking to the toilet from the caravan, I realised I had not checked about the bear situation with Mark and Linda! One of the tips to prevent a bear encounter, is to make a noise, so I started to click my fingers in a bit of a rhythm as I walked the few hundred metres to the loo! Later I checked with Linda that there have been no bears around the vineyard so no more musical trips to the toilet were needed! A week or so later, we were out in a hire car and saw our first bear by the side of the road! We stopped a reasonable distance away and watched in awe as it crossed the road a couple of times, before ambling back into the forest. There are between 9 and 11,000 black bears on Vancouver island, alongside wolves and cougars! I have read all of the safety leaflets and purchased some bear bells, which allegedly will let the bears know I am coming, so they will avoid me!!

We got 2 days off a week and I think we appreciated them more because we were working.  We visited Victoria, the capital of the island and really enjoyed exploring it`s coast, including cattle point and the quaint floating houses and restaurants at Fisherman`s wharf ; the lovely Beacon hill Park which hugs the coastline and has the world`s tallest totem pole; the imposing British Colombia Parliament buildings and the fantastic  Royal BC museum which was so interesting and informative about First nations people, the natural world and the history of BC. We went on a whale watching trip from Cowichan Bay and were delighted to see a few orca (Killer)whale families, with young whales about 3 month old who would come right out of the water as they were swimming. We also spotted bald eagles, native birds of prey to North America. We also visited the imposing Cathedral Grove rainforest, where the trees were dense and  massive; and the rugged Pacific rim national Park where we visited the huge beaches which are lined with dense rainforests and full  of huge pieces of driftwood from trees. It was a beautiful place and we did some short walks through the forest onto the beaches , whilst taking care to make enough noise so the bears, wolves and cougars would avoid us!! There were notices up about the bears, wolves and cougars and I have all the safety leaflets so am now an expert in how to avoid or deal with an encounter!  We also drove into Tofino and went to the wonderful botanic gardens which led down to the shore.

So where is Ruby whilst we have been working and enjoying ourselves on Vancouver island? She is still sailing the high seas! She left Chile on the 12th May, apparently got delayed somewhere near Panama, changed ships in Mexico and is still at sea!! She is due to arrive in Vancouver on the 23rd May and we hope to get her back the following week. Our wonderful friend Dane, who we met in South America, and lives and works in shipping in Vancouver has handled the whole shipping process for us and will help us get Ruby back!

We are due to leave the wonderful Rocky Creek on the 25th May, when we will head back to Vancouver for a week. We will spend my birthday and Canada day there, before heading North towards the Alaskan border. It will be great to see her again and get going on the next phase of this epic road trip!

Whilst Ruby was getting her clutch fixed, we stayed in a fantastic airbnb on the outskirts of Santiago. It was a small house, with a lovely yard, owned by a wonderful lady who lived next door, Teresita. This was our best ever airbnb experience! Teresita had filled the fridge full of goodies for us and she popped round most nights with something that she had baked that day. We had cakes, pies, puddings, empanadas and other delights! We were invited for Sunday lunch with Teresita and her two grown up children, Cristian and Marcella. We had a wonderful time-filled with meat from the parilla and lots of good wine. The following weekend, we reciprocated and invited them for a traditional English Sunday dinner-consisting of roast beef, yorkshire puddings, roast spuds, vegetables and gravy! Then for pudding-we had scones with jam and cream! They loved it! Gav did all of the cooking (he is a fab cook) and Jen was on waitressing and cleaning up!

We had heard that this time of year was an active one for earthquakes in Chile and a flashlight had been provided at the airbnb, kept beside the bed. We were woken one night by the bed shaking like crazy-it was our first earthquake-the epicentre being off the coast of Valparaiso some 100km away. However a couple of days later-we experienced a much bigger one. At around 7.30pm-the whole house and floor began to shake for about a minute! Teresita called us outside after it had finished. It is safer to stay indoors whilst the ground shakes and then evacuate outside once it has stopped. It measured a 7.1 on the Richter scale and was reported across the world. Thank goodness there were no deaths-as Chile is very well prepared to deal with earthquakes. Teresita showed us her emergency box outside-containing clothing, food, water and other emergency supplies in case of a big devastating earthquake. She told us how she and her family had to camp in the garden of the house for a month in 1985 after a huge devastating earthquake. There were a few tremors over the following days but nothing as big as before.

We collected Ruby from the mechanics, where they had replaced the clutch and they did a great job cleaning her too. All of the dirt and dust from the last year was washed and polished away, as we prepared her for her second shipping experience! We had a great shipping agent in Chile, called Ronald and he came with us and our shipping partners to the port of San Antonio, where we did all the paperwork and left Ruby to be put into a container! We were lucky to find 2 Canadians who were shipping home to Canada, to share a 40 foot container with. We had also booked a high cube, so Ruby could be driven straight in without having to remove the rooftent.

After saying farewell to Rubes, Gav and I caught the bus from San Antonio to Valparaiso, a huge city on the coast. We were staying on the 13th floor of an apartment just outside the City. As we were in the taxi heading to the apartment, the taxi began to shake! " Terremoto" (earthquake) said the taxi driver! Wonderful and we were heading to a 13th floor apartment!!  There were a few shakes that night but nothing major!

Valparaiso was a great city to spend a few days. It is quite a dirty chaotic city-however its numerous hills with the colourful buildings and street art gives it such a charm. We took 2 walking tours here and then wandered around ourselves for another day or so.

