Antarctica to Zimbabwe – Day 1

The bags are packed, the housesitter is prepped, and we are poised to embark on a three month trip from South America to Africa – through Chile, the Falklands, South Georgia, Antarctica, St. Helena, South Africa, Namibia and Zimbabwe.

Why do we want to visit all of these places? The best I can come up with is because they are simply so remote that it never occurred to us that it was possible until recently. But after years of gradually expanding our kids’ travel skills, it now seems within our grasp.

And why not later? Frankly, time is running out. Our son will be starting high school in a year and a half.

A trip like this takes months of planning. Perhaps years. We first started seriously looking at Antarctic cruises in 2019. We put a deposit down more than 2 years ago – and shifted the cruise twice before we found one that would actually work.

I was never much of a travel planner. It was surprisingly our last 3 month trip – our honeymoon, more than 14 years ago – that convinced me of its merit. There’s nothing worse than wasting a sun-drenched afternoon in Dubrovnik frantically searching for our next hotel room.

So night after night, we pored over our Antarctic spreadsheets as we planned excursions, booked hotels and arranged transfers. But finally we reached the point where everything was green – all the plans that needed to be made had been made.

Even packing took several weeks. We went through a full practice round of packing two weeks in advance – and I’m very glad we did, as we ended up ordering two new suitcases to deal with the extra load.

It’s one thing to pack for a three month trip. It’s something else to pack for three distinct climates – hot, temperate and polar. But trying to pack for a three month trip that also goes to three distinct climates? That’s another matter altogether.

I mean, just think of the sunscreen. And three months worth of over-the-counter medicine and first aid supplies to treat everything from heartburn to snake bites.

Anyway. We got there. And this was the end result:

Exhibit A: 345 Pounds of Luggage

Despite this seeming over-preparedness, I woke from my mid-afternoon nap to a nasty surprise: our upcoming flights from Santiago to Puerto Natales – gateway to Patagonia – had been shifted several hours earlier. We needed to figure out if our drivers would still be able to take us, and whether this would mean another 4 am wakeup in our future.

So amidst all the packing, I was also bouncing frantic WhatsApp messages to our contact in Chile – though thankfully they were able to confirm that they were aware of the changes, and that the driver had already factored that into the pick-up time. One small relief, at least.

4 pm arrived, and my wife and daughter were back from school and racing to eat an early dinner and finish the last of the packing and clean-up before our house sitter arrived.

And then a phone call – our driver had arrived almost 40 minutes early. The planning was paying off.

Usually we drive to the airport and leave our car at the Park ‘n’ Fly valet. There’s a substantial discount available for those who pre-book, and the valet aspect means that they clear snow off your car off before they bring it out to you. You’re not right at the airport, but they have a shuttle that runs frequently. I would typically drop my wife and kids at the airport with the bags, then catch up after leaving the car with Park ‘n’ Fly.

This time, however, we needed to make alternate arrangements – we were somehow able to score inexpensive business class seats on our 24-hour journey home from Zimbabwe, but only by ending the flight in Ottawa. So whatever transport arrangements we made would have to work with an open-jaw flight. (Though in truth our luggage wouldn’t have fit our car, anyway.)

So we booked a driver with a large SUV instead, and sprawled ourselves across the back seat as we admired our last Canadian sunset for the next three months:

The driver got slightly turned around on the way out of town, but otherwise the journey was very comfortable. Full credit to Toronto Airport Limo for making this a painless experience (and for putting up with multiple calls in the weeks leading up to confirm – and then really really confirm – that everything was set to go.

I think we’ll still opt to drive ourselves when possible, but we would go with them again should we run into another open jaw trip (or further luggage problems).

It wasn’t long after that we were pulling up to Pearson airport.

We typically post photos of the expert-level Jenga that goes into arranging our luggage, and this trip shall be no different:

Our son had opted to complete a school swim meet earlier today, so we checked bags while we waited for him to arrive. Or, at least we tried:

Thankfully, the error was short lived – the red lights soon turned green and we were able to get our bags through to the conveyor belt with a minimum of hassle, despite the system repeatedly asserting that our horizontally-laid bags were definitely vertical.

(Picking up the bag and shifting it slightly before re-attempting seems to be the baggage-robot equivalent of turning it off and turning it back on again.)

But again, the planning paid off – our carefully-weighed luggage was not sent back to us, and we were spared the indignity of having to shuffle our unmentionables between various bags in a vain attempt to meet the weight allowance.

Our son arrived soon after – flushed with victory from his new personal bests, or perhaps from the cookies he’d been given – and we made our way through the Nexus line.

Have I waxed poetic recently about the wonders of Nexus? No waiting, and they don’t even make you take your liquids or electronics out of your bag, or remove your shoes and belt. Very civilized.

Then off on our lengthy walk to the international terminal, where we finally ended up at the Plaza Premium lounge, which we can access via our credit card rewards.

The Plaza lounge is either a highlight or a nightmare of any particular trip, depending on whether it’s full or not. They have attempted to instigate a pre-booking policy, but it’s not available until 10 pm at night, effectively rendering it useless.

But flying out late on a Tuesday meant that we were able to get in without having to wait in line – and there was plenty of space:

The food was good too – and included a somewhat-healthy chicken Cacciatore that makes up our second dinner of the evening:

We were also impressed to find a wide-range of Ontario beverages being served at the bar, including Niagara wines and Prince Edward County beers.

I took the time to get a bit of blogging done, while the kids had a bit of iPad time. It wasn’t long before the staff were coming by to gently remind us that we had 30 minutes left in our 2 hour window. (And to kick out a few guests who had overstayed.)

By then we were about an hour out from departure, so it was time to head to our gate. We’d got a good deal on the flight when we booked almost a year earlier, so had managed to snag seats in premium economy – which also meant we’d be boarding in zone 2, and thereby perhaps actually able to find some overhead bin space.

However, by the time we arrived Air Canada was giving its usual spiel about it being a completely sold out flight, and that they would allow anyone who gate-checked their bag to also board in zone 2. So we’ll just have to see whether we get our bin space after all.

This delay gave us just enough time to turn off our phone data at the network level via the Rogers app. Normally it would be enough to keep data roaming off, but the iPhone 15 has an irritating habit of using small bits of data even when roaming is off. And Rogers unfortunately treats any roaming as a full day of “roam like home”, thereby incurring a $15 charge.

Fortunately, we have Airalo global e-SIMs, so we’ll still have access to the internet while abroad. We also paid a bit more so we’d have the ability to make calls and send texts too. Unfortunately, the number is from Austria of all places but it will hopefully prevent what happened last time in Reykjavik, where the taxi driver couldn’t find me and I had to pay the dreaded $15 to answer his 20 second call.

If this isn’t enough of a belt-and-suspenders approach, we’ve also purchased a Zoleo satellite communications device so that we can send texts and e-mails while outside of cell service. Zoleo uses the Iridium satellite network so you can even get full coverage in polar regions. You can only send text and each message is limited to 200 characters, but we were able to get an unlimited plan for CAD$70 per month. (Thankfully we can downgrade the plan once we get home.)

Our group was called, and we milled our way to the front of the line to join the lineup. Thankfully, zone 2 began somewhere near the middle of the huddle so we were able to segue in without incident.

The rest went smoothly – we were able to shelve our bags directly overhead of our rows, and we taxied off on time for once, and bid adieu to Toronto.

Kids had pre-ordered their own children’s meal, which was spaghetti and