World Cruise Day 48/152 - Sea Day - Rounding Cape Horn - we're now qualified to wear a gold earing and eat with a foot on the table

Cruise day: 48/152
Ports days: 16
Sea days: 32
Countries: 5
Continents: 2
Ports: 10

NOTE: (Thursday 7am) There is very little satellite internet coverage this far south in the southern hemisphere.  We had essentially zero internet service on the ship.  Now that we are sailing back north, we are back in coverage and I can post this.

We sailed out of Ushuaia, Argentina last night late after our technical stop for fuel and to offload some trash.  We weren't allowed off the ship as Argentina isn't really open to cruise travel at the moment, so that was the main factor.  Well, that and the fact we would only be there for a few hours in the evening to gas up.  This complicated our travel around Cape Horn as there is a requirement to stop in Chile before proceeding.  Since we stopped in Argentina, that meant another stop at about 2AM in Puerto Williams, Chile, a city, port, and naval base on Navarino Island in Chile before heading south.

This morning, we were near Cape Horn. It remained a chilly 50-degree day all day, give or take a degree. It was amazing how close we were able to be to shore.  These photos show both our wake and the shore.  It was closer than the photos make it look.

This guy seemed unimpressed that a beautiful cruise ship was sailing by.

Cape Horn is the southernmost headland of the Tierra del Fuego archipelago of southern Chile. It is not the most southerly point of South America but does mark the northern boundary of the Drake Passage where the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans meet. 

It was named by the Dutch for who named after the city of Hoorn in the Netherlands. We circumnavigated Hornos island which contains Cape Horn. 

Cape Horn is notorious for its horrific weather.  Winds come up unexpectedly.  Waves have been recorded as high as 98-feet.  It just isn't a place to go for a nice pleasure cruise.  But...that's what we did today!  We circled the island in a counterclockwise direction, ending up just crossing the 56-degree latitude line. The map is approximate - no, we drive the ship over the island.

As we approached, we got a nice view of the island.

Then, we got a view of what is known as Cathedral Rock.

We finally came around the south side of the island, sailing around Cape Horn.

There is a house on the island.  It is inhabited by the lighthouse keeper and his family.  It is an amazingly inhospitable place to live, but it works for them.

Near the house is a monument that is said to be designed to resemble the albatross that frequent the skies in the area.

We learned that now that we've rounded the Cape, we can indicate that like sailors of the day with a gold hoop earring in our left ear - the ear that typically faces the Cape in a west-to-east passage.  I'm passing on that.  In addition, lore holds that sailors that sailed around Cape Horn are allowed to put one foot on the table when dining.  Perhaps that's why this guy stands like this:

We're planning to pass on that as well.

After we sailed away from Cape Horn, the Chilean Pilot that has been on the ship since we left Punta Arenas departed. He was brought onto the ship to assist with the navigation through the fjords and the extremely narrow Chilean waters.

While the seas are not bad, as they sailed, you could get a sense of how the ocean affects ships.  Again, this is on a relatively smooth day.

At noon, the Captain, in his noon sea day announcements confirmed that since yesterday, we have one case of COVID on the ship.  We all knew it was inevitable that someone would pick it on while on excursions.  That person is isolated and close contacts are quarantined until cleared.  Viking is handling these situations extremely well and containing COVID effectively.  Once again, we feel that we are in the safest place on the planet.

Trivia today was musical - we were presented with three song names and had to guess the band name.  We nailed 14/15 and failed on One Step Beyond, House of Fun, Driving in my Car. The band was Madness.  We lost in a tiebreaker for consolation points.  On average, how many slices of pizza are consumed per second in the USA.  The right answer was 384. We didn't win.

After lunch, we spent the afternoon with our bridge partners, Steve & Kathy, trying to play and make guesses about competitive bidding.  I actually think we're learning, but who knows?

After a nice dinner, we wound up having a quiet night in our stateroom watching a movie.  Tomorrow is another sea day as we head for Montevideo, Uraguay.