Finally we returned to Santiago to spend our final days in South America. We did some sightseeing and got our bags ready for our flights. Whilst Ruby heads for Vancouver, we are going via the UK for a couple of weeks to see family, friends and stock up on the things we have missed such as Yorkshire teabags! We will then fly to Vancouver and be reunited with Ruby-before heading North to Alaska.

South America has been a brilliant experience and has been so very kind to us. We have had no problems whatsoever, in fact have been overwhelmed by the wonderful, warm hearted people. Next phase-North and Central America!

We made our way to Mendoza and camped at the Suizo camp site, next door to Roger and Anita, our lovely Swiss friends. We completely wound down here and ending up staying for 22 days-our longest stay anywhere yet! The weather was perfect, the company great and we really liked the campsite. Mendoza`s top industries are the production of olive oil and wine. The region around Greater Mendoza is the largest wine producing area in Latin America.

We spent some time in Mendoza wandering around the town and doing a walking tour, however most of our time here was spent relaxing on the camp site! We spent a day on bicycles, touring the vineyards in Maipu with Roger and Anita, what a great day! We started out at our first vineyard, Vina el Cerno, a family owned Bodega. We expected the amounts of wine for tasting would be quite small however we were immediately proved wrong, as we all got 3 large glasses almost full on our first tasting! Well, the four of us were tipsy after the first glass. Roger began singing falsetto (I like to ride my bicycle-Queen); Anita was crossing herself and muttering "Oh Jesus" and Gav and I were laughing at them!

Back on the bikes and we weaved our way to the next bodega, Tempus Alba, where we decided that it would be a good idea to have some lunch before drinking more wine! We then finished with Trapiche winery, which is the largest exported brand  of wine from Argentina, exporting its wines to more than 80 countries worldwide. Here we had a tour and finished with 3 more "tasting" glasses of wine each!

After the bodegas, we went to a wonderful olive oil production shop, where we wanted a break from the alcohol! We tasted some delicious olive tapenades, olive oils, malbec and chardonnay honey and then chocolate and liqueurs! (More alcohol-oh no!!!)

We somehow made our way back to the cycle hire shop-who promptly ushered us into their "bar" and produced more wine for us to drink! We managed to get back onto our bus to Mendoza and the campsite, and slept very well that night!
We really enjoyed the company of the campsite dogs. One worthy of mention was Simona, an overweight labrador, who was absolutely brilliant at football! She could dribble it, control it etc and we named her Maradonna after the other overweight great Argentinean footballer!

The time came for Roger and Anita to leave and this was definitely the last time we would see them on this trip. We finished in style with 2 nights of asado (BBQ) and a crazy night of pisco sours and karaoke, at the campsite, singing along to Jen`s ipod.  Gav was the DJ, whilst Anita, Roger and I belted out the cheesy greats such as Sex bomb, Dancing Queen, and Mamma Mia. We were sad to say goodbye the next day but know we will see them again one day.

A few days later, Frank and Sharon from Australia turned up in their landy-we had been facebook friends for a couple of years so it was great to meet them in real life! We spent our last couple of days in Mendoza with them and, again, had a wonderful last night BBQ (minus the singing!)

We dragged ourselves away from Mendoza and crossed the pass into Argentina at Paso Internacional Los Libertadores. From the Argentine side the route to the pass is a slow, gentle incline until entering a tunnel at approximately 3,200 meters (10,500 feet) elevation. On the Chilean side the slope has a far higher grade, and the road descends down a long series of switchbacks to make the descent. It was snowing when we got to the border, which was a huge contrast to the warm weather of Mendoza. The border was fairly easy to cross. Both the Argentine and Chilean officials were in the same building-so we went from one to another to complete the paperwork and then had the car searched by Chilean officials. We had heard that they could spend hours searching the car, insisting that they inspect every nook and cranny. We were lucky and they only looked in a few boxes before sending us on our way.

As we left Argentina, we reflected that this was our last time in the country on this trip. We had first entered Argentina in October of last year and then spent a lot of time in the country, as well as zig zagging to and from  Chile and entering Uruguay for a couple of weeks. We have loved Argentina-for many reasons but mostly because of the incredibly friendly people. We have been overwhelmed with offers of food, lifts and just the great nature and spirit of the people. We have felt no animosity from anybody about the Falklands (Malvinas), although a lot of people feel very strongly about the islands. Those who asked our opinions about the Falklands (Malvinas) did so with interest and not hostility. We want to return one day as there is so much of this great country we have not yet seen.

So, Ruby zig zagged her way down the mountains heading towards Los Andes, where we planned to spend the night, before heading into Santiago. As we got to the outskirts of Los Andes, Ruby decided she would go no further and her clutch stopped working! We could run the engine, however could not change gear and were stuck in the road. We were happy that we had made it down the winding mountain roads but felt a bit stuck! Again, the wonderful South American people came to the rescue and we got a tow to a nearby hotel from a lovely young man and his Dad, in a small jeep!

We left Ruby at the hotel and went into Santiago, as we had an appointment at the US embassy to apply for a 6 months US visa. We already have our 3 months ESTA, however realised that this would not be sufficient, given the US visa "clock" would start to tick as soon as we entered Alaska, giving us only a short time to drive up North and then transit back though Canada and return and explore the US. We had completed our application on line and had to go into the embassy for an interview. We were delighted when our visa application was approved. To celebrate, we went to see the film "Train spotting 2". It was in English with Spanish subtitles, but how you capture the wonderful dialogue in subtitles, I`m not sure, and some people left the cinema before the film ended looking a little bemused!

