Ohhhh, I’m on a ghost ship. It is scary and spooky. Nary a passenger soul is on board this morning. I have the ship to myself. It is quiet, and I can sneak about like an unseen spirit going whenever and wherever I want.
We are in Port Stanley, anchored in the bay. Most passengers are on excursions, but not me. I put in for the penguin 4x4 off-road trip but had absolutely no expectation of getting this oversold excursion. Michael is escorting a military excursion. There is not much to see in town that I didn’t see last time except for the military museum, which I have no interest in. So I stayed on board, having a wonderful time this morning just lazing about, having a leisurely morning to myself. For breakfast, I had a pear and chocolate chip cookies! I never even got dressed to get a proper breakfast. The room stewardess leaves a plate of fruit in your room every evening; the chocolate chips cookies is another story.
The previous day I ran into the restaurant manager who asked if everything was alright. I said yes, however, there haven’t been any chocolate chips cookies for six days. Six days!!! His eyes widen and said he would take care of that immediately and asked how many I wanted. I said a dozen, Michael just looked at me rolling his eyes telegraphing that I don’t need that many (what he meant was that he would also eat them)….. then I said six. Now these are about the best chocolate chip cookies I have ever eaten. They are just the right crunch without the annoying mushiness inside. Anyone who knows me knows I love cookies. They are my downfall. The hotel manager said he would have then delivered to my room every evening for the rest of the trip! How awesome is that? Well, last night we returned to our room and found a plate of chocolate chip cookies – 18 of them!!!! I was so full from dinner, so I skipped eating these delicious morsels of sweet sensation. But Michael dug right in. So there was my breakfast. Naughty, naughty me, but I am eating lots of fresh fruit so I don’t feel guilty.
Yesterday I didn’t have to play bridge (yea!) so I got to knit. We had a small but enthusiastic knitting group meet in the afternoon. We all agreed to meet each sea day even if it isn’t mentioned in the daily newsletter. The lady from Manhattan told about her knitting guild group and boy oh boy, I could really dig it. Goody bags and free samples for each person at each meeting! Hey, Louise, let’s talk.
Today is catch up day for me. I am editing the pictures from previous days so we don’t get overwhelmed with them. The bad ones, the duplicates have to go.
BE CAREFUL WHERE YOU WALK
Its Michael’s turn now, and I have just returned from an excursion entitled “74 Days to Victory.” As you might imagine, this is the history of the Falkland Islands war. It was a day by day and battlefield by battlefield description of the 1982 war. As you may recall, Argentine troops landed in the Falkland Islands on April 2, 1982. The invasion was authorized by Argentine president Leopoldo Galtieri, the head of Argentina’s ruling military junta. The operation was intended to draw attention away from serious human rights and economic issues at home. The Argentines mistakenly thought that Great Britain would not bother to send troops some 8,000 miles to defend these nearly useless islands. That was a big mistake.
In only 74 days the Brits sent the Argentines packing, but to this day Argentina still contends that the Malvina’s (Falkland Islands) are being illegally occupied by the British. Interestingly, only yesterday there were some major government sponsored demonstrations in Argentina trying to raise the public’s interest in reinvading the islands. We are told that as before, this is the government’s way of diverting attention from much more serious problems at home. By the way, only three days after the fall of Port Stanley back to the British, President Galtieri’s military junta fell, and was replaced by a democracy.
As the title above suggests, you really need to be careful where you step foot on this island. If the sheep shit doesn’t get you then the land mines will! Yes, you heard me right. Even 30 years after the war ended, there are still some 28,000 land mines yet to be dug up. They are right off the main highway between Port Stanley and Fitzroy. You cannot venture far off the beaten path. Just five feet on either side of the highway is barbed wire with skull and cross bones signs warning of land mines just on the other side. As we drove to Fitzroy this morning, we saw two trucks and four men on mine Clearance duty. This is a daily occurrence here, and when children turn five they are taught in school how to identify mines and what to do when they find one.
We are in Port Stanley, anchored in the bay. Most passengers are on excursions, but not me. I put in for the penguin 4x4 off-road trip but had absolutely no expectation of getting this oversold excursion. Michael is escorting a military excursion. There is not much to see in town that I didn’t see last time except for the military museum, which I have no interest in. So I stayed on board, having a wonderful time this morning just lazing about, having a leisurely morning to myself. For breakfast, I had a pear and chocolate chip cookies! I never even got dressed to get a proper breakfast. The room stewardess leaves a plate of fruit in your room every evening; the chocolate chips cookies is another story.
