Falkland Islands 1982
(Brilliant)
Flew out to some lovely volcanic Is. just south of the equator where a tour guide bundled us into a smart looking helicopter (called a Humphrey?). A short hop across the bay and we were placed onto a nice looking white boat called the Cunard Countess. The following day we set off across the South Atlantic at a breakneck speed (!), soon to be slowed by storm force winds and 50 foot waves. Only now did the Captain explain why we appeared permanently pi**ed as the gyro stableized thingys had broken and his flat bottomed ship(now he told us!) was wallowing like a fishing boat. To be honest, this only added more excitement to the trip and in the words of a tour guide “errrrrgh!…….errrrrgh!” as he lost his breakfast into a plastic pedal bin. Now this was my idea of a holiday! We limped out of the storm minus a prop shaft on one engine and an engine failure on another, and as we only had three engines in the first place, in the words of another tour guide ” ..if we had lost that, things could have got really interesting!….”
We did notice however, we only had paper plates for the rest of our voyage as all the crockery was destroyed.
Some of the entertainment was fun, firing guns off the back of the boat at black bin bags thrown in by the crew and running around the decks whilst being shouted at by very noisey tour guides. Now, as I was a member of a big flying club(we don’t do exercise), I decided to (successfully)avoid the runney, shouty stuff by hiding in my cabin! The cinema was good, showing films on land mine and ordinance recognition with a bit on first aid during the day and “The Excorsist” during each evening (a bit boring after 3 viewings)
All in all a very nice trip in a boat, however, in the ten day cruise, we only stopped at one place, right at the end, San Carlos. (and there were no shops!!)
For the next 5 months, I was convinced we were in Scotland.
They wouldn’t refund my money.
Baz
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