We returned to collect Ruby in a pickup truck and she entered her last South American capital city kicking and screaming!! She is currently with the mechanic and we hope to get her back soon. We are staying in a wonderful airbnb on the outskirts of Santiago, with great parking and when we get her back we need to clean and pack our things ready for shipping from Valparaiso to Canada.

We left Cochamo and the lovely people we had met at the land rover meeting and headed to Puerto Varas which is on the shore of Lago Llanquihue  and overlooked by two volcanoes, Osorno and Calbuco. Varas  is a very picturesque town with a lot of colonial German architecture. We found a wonderful hostel where we met some lovely English people-Tabitha and Nick from Around the world in 8000 days, who had retired at 40 and were now travelling permanently and Rachel, Chris and their 2 children from My family travels who were backpacking around the world for a year. We really enjoyed  their company and spent a lot of time chatting!

The area is renowned for all sorts of extremes such as earthquakes, tsunamis and volcanoes. Every day at noon, the warning siren is tested, sending an eerie wailing sound across town. At 6.30 one morning, we woke suddenly to the sound of the siren. I leapt out of the rooftent, certain that we were about to be covered in volcanic lava and ran into the hostel. The owner and her staff were in the kitchen cooking breakfast, when I burst in in my PJs loudly asking "Is the volcano erupting?"! They informed me that it was the siren form the fire station we had heard, so I went back to bed, telling the other campers that we were all safe!

We spent a couple of days on the island of Chiloe, South America`s second largest island, catching a feryy from outside of Puerto Montt. We took a short boat trip at Punihuil to three small islands just off the coast which are home to Magellenic and Humboldt penguins. The Humboldt was the 9th species of penguin that we have seen this trip! Chiloe is also famous for its 150 wooden churches and chapels, 14 of which are UNESCO world heritage sites and we visited a few of them.
We then headed to Osorno for a catch up with Krystelle and Justin, a fab Aussie couple we had met on the Antarctic trip. They were working at a hostel and we spent a lovely couple of hours with them. Krystelle made us feel  right at home with homemade scones with jam and cream and copious amounts of tea!

We had also been in touch with our lovely Swiss friends, Roger and Anita, who told us they were in Pucon, near Volcano Villarica so we decided to go and meet them at the campsite. We had a rainy couple of days there with them, although we did not let it stop us enjoying a BBQ under both of our awnings. We only saw the volcano on our drive in as it was then under cloud for the 2 days we were there. Villarrica is still active and can spit out out lava and smoke.

We then all decided to head back into Argentina to escape the rain of Chile, and on the way we stopped at Las Llajas where our other lovely Swiss friends, Claudia and David (who we first met in Colombia) were working at a huskie and horse lodge. The owner had left them in charge for the weekend and we spent a brilliant weekend together. The farm was located at around 1500 metres in the Andes, which were dusted with snow. There were  around 20 beautiful husky dogs, who  lived in huge kennels in husky land! They work in Winter taking tourists on sledge trips. We loved them. Claudia and David let us feed them, which was amazing. They eat one meal a day and devour their food in about 20 seconds, bones and all! We had to enter each pen with 2, 3 or 4 dogs in, put the bowl down without them biting our fingers off in their haste to get to their food, make sure they don`t steal each other's food when they have finished and then take their empty bowls out. A few times a day they would all put their heads in the air and howl in unison, which was a haunting sound. One, Bart, was old and blind and was let out to exercise each day. He loved chewing on bones and once, whilst we had taken our eyes off him, ate a whole pair of gloves that he had found in the porch! He also ran into thongs when he was let loose, but had a wonderful time exploring! There was also a husky puppy called Zorita who also was let out to exercise and get fussed by everybody!  We had great weather for the 2 days and ate and drank outside admiring the spectacular views, chattering ten to the dozen! Gav and David went fishing and returned with a huge trout, which we ate for our tea. Although David managed to cut his finger with his fishing knife whilst he wrestled with the fish! This is the last time we will see Claudia and David this trip, as they are returning home soon and we will miss them as we have seen them a few times along the way. This was a great way to say goodbye though!

Now we plan to head to Mendoza, famous for its vineyards and wine tasting!

We left Argentina at Los Antiguos, crossing the border into Chile at Chile Chico. Again, the process was straightforward, although the Chilean customs agent wanted a really good look in a lot of the boxes in Ruby. She was very impressed  when she looked inside Gav`s boxes at his very neat packing (good spacial awareness so my mum says!) She was less impressed by the state of the packing in my boxes with stuff crammed everywhere!

After spending the night in Chile Chico, we began the drive North on the Carretera Austral. The Carretera Austral ranks amongst the world`s ultimate road trips and runs 1240 kilometres alongside national parks, forests, glaciers, farms, turquoise lakes and the Pacific ocean. Big portions of it are unpaved and part of the fun is trying to negotiate the large potholes and corrugations! We drove on rough road to Puerto Rio Tranquillo where we camped with tens of Chilean students, before catching a small boat trip to the marble caves (Capilla De Marmol). The boat took us on the beautiful clear waters of Lago General Carrera to the caves which are sculpted geological rock formations and we went inside some of them, marvelling at how smooth and colourful they were.

We drove to the National Park San Rafael and hiked to a viewpoint for the San Valentin glacier. The glacier dates back 30,000 years and was interesting to see. The drive there and back, however, was spectacular-with waterfalls, mountains and lakes along a rough dirt track.

Next we headed to Cerro Castillo, where we did a long day hike and climbed 1000 metres in the national park to a turquoise mountain lake and glacier. It was a tough but rewarding walk with great views of this part of Chile. And then the rain started. And went on and on and on for 7 days! We have experienced the Lake District in the rain, in England, but this rain beat that hands down!

