expedition,with,Indochina,Sail travel,insurance A expedition with Indochina Sails (1 June, 2008)

Torres del Paine is among the biggest of Chile’s national parks, occupying almost 600,000 acres (242,000 ha) of land in the south on the border with Argentina. It is also among the most important, receiving a significant proportion of domes Like any American, traveling occasionally is just what I love doing and I bet you share the same stuff with me. But traveling does not mean that you would be safe. Escaping from our job and other stressful activities is just something that w

We got off the bus and were greeted by a guide with Indochina sails. We were taken inside a building to wait for our boat to be ready.  Wewere given cold towels at the door, you know your entering luxury whenyou get a towel to freshen up.  We waited for about a half hour, whileour luggage was taken to the ship.  We then were put on a small boat orthe "tender" and taken to the ship.  As we were drawing close to theship, one staff member on the boat was playing a drum, it was a bitodd, feeling like your in a King Kong movie or something.We were greeted by a female staff member and were brought to thedining room on the 2nd level of the ship.  There was 13 peopleincluding ourselves.  We were given the safety speech and told a bitabout our itinerary.  Then we were given our key and told to settle ina bit then return to the dining room for lunch at 1pm.  We had a roomon the 2nd floor, which I think would have been better than the 1stlevel.  We had a fantastic view of the bay and our room was amazing. Definitely one of the best showers we've seen.  It was like a 4 starhotel room.We settled in and looked at our in tin a bit closer, then headed tothe dining room.  We had a set lunch, which included cream of pumpkinsoup, papaya salad, prawns, fish, chicken, spring rolls and fruitsalad.  Overall it was really good quality.  The prices for drinkswasn't actually too bad and they had a really good selection.  Afterlunch we were told we would cruise to a fishing village with 400floating houses.  The bay is as stunning as everyone says it is!  Thelegend behind it involves a family of dragons that were sent by thegods to help protect the coast during times of war with China, thedragons spit out jade and emerald which turned into the islands aroundthe bay.  After the war the family of dragons decided to stay and themother settled into Ha Long bay andthe children in other near by bays.  The islands do have an amazingdense green to them, like nothing we've ever seen.  I can see why it isa UNESCO world heritage site.We cruised for about an hour and a half before we reached thefishing village.  We all hopped on the tender and were taken around theCua Van village by the guide.  The village is supported by thegovernment these days and the people are provided with a basiceducation and health care within the village.  There were a lot ofchildren around, some around 6-9 years old, rowing their own boats. There was a squid fishing boat, the primary school and even a localcafe for relaxing.  It was really interesting.  After our tour weheaded back to the boat and doubled back to Ti Tov beach.  We opted togo kayaking for $10 each.  We had to wait for them to bring the kayaksto the boat, which set us back a bit on our itinerary.  I've never beenkayaking before, so this was going to be interesting.We got in and were on our way, everyone except one couple went.  Weended up going quite a ways to the east of the boat, a good 2km.  Wecame upon Bat cave, which was a opening to a otherwise closed offsection, which the guide called a lake (which it wasn't).  It was coolto just drift though the cave.  The section past it was so serene andpeaceful.  We drifted around for about 20 minutes then our guide tookoff, so we figured we should go too.  Kayaking is hard work, especiallywhen there is a fairly strong current.  We had to pause a lot on ourway back, but it was nice to really soak up the experience.  Eventuallywe made it back and were directly taken by the tender to the beach.The sun wasn't out but we figured we might was well go in thewater.  You could climb to the top of the island, some 400 steps, butkayaking was enough for us.  The other two girls who were on our bustold us the water was actually pretty warm, they were both from B.C... So we swam around for about 20 minutes, chatting with them and a couplefrom Australia.  Then we were all herded back on the tender to the shipWe had some time to get ready for dinner at 7:30.  You could do awine tasting before dinner, which was tempting but we passed.  Werelaxed in our room for a bit and freshened up.  The sun, what sunthere was, went down quick and it became pitch black out.  We went outto the top deck, the weather was actually quite pleasant.  Some staffwas fishing for squid off the front of the boat, so we watched themcatch a few.  Then we headed to the dining room for dinner, which was aset menu as well.  I had a relish glass of red wine, a rarity in Asia Ithink.  We had vegetable soup, shrimp and grapefruit salad, calamariand beef with potatoes and veggies.  The main course was a bitunimpressive, especially when you are used to Alberta beef.  We hadchocolate cake for dessert.After dinner we could watch a movie (which was a Vietnamese dubbedclassic), fish for squid or a few other activities.  We opted to trythe squid fishing.  We were both unsuccessful, but other people caughta couple.  They use a bright light to attract the fish that the squideat.  They were pretty cool, they were little and they'd squirt inkwhen they were caught.  It was funny to watch.  They had a 2 for 1happy hour on all drinks from 9 to 11pm, so we had a couple beers whilefishing.  Then we went up to the top deck and sat in the loungechairs.  It is so peaceful here.  The manager told us that we wereanchored at an exclusive spot.  All the other tour boats anchorsomewhere else, there can be up to 50 of them when its busy.  Therewere 3 other boats around us.  I'm happy we're at the exclusive spot. We took in the beautiful night, then decided we better head to bed.  Wehave another early start tomorrow and we were pretty exhausted from theday.  I am so ready for a comfy bed!  Ciao for now!Source: Travelpod