The previous day I ran into the restaurant manager who asked if everything was alright. I said yes, however, there haven’t been any chocolate chips cookies for six days. Six days!!! His eyes widen and said he would take care of that immediately and asked how many I wanted. I said a dozen, Michael just looked at me rolling his eyes telegraphing that I don’t need that many (what he meant was that he would also eat them)….. then I said six. Now these are about the best chocolate chip cookies I have ever eaten. They are just the right crunch without the annoying mushiness inside. Anyone who knows me knows I love cookies. They are my downfall. The hotel manager said he would have then delivered to my room every evening for the rest of the trip! How awesome is that? Well, last night we returned to our room and found a plate of chocolate chip cookies – 18 of them!!!! I was so full from dinner, so I skipped eating these delicious morsels of sweet sensation. But Michael dug right in. So there was my breakfast. Naughty, naughty me, but I am eating lots of fresh fruit so I don’t feel guilty.
Yesterday I didn’t have to play bridge (yea!) so I got to knit. We had a small but enthusiastic knitting group meet in the afternoon. We all agreed to meet each sea day even if it isn’t mentioned in the daily newsletter. The lady from Manhattan told about her knitting guild group and boy oh boy, I could really dig it. Goody bags and free samples for each person at each meeting! Hey, Louise, let’s talk.
Today is catch up day for me. I am editing the pictures from previous days so we don’t get overwhelmed with them. The bad ones, the duplicates have to go.
BE CAREFUL WHERE YOU WALK
Its Michael’s turn now, and I have just returned from an excursion entitled “74 Days to Victory.” As you might imagine, this is the history of the Falkland Islands war. It was a day by day and battlefield by battlefield description of the 1982 war. As you may recall, Argentine troops landed in the Falkland Islands on April 2, 1982. The invasion was authorized by Argentine president Leopoldo Galtieri, the head of Argentina’s ruling military junta. The operation was intended to draw attention away from serious human rights and economic issues at home. The Argentines mistakenly thought that Great Britain would not bother to send troops some 8,000 miles to defend these nearly useless islands. That was a big mistake.
In only 74 days the Brits sent the Argentines packing, but to this day Argentina still contends that the Malvina’s (Falkland Islands) are being illegally occupied by the British. Interestingly, only yesterday there were some major government sponsored demonstrations in Argentina trying to raise the public’s interest in reinvading the islands. We are told that as before, this is the government’s way of diverting attention from much more serious problems at home. By the way, only three days after the fall of Port Stanley back to the British, President Galtieri’s military junta fell, and was replaced by a democracy.
As the title above suggests, you really need to be careful where you step foot on this island. If the sheep shit doesn’t get you then the land mines will! Yes, you heard me right. Even 30 years after the war ended, there are still some 28,000 land mines yet to be dug up. They are right off the main highway between Port Stanley and Fitzroy. You cannot venture far off the beaten path. Just five feet on either side of the highway is barbed wire with skull and cross bones signs warning of land mines just on the other side. As we drove to Fitzroy this morning, we saw two trucks and four men on mine Clearance duty. This is a daily occurrence here, and when children turn five they are taught in school how to identify mines and what to do when they find one.
I will spare you all the gory details, but the most interesting sight was in Fitzroy where in one air raid by the Argentines killed over 50 British sailors and Merchant Marine men with another 180 injured. The ships were the Sir Galahad and Sir Tristam, and they were bombed while transferring troops, ammunition and equipment to the island.
As we traveled back and forth to Fitzroy, a distance of some 40 miles each way, you see no trees, and I mean no trees. It is simply too windy in this Godforsaken place for even trees to grow. What you do see are “rivers of stone,” created during tens of thousands of years of glaciers. There are millions of rocks in formations as big as 1 ½ by 2 miles making it impossible to travel and making the land nearly useless.
Finally, there are only two ways to get to the Falkland Islands – by sea or air. Sea is easy as long as you have a big sturdy boat. Air is much more difficult. They have twice weekly RAF flights from Great Britain with a refueling stop at the Ascension Islands. LAN, the airline that we flew into Chile, used to have flights from Santiago to the Falkland Islands but they must fly over Argentine airspace and the Argentines have recently refused to allow this. The bottom line is that if you make a commitment to live here then you are here for the duration.
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