We continued along the Carrera Austral, and could still appreciate the stunning scenery through the rain. We stayed in Coyhaique for two days on a campsite which had covered shelters with a table and bench in, similar to a garden shed! We put on our waterproofs and walked into town to get our laundry done and stock up on supplies from the supermarket. We then spent the rest of the 2 days in our shed, reading, playing yangtzee and watching films!

Continuing North, we headed into National Park Queulat. a beautiful  green forested national park on the shores of the Pacific. We found another campsite with a shed on the shore of the Pacific and spent a day or so there! And still it rained! We moved on to La Junta, where we visited a lovely mechanics to have the bush on the front shock absorber replaced (these dirt roads are tough on Ruby!) and we wild camped at Lago Rosselot in a beautiful spot next to the lake. We moved on to Chaiten, close to the volcano which erupted in 2008 for a month with a 20km high column of ash. We wild camped for 2 nights on the shores of the Pacific and black volcanic sand, living underneath Ruby`s awning, as still it rained!

We reached a tiny place called Caleto Gonzalo, where we wild camped before catching the 7am ferry to Hornopiren, a beautiful journey that took us across lakes and between mountains. We then drove to a stunning small village on the shore of the Pacific ocean called Cochamo where we were due to meet with a small group of landy owners from Argentina and Chile for the weekend. This had been arranged by Jorge, the mechanic we had met in Puerto Madryn in Argentina. We had such a good weekend with everyone. Alongside us, there were 3 other landys from Holland, Austria and Switzerland and we all camped at the back of the house where the weekend was being hosted. All the other landys were from Argentina and Chile and we received such a warm and lovely welcome from them. The weekend was spent eating, drinking, chatting and laughing! The food was fantastic and they barbecued a whole sheep and goat one evening on the open fire. On another day we had a traditional dish called curanto from an island called Chiloe. It was a mixture of shellfish, pork sausages, potatoes and dumplings which were all buried in a hole in the ground with stones heated in a bonfire, covered in leaves and left to cook for a few hours! It was great to watch them prepare it and then to eat it! The people were simply great and we had such a giggle with them. One man from Argentina learnt English many years ago when he was child and kept saying in perfect Queen`s English " the cat is under the table", a phrase he had been taught a school. For some reason after a few drinks this became the funniest thing ever and we would yell at him across the garden, "Where is the cat?" and he would shout back "under the table" and we would all laugh our heads off! (You had to be there!). Jorge had decorated the garden with flags from all of the countries present and he also lined us all up in our landys to have a group photo. We spent 3 nights there and left with a lot of new friends and a few pounds heavier!
 
 

We headed North from Ushuaia  and camped the night outside a small hotel at San Sebsatian before the border with Chile. Chile are very strict about the food produce you are allowed to take across the border, so in the morning we had a 6 egg omelette with onion to use everything up that we know they would confiscate! We crossed easily over the border into Chile, getting new Chilean stamps in our passports and temporary import paperwork for Ruby.

We spent a couple of days wild camping outside Punta Arenas, however the town held little of interest for us and we moved on to Puerto Natales, the gateway to the National Park Torres De Paine. Here we stocked up on groceries and then headed straight for the national park, planning to camp at a lovely campsite just outside. Unfortunately it was full and we ended up outside the rangers station at the entrance to the park after hours. We knew it was OK to camp here in the car park, so we put the roof tent up and climbed inside. We had not really had huge issues with the infamous Patagonian wind to date, but that was about to change! The wind was wild and howled around the roof tent, with us rocking around inside! There was no way we would be able to sleep up there and we were also worried it could damage the roof tent. At midnight, we were outside in our PJs wrestling against the wind to get the roof tent down! Unfortunately, we don`t have a system whereby we can sleep inside the landy, so Gav made me a little bed  by folding down the front seat and I lay very curled up over the second and front row and Gav slept in the driver`s seat! We managed some sleep and woke up early, paid and entered the National Park where we headed straight for the official campsite where there was good wind protection for the roof tent! We also had our own armadillo, who was very tame, who we called Arthur!

Torres De Paine is a beautiful national park in Chilean Patagonia full of mountains, turquoise lakes, icebergs, glaciers, rivers and forests. The Torres del Paine are the distinctive three granite peaks of the Paine mountain range or Paine Massif. They extend up to 2,500 meters above sea level, and are joined by the Cuernos del Paine. We spent a lovely few days doing some short walks, as Gav`s ankle is still healing and driving around the park. On our last morning-we were in bed when we heard a thumping sound at the front of the landy. We thought it was a vehicle parked in front of us and I was merrily cursing them for the noise, when we suddenly also felt the landy shake. Gav got out to find a southern crested caracara bird (bird of prey) on the bonnet, tearing  the rubber from our windscreen wipers! Gav shooed it away but it had managed to take both of them! Luckily we had replacements and fitted them before we left!

We crossed back into Argentina and headed to El Calafate, a small town which serves as the gateway to Los Glaciares National park which houses the Perito Moreno glacier. We found a lovely campsite and stayed a few days, doing some checks on Ruby and replacing the UJs on the rear prop shaft. We also met a lovely British couple called Polly and Sam, driving a mazda Bongo, lovingly referred to as " the Bong-alow"! We also visited the national park and Perito Moreno glacier. The ice formation is 250 square kilometres and 30 kilometres in length and was a spectacular sight.  The terminus of the glacier is 3 miles wide, with an average height of 74 metres above the water of Lago Argentina. There were a series of long walkways, at different levels, overseeing the glacier which meant  you could view it fairly closely from a variety of angles. The sounds were also interesting-with it creaking, rumbling and crashing, as pieces caved off into the surrounding water. We witnessed some huge pieces break off and crash into the water-leaving multiple pieces of floating ice. We spent a few hours here just staring and listening to the glacier.

After leaving El Calafate, we had planned to head to El Chalten and spend a few days hiking in the Southern part of the Los Glaciares national park, in the famous Fitzroy mountain range. We arrived there, however, and it was incredibly windy and we drove around a few camping spots to see if there was any wind protection. We could not find any, and still scarred from the windy night before we entered Torres, we decided to keep driving and save the park until another time!

We slept at a sheltered camp spot in Tres Lagos and then headed 350 miles to the last town before the Chilean border, Los Antiguos, set on a stunning turquoise lake. We headed for the municipal campsite and were pleased to find there was space and that it was relatively quiet. That was until midnight when the music went on and it was really loud until about 5am the following morning! I am now generalising, however it has been our general experience that the people in Argentina like loud music and also want to generously make sure that you can hear it very loudly too!! After an interrupted nights sleep, I woke up fairly cranky and cross with some of the people on the campsite. It was not too long before the music began again, this time from about 3 or 4 different groups of people! However, within a short time, we realised that we can forgive the people here such a lot because of their incredible warmth and friendliness. A lady bought us a pile of cherries to eat (this town is the cherry capital of Argentina) and then a lovely couple bought us some empanadas over and later a huge sausage sandwich! They were also fascinated by Ruby and we did the guided tour of her and posed for many photos with them! "Now turn that music down!" Said no Argentinean ever!!

It took us a week to leave Buenos Aires, following our Antarctica trip, and we reminisced about the wonderful trip we had had and the great people we had met. We set off again in the second week of January heading towards Ushuaia (for the second time, but this time with Ruby), the most Southerly City in the world along Ruta 3.We made it in 10 days, covering 2,500 miles along very long straight roads! We spotted a lot of wildlife along the way, scores of guanacos, hundreds of wild ostrich type birds, armadillos and road runners.

Along the way we had some great stops: we drove to Balneario el Condor, where we wild camped on the cliff tops, which houses the biggest parrot colony in the world. It has over 35,000 nests in its cliff faces and we watched in awe as thousands of parrots flew around and burrowed into their nests in the cliff face. It was incredibly busy when we got there as it is peak holiday season in Argentina, however we had the place to ourselves after sunset and had great views over the Atlantic coast and of the parrots from our roof tent. In the middle of the night the wind really picked up and we were both awoken as it whipped around the roof tent. We decided to move at around 3am, running around outside in the wind in our PJs, winding the tent down and laughing manically (well Jen was!) We drove a few hundred metres down the road to a more sheltered spot and managed to grab a few hours more sleep, waking up to a calm morning!

We also briefly stopped in Puerto Madryn  to get a belt tensioner and serpentine belt for Ruby from a wonderful  landy mechanic called Jorge. He was a lovely man and we gave him some landy gifts that we had received from other people along the way. We had to go to the ATM to get some money out to pay him, and when we returned-he rushed around his garage pulling out loads of gifts for us from stickers, to a large chopping board which he had made with "Landrover Patagonia" etched on it!
We visited Reserva Punta Loma, home to sea lion colony and cormorant rookery and watched the sea lions on the beach. We also visited a small town called Gaiman, which has a strong Welsh heritage from the 1800s. We treated ourselves to tea and scones in a traditional Welsh teashop.6 cups of tea and half a dozen scones later-we rolled ourselves out!

We drove a great gravel road to Cabo Rasa where we camped for the night. The following day we were driving and spotting wildlife along the way and we stopped for Gav to take some photos. Unfortunately, he misjudged the  drop out of the landy to the floor and ended up badly twisting his ankle, which swelled up like  balloon! I took over all of the driving and helped him to get to the loos etc at the campsite for the next couple of days! That afternoon we went to Cabo Dos Bahias, which had a large colony of magellanic penguins which we walked  (Gav hobbled) through on a raised walkway.

We also camped at a few petrol stations along the way. In one we camped by the air machine, expecting that no one would want to fill their tyres with air during the night! Wrong! There was a steady succession of night time visitors to the air machine, resulting in an interrupted night`s sleep! The following morning we showered in the garage, as a lot of them have proper showers. Now maybe it was because I was tired from the night before or maybe it was just me, I managed to leave the knickers I had taken off in the leg of my trousers , whilst wearing clean ones after my shower. As I went into the busy garage to return the shower key, my pants fell out of the bottom of my trouser leg!! With skill akin to that of David Beckham, I kicked them into the air, caught them and swiftly shoved them in my wash bag!

On the way to Ushuaia, we had to cross the border into Chile and back into Argentina again, with all the border processes that involves. We got stamped out of Argentina, gave in our temporary import permit for Ruby, got stamped into Chile and received a temporary import permit for Ruby for Chile.. We had to repeat it all in reverse some hundred or so miles later when we went back into Argentina.

At last we arrived in Ushuaia, the end of the world! It is flanked on one side by the Andes and the Southern ocean on the other. Here we met a fantastic British (and Yorkshire) couple, Amy and Guy, in their landy, Hugo! They have been travelling South from Alaska over the last 18 months so are in the final few months of their trip. We all wild camped in the car park overlooking the Beagle channel and then spent the next couple of nights camping in the Tierra Del Fuego National Park, where we did some small hikes (Gav rested his ankle) and a couple of great BBQs!

We sadly said goodbye to them as they needed to head North and Gav ad I wild camped for a couple of days on Estancia Harberton, about 50 miles South East of Ushuaia, taking in the scenery. Here we were accused of stealing a motor biker's  stash of firewood, when all poor Gav had done was gather firewood he spotted lying around for our fire! It turned out that the biker had gathered it  and left it in sort of a pile, although it was nowhere near his tent. We could not stop laughing after he purposely strode over to  us saying "have you taken my firewood?" before marching off and collecting  more!

We returned to Ushuaia for a couple of days, as we were awaiting the return of MV Fram ,our wonderful Antarctica ship. We wanted to introduce her to Ruby so she knows where we spent Christmas and New Year without her!  The first night we spent back in the car park overlooking the Beagle channel, however it was so noisy that we decide to find another spot for night 2. We found a great spot about 5km out of town on some cliffs overlooking Ushuaia and  the Beagle channel. We knew the Fram was due in early morning so we expected to see it in port. It was a much quieter spot until about 5.30am when I heard a loud thump. I had no idea what it was however about 10 minutes later, a woman knocked on our roof tent and shouted.  I opened the flap and she told us someone had had an accident. When we got out and went to look-a man had driven his van over the side of the cliff , although thank goodness it had not gone all the way down. The police and ambulance were on their way and a few people were helping so there was nothing we could do. He was stretchered into the ambulance and off he went to hospital. And then, under the morning sunshine, the Fram appeared around the corner, sailing towards us down the Beagle channel! We got some pictures of Ruby and Fram and then drove back into Ushuaia , following the Fram down the channel!

What a morning! Now we will start to head North towards the beautiful  national park of Torres del Paine.
 
 

We flew from Buenos Aires to Ushuaia with our fellow passengers on a charter flight, taking about 3 and a half hours. On arrival, we had about 3 hours to spend in Ushuaia before boarding the ship. Ushuaia is regarded as the Southernmost City in the world, located on a wide bay with a mountain range to the North and the Beagle channel to the South. We will be returning here with Ruby, as we plan to drive down when we collect her from Buenos Aires, so we spent most of the time taking photographs of our wonderful ship-MV Fram which was waiting for us anchored in the harbour. We also spotted Houdini-a white van belonging to Jason and Maria of van nomads and left a note on the windscreen, hoping we could meet up for a few minutes. We last saw these two in Ecuador, they are driving from New York to Ushuaia, so were at the end of their journey. We were delighted to meet up with Maria before we boarded the ship and she waved us on our way!

Neither of us had ever been on a "cruise" before and did not know what to expect. We knew that it was not going to be a mainstream cruise, the entertainment was going to be provided by wonderful Mother nature and this suited us both down to the ground. We were so excited to board the MV Fram, named after the ship that carried Roald Amundsen to the south pole before Scott. She was beautiful. The observation lounge had comfortable sitting areas at the top of the ship and large panoramic windows, which gave us incredible views of nature. The huge restaurant provided the same amazing views. Our Captain, Rune Andreassen, who we later labelled Captain fantastic, welcomed us on board and introduced us to some of the crew, who we grew to know and love over the next few weeks. We then had our first fantastic meal and later settled down in the observation lounge as we headed out of the Beagle channel. I was hyper excited and nearly delirious when I spotted whales blowing and breaching not far from the boat. I lost all power of intelligent speech, shrieked "Animals" and caused the first of many stampedes across the ship as people ran to spot them!

The following day was spent at sea as we headed towards the Falkland Islands. We had a daily programme delivered to our cabin each evening by our wonderful cleaner, Jose. On sea days-there would be a series of lectures or talks delivered by our inspirational expedition team and in between we would fit in eating, chatting and going out on deck to spot the wildlife. On our first sea day we saw a lot of sea birds following the boat, such as the Black- browed albatross and the giant petrel.

We then arrived at the Falkland Islands,300 miles to the East of the South American continent  and 580 miles North of the Antarctic. The Falklands consists of two large islands, East and West and 740 small islands and islets. Our first stop was West  Point which lies off the north-west tip of West Falkland. The ship anchored and we were taken to shore in a series of small polar cirkel boats. We did a small hike to Devil`s nose where we saw the beautiful landscape of the cliffs and our first of many penguins! We saw Rockhopper penguins, many of whom were looking after their new born chicks or incubating their eggs. It was a privilege to get close to them and watch, as they fed their chicks, protected them and generally went about their daily life. Amongst them was a large number of Black-browed albatrosses who were also feeding their chicks or incubating their eggs.

There were a couple of land rovers (one formally belonged to the governor of the Falklands and still had the attachment on the bonnet for the flag) which were transporting those who struggled to walk, up and down the hill. We got chatting to their lovely drivers, Alan and Jacqui, who kindly invited us into their house which is the oldest house on the Falklands. We went inside and found our expedition team secretly having tea and a selection of homemade cakes! We were invited to join them and had the best cup of tea since leaving home-PG tips! 3 cups later, we had to leave and Jacqui very kindly packaged me up some tea bags! We will most certainly stay in touch with these lovely people and their face book page is West Point island-Falklands. That afternoon we had our second landing of the day at Carcass island-where we did a 10km walk to and from Leopards beach. The scenery was stunning with beautiful white sandy beaches and we were rewarded with a number of Gentoo and Magellanic penguins.

As a British overseas territory, the Falklands has many land rovers. We needed spare parts for Ruby so we had already been in contact with John from Falklands 4x4 located in Stanley, the most southern land rover dealership in the world! The following day, we docked at the pier in Stanley, the capital of the islands and whilst the other passengers went off on various trips or walks, Gav and I made our first stop at Falklands 4x4 and met John. John was brilliant to talk to and we bought a load of spares including shock absorbers, brake pads etc to squeeze into our luggage! We hope to stay in touch with John, who also shared some of his personal stories about being held hostage at Goose green in the Falkland's war, when he was a child. We were also really lucky to meet Tony. We got chatting as he had a defender land rover and we told him about our trip. Tony was so kind and offered to take us in his landy on a tour around Stanley. This was one of our highlights of the Falklands-it was great to have a locals viewpoint of the area and Tony was a knowledgeable and interesting man. We went all over the area and suddenly Tony told us that the landy we were in had belonged to Prince William when he was stationed on the island!! We went off road and visited some of the battle sites from the 1982 Falkland`s war-we saw Mount Longdon and  Mount Tumbledown, amongst others, and saw machine guns posts and remnants of weapons. We went to the Falklands war memorial and the statue of Maggie Thatcher, and all of the other main tourist spots as well as other places that Tony knew. We loved it and cannot thank Tony enough. He gave us a real insider's view to life on the islands. When I told Tony I had worked in criminal justice he took us to the prison on the island which houses 18 inmates! Before we got there we saw one of the prison guards who was supervising the prisoners who were doing community service. I had a great chat with him and enjoyed meeting him.

Stanley is full of British influences-with union jacks, red phone boxes, British style pubs and supermarkets full of British brands! We bought 2 cans of heinz baked beans (not seen since leaving the UK!) and a box of Yorkshire tea bags for our onward travels, much to the amusement of our fellow passengers!

 (We left the Falklands determined to return one day-as the scenery, wildlife and people are incredible. The following 2 days were at sea as we headed towards the island of South Georgia. We had some interesting lectures on seals , penguins, photography and the explorer Earnest Shackleton. We arrived at South Georgia on Gav`s 45h birthday. The scenery was breathtaking. We landed in the morning at Fortuna bay, named after one of the first whaling ships in the area. This was packed full of wildlife-including hundreds of fur seals and pups, wonderful king penguins and their chicks and elephant seals. There was a massive King penguin colony along the shore with literally thousands of penguins. We spent a couple of hours wandering along the beach, watching the amazing birds and animals. In the afternoon we landed at Stromness, home to 3 deserted whaling stations and King penguins, Gentoo penguins, fur and elephant seals. Gav had a great birthday, topped off in the evening with a cake and singing by the lovely waiting staff!

The next day we landed at St Andrews bay and this was one of our favourite spots from the whole trip. The scenery was spectacular-with the snow covered mountains of the Allardyce range, some 200metres high, towering over the beach. There were 100-150,0000 pairs of king penguins (the largest colony in the world), pottering around, swimming, making a noise, coming to take a closer look at us etc! There were also some massive elephant seals on the beach, waiting to moult, and burping and farting!! There were also plenty of fur seals, who can be aggressive with humans and who can cause some nasty injuries. We had been taught to raise our arms above our heads and shout stop-if they came for us. Sometimes people forgot and tried to run away but they would chase you, so it was not recommended! One went for me at St Andrews and Gav said he could hear my "STOP" from the other end of the beach and not only the seal stopped but all the other people as well, it was so loud!

That afternoon we all went out on the polar cirkel boats for a short ride around Ocean`s harbour where we saw the wreck of the Bayard, a ship built in Liverpool in 1864 and wrecked in South Georgia in 1911.The ship was covered in tussock grass and blue eyed shag birds.

We spent Christmas Eve at Grytviken on South Georgia and had a really special day. We visited the grave of Ernest Shackleton,  who we had learnt so much about on this trip and I toasted him with some whiskey as is custom and practice. We also explored the old whaling station there and saw penguins and fur seals (2 tried to get me this time!) The highlight of the day, for me, was the lovely Christmas Eve service that we all attended in the church at Grytviken. Norwegians celebrate on Christmas Eve and as it was a Norwegian boat with a Norwegian captain, this was a special day. We sang carols in three languages (English, Norwegian and German) and our captain led a short service. It was simple and very touching. We then spent the evening on the boat where we had a toast and a party and were visited by santa! In the middle of all this it had started to snow outside which added to the festive spirit.

 hlyThe following few days were largely spent at sea heading towards Antarctica. The nights started to lengthen until it did not really ever go dark and the scenery began to change with our first sightings of icebergs and ice covered islands. We had a quick stop at the Orcadas scientific station, an Argentinean base where the staff welcomed us and showed us around. They research continental glaciology, seismology, sea ice zone and meteorological observations. We also saw some chinstrap and Adelie penguins. We stopped next to Elephant island, where Shackleton`s men were marooned for 4 and a half months awaiting rescue, barley surviving living under 2 overturned lifeboats. That evening-the boat was surrounded by tens and tens of whales (fin whales-the second largest species) and Captain fantastic decided we would go off course and follow them, stopping when they stopped and observing their movements! The whole boat went crazy-we were all running around the decks shouting "whales", taking pictures and simply enjoying these majestic creatures. What a treat and we all applauded our fantastic Captain when we started back on course a couple of hours later.

