The Traveling Richters are well traveled, and thanks to many years’ accumulation of frequent flyer miles and various elite status memberships with certain airlines, we usually manage to upgrade our flights to first class on U.S. domestic routes as well as to/from Bonaire, our home in the Caribbean. That said, we have never traveled trans-ocean in international first class. Until now.

On our current trip to Hong Kong and Macau, Linda and I had the privilege (thanks to 125,000 American AAdvantage miles per ticket) to fly international first class across the Pacific. Oh my. What a difference that is from cattle economy class!

On the Cathay Pacific 747 we flew on from San Francisco to Hong Kong last weekend, the first class cabin has nine seats and two dedicated cabin attendants who made us feel very loved (thank you Geri and Patrick!).

Flight time was nearly 13 hours, with a 5:30pm departure (our flight was about three hours late), and a roughly 10pm arrival (one day later due to crossing the International Date Line). That’s a pretty long flight, and the seats in first class were perfect to accommodate the flight time.

Linda in her first class pod on Cathay Pacific, with champagne and newspaper in hand

Each seat is basically a pod that offers a number of amenities, including the ability to create a flat bed long enough for even my 6’3” body. There’s also a bench opposite the main seat where a travel companion can join you for a meal (or they can sit, a bit snugly, next to you). Of course, there’s also a 17” LCD display, and dozens of on demand program options.

Jake reading his newspaper in his pod

To further make your flight as comfortable as possible, the airline provides a complimentary set of pajamas, custom made by designer/retailer Shanghai Tang, and cabin staff will make your “bed” for you with a comfortable mattress pad, pillows, and even a snuggle-worthy duvet. The only thing they didn’t have were slippers in my size (13 US).

Nap time for Jake, fully reclined, in Shanghai Tang designed jammies

Add to all that a couple of multi-course meals and a snack service, along with a very nice wine list, and you have a recipe for a wonderful and relaxing travel experience. The only minor complaint we had was that the asparagus was mushy – that’s pretty bearable considering everything else.

Dinner for two on Cathay Pacific

Salmon and caviar for our appetizer in first class on Cathay Pacific

The only real negative we see now is that we are spoiled and will be hard pressed to fly mere coach class. Sadly, even a large supply of frequent flyer miles will run out at some point. But, if you have the miles to spend (or the money), spoil yourself with international first class on a great service-oriented airline like Cathay Pacific.

I was asked by Lindblad Expeditions if I could write an article for their blog about our trip on the National Geographic Explorer. I immediately agreed, and only realized later how challenging an effort it was – we just saw and experienced so many wonderful “firsts” on our trip. After a third attempt I finally came up with as good a summary as I possibly could without writing a book.

You can find it at
http://www.expeditions.com/blog/index.asp?Display=336.

For those interested in the word from the naturalists here aboard the National Geographic Explorer, one of the things that is done every day is the writing and submission of a “Daily Expedition Report”. These are in turn published on the Lindblad Expeditions web site.

The reports from the National Geographic Explorer are a couple of days behind, but have a lot of great information.

You can find them here.

So maybe not really famous, but Lindblad Expeditions, the folks who operate the National Geographic Explorer from which we’re presently enjoying our three week exploration of Antarctica and the sub-Antarctic, just posted a news item on their site about The Traveling Richters.

You can see their post here.

And our fellow blogger/traveler, Andrew Evans, also just tweeted about us on Twitter.

In all the writing I’m doing, I realized yesterday that most of the writing has been Antarctic “facts”, like the history of the Antarctic continent, the behavior of penguins, and ecological factors. I think I have been remiss in sharing my impressions of Antarctica and our journey so far, which has involved two days on the open sea, and another three and a half off the Antarctic Peninsula.

You may have heard this before, but let me state it for the record: Antarctica is unbelievably real and heart-achingly beautiful.

The land is covered by a glacier, icebergs float in the water, and a penguin porpoises in the foreground

For example, yesterday evening, after returning to the National Geographic Explorer from several hours on land at Cuverville Island, home to one of the largest colonies of Gentoo penguins, all I could do is sigh, wistfully, as I stood our on the balcony of our stateroom, looking at the vista in the bay in which the ship was anchored.

A lone Gentoo penguin leaps out of the water with icebergs in the background

Glacial ice forms these amazing blue-green icebergs

In my immediate view was land covered with eons old glacial ice. I also saw a number of ice bergs of varying size formed from calving glaciers, almost shining blue from the purity of the ice. In the water were countless Gentoo penguins, porpoising out of the water in a sort of carefree exuberance.

A group of Gentoo penguins porpoising from the water on their way back to the colony

I could not tear myself away from the view, and just waited for yet another group of penguins to play their aquatic game of leap frog merely dozens of feet away. And I kept sighing, and mumbling to myself about how stunningly beautiful it all was.

A group of penguins on an iceberg as we leave Cuverville Island

However, our ship ultimately did have to leave the bay, and thus our view changed, with icebergs and glaciers slowly getting smaller in the distance. A humpback whale surfaced about 400 yards behind us in the ship’s wake, occasionally blowing out mists of air propelled moisture. But even the whale got smaller as we kept on course. And still I kept sighing.

We see a humpback whale from our balcony as its flukes come out of the water to propel it to the deep

Dinner was a the time to recap our day and guess at what new things we would experience and encounter the following day. But as it turned out we didn’t even have to wait that long.

After our meal, Bas and I went up to the bridge to get log readings for his science project. The bridge was mostly dark with two crew on duty. It was after sunset, but there was a beautiful soft ambient glow emanating from the overcast heavens above, reflecting on relatively calm ocean waters below.

As I watched the seas ahead of us, two dark shapes appeared, bobbing above and under the water. I watched for a minute or two as they got closer and found they were seals of some sort, frolicking about, even at night.

Another sigh. Nature’s beauty and serendipity just wouldn’t go away. Nor did I want it to.

And then several more, larger but more distant, shapes appeared ahead of the ship. We finally got close enough to determine they were humpback whales. I stood rapt, just watching as their huge but sleek bodies emerged out of the ocean. First the back of the head, then a blow of moisture which quickly dissipated, then the stunted dorsal fin on the curved back that is the trademark of a humpback whale, and then it would disappear entirely below the frigid water, only to repeat it all over again a minute later – sometimes close and sometimes far from where it last dove underwater.

As we passed the whales, Bas and I rushed to port to catch one last glimpse of our leviathan companions, and were rewarded with seeing one of the whales surface, and then bring its tail completely out of the water to give itself the extra push it needed to descend deep into the depths. Almost as if it was waving good bye to us.

Sigh.

Every day so far has been filled with wonder, excitement, and appreciation for the privilege of being able to visit Antarctica before it change much further.

And we can’t even imagine what the following day may hold, as plans are fluid, and opportunities are seized as they appear. And here we are, ready for more of nature’s beauty.

Today was day 1 of our five week journey to visit the Antarctic region. As we live on the small Caribbean island of Bonaire, a mere 12 degrees or so north of the equator, we’re actually already a lot closer to the Antarctic than perhaps any of the other people we will be meeting in Santiago for our group trip. But being closer does not mean it’s any easier to get to southern South America.

After researching our options, which including the possibility of flying four or five hours all the way up to the U.S. only to fly all the way back south, or the option of having a 15 hour connection in Guayaquil, Ecuador or Quito, Ecuador, we found that we could fly relatively painlessly from neighboring Aruba (only 80 miles west of Bonaire) to Santiago, Chile. From a travel time and hassle perspective, never mind price, this ended up being the best option.

The Traveling Richters at the Bonaire airport with 8 pieces of luggage and four carry-ons

What we didn’t count on was the challenge of getting all four of us and our luggage to Aruba from Bonaire. The problem is that the only planes that fly between islands are all relatively small and that means they too have luggage restrictions. After researching those options last month we finally settled on Tiara Air, which offers a roundtrip flight several times a week between Bonaire and Aruba, non-stop between the islands. We were able to arrange a deal where we purchased two additional seats (for a total of six) to ensure that we would not have to pay additional luggage fees, and a guarantee that all of our luggage would make it on the flight. The only downside was that we could only fly today, and could not change tomorrow’s flight from Aruba to Santiago, so we had to schedule an overnight in Aruba.

Our Tiara Air flight from Bonaire to Aruba - a Short 360-100 aircraft

Tiara Air came through for us today, and we greatly appreciate it. The Short 360-100 aircraft they use for the flight is comfortable enough, although a bit tight for people with long legs, and the flight was quite smooth and short (45 minutes).

Once we arrived in Aruba, we grabbed our luggage, headed to our hotel in nearby Oranjestad, checked in and then went out in search for lunch. We found our meal right next door to our hotel at a place called “Cafe The Plaza”. The food quality and service was reasonable, but nothing really exciting.

After that we went out to find a pair of closed toed waterproof slip-ons for Bas, as he had outgrown his old set of Crocs. It took more than a half dozen beach-oriented stores to find a pair of Croc knock offs that fit him and were not in an offensive color (e.g. pink). He ended up with blue ones, as that was the only color available in his size.

As we wandered about in search of the shoes, we started noticing an over-abundance of jewelry stores. By my estimation, in the half hour of wandering we did to find the shoes and return to our hotel, we saw at least 15 jewelry stores. We were completely dumbfounded at how it might be possible for all of them to survive with such competition. I guess there’s a lot of loose money floating around here from somewhere.

Getting back to our room Linda discovered that both of the pairs of polarized Oakley sunglasses she had purchased in Chicago last summer were missing from her luggage, and while she believes this was a nefarious deed, we found nothing else missing. So, we ran out to a nearby sunglass shop and bought her some replacement glasses. She’ll need them when looking at ice, snow, and icebergs in about a week.

Linda buys two new sets of polarized sunglasses to replace the ones she can't find in the luggage

We capped off the evening with a couple of rousing games of Five Crowns, and dinner at a nearby Japanese restaurant (which employed only South Americans and Filipinos) by the name of Sushi-ya. Nice meal!

Dinner at Sushi-ya - we had the 'Sashimi de-luxe'

All the selected photos from the day (which includes those above and a number more) have been uploaded to my Flickr page.

I will mention that I probably will not be writing as detailed daily commentaries as this one once we’re further south due to time and bandwidth restrictions, and that will also, in turn, limit the number of photos I can share. So please don’t expect huge daily missives from us, but if you get aone occasionally, enjoy!

The next post will probably be late on Sunday after we’ve arrived in Santiago and spent the day out and about.