We woke up to the most spectacular scenery I think I have ever seen as we came through the Antarctic Sound. It was full of huge tabular icebergs-some had penguins on-as we slowly glided through. We anchored outside Brown Bluff and this was to be our first landing on the Antarctic continent. As we stepped ashore I gave thanks for being lucky enough to have walked on all of the 7 continents on earth. This felt really special. The brown cliffs soared above us and the shore was home to numerous Adelie penguins, Gentoo penguins, kelp gulls and kelp petrels. Here some of our group witnessed a skua  (bird) attack and kill a penguin chick and we watched as it devoured it. We watched and laughed , as the penguins stole small stones from each other to place on their nests and squawk to try and keep other birds at bay.

The following day we  landed at 2 Antarctic islands-Half Moon bay where we saw our first and only Macaroni penguin and Deception Island, Whalers bay where there was another derelict whaling station. Here I was one of the thirty or so passengers out of 230 who did the polar plunge! This involved running into the sea in my swimming costume at icy cold temperatures and running out again! For good measure I also swam round  for a very short while, before getting out. It was the coldest I had ever known and Gav and my lovely new friend Anne, had to help me get dressed as I was completely numb! I then got on the polar boat back to the ship and had a series of cold, then lukewarm and then hot showers to warm myself up!

The next day might have been the best day ever! In the morning we anchored outside Cuverville Island. The weather was spectacular-bright blue skies and pure white snow and ice. The island was mountainous and covered in ice and glaciers. It was home to huge numbers of gentoo penguins-which we observed walking around on penguin highways (channels they have forged in the snow) and we also saw whales feeding and breaching from the shore. We also saw them after lunch from the boat and one swam right under the boat-and we could see it clearly as went past. We had another landing at Neko harbour in the afternoon. First we sailed through some more stunning scenery, into the Andvord bay which is surrounded on all sides by mountains and alpine glaciers. Neko harbour was nestled at the bottom of the bay  and we saw  more penguins and part of a glacier cave in.

We then went on a 2 hour polar boat cruise with 8 other people. It was brilliant and we got up close to our first leopard seal which was resting on a small iceberg. We also saw hump back whales which were blowing, feeding and flicking their tails out of the water as they deep dived. We were so close to them in the smaller boat and it was another one of our highlights. We then spotted the sister ship of the MV Fram, the larger Midnatsol. We knew it was coming to meet us to swap some supplies over. I asked Adrian, the guide if we could go and meet it in our tiny boat. He hesitated, then said shall we go? We yelled "Yes" and so our driver went racing towards this huge boat. When we  got there it towered over us and we did a loop around it, waving and shouting at their passengers who looked on in amazement at this small bunch of people  who were seemingly going bonkers!
We had a lovely BBQ ion board that evening which rounded off a superb day!

On New Year`s Eve day our names had been drawn to go kayaking at Port Lockroy! We had to wear special clothing and were dropped off at a tiny shore to get into the double kayaks. This was a superb experience, kayaking around the peaceful waters, spotting penguins nearby in the water and the odd crab seal on slabs of ice. We then landed at Port Lockroy, which has the penguin post office-the most Southerly one in the world where we sent some post cards and enjoyed watching more penguins and their chicks. There was also a small museum which recreated life when it was a British base.

Then Captain fantastic took us though the Lemaire channel-a spectacular 7 miles long and 1 mile wide channel full of steep cliffs, glaciers, and floating ice. It is often blocked by icebergs so we slowly navigated through huge blocks of ice and lots of floating ice. Nearly every [passenger was on deck admiring the wonderful scenery and marvelling at how close we would get to the icebergs and towering cliffs. and  We nearly made it through when we were thwarted at the end by some huge blocks of ice that were impossible for us to pass through. We did a 3 point turn and headed back. Then the captain stopped and they announced that we would all get a 30 minute small boat ride around part of the channel. This was an unexpected treat and we got up close to the ice bergs and went through the polar ice. To cap off a wonderful New Years eve, our superb crew put on a show and a party. They did a crew show, which contained a lot of talent and some less talented acts! Our expedition team did a George Michael tribute medley and I got pulled up to join in along with my lovely friend Anne and then poor Gav was pulled up too! We jitterbugged our way though the song, I completely threw myself into it and there is video  evidence somewhere! I also got pulled up by our waiters who were in drag dancing to pokerface, but thank goodness afer a few minutes everyone joined in and then we had such a great party! We danced, sang karaoke and marvelled at the light outside. The Captain joined us at 11.30 to count down the New Year with us. By this stage I was giddy as a kipper and much to everyone's amazement, as Captains are rather aloof figures, asked him to dance to Dancing Queen! How could he refuse? He was a great sport and woodenly danced for 5 minutes or so before making his way off the dance floor to do the countdown to midnight. What a way to see in the New Year, dancing and singing, whilst it is still light outside, in Antarctica! Oh not forgetting the whales who made an appearance outside!

The next couple of days were spent crossing Drake`s passage , a notorious rough crossing connecting the Atlantic and the Pacific. We were lucky and had a smooth crossing, arriving in Ushuaia relaxed, happy and tired! We had reached 65.11 degrees South (Just short of the South Pole-damn-will have to go back for that one!) and sailed 4,053 miles. This was our best trip ever! We cannot recommend Hurtigruten and her staff highly enough-they were outstanding and if you ever get the chance to go to Antarctica then just go, don`t think about the cost, just go because it is like nowhere else on earth. It is the highest, windiest, driest, coldest and  most beautiful continent. At times we had to pinch ourselves at what we were seeing and experiencing. We are now back in Buenos Aires, ready to collect Ruby and start the next part of our journey. Ruby is ready to get going again, we might need a little more persuasion as we are still dreaming about Antarctica!

Someof the pictures were taken by our brilliant ships photographer-Dominic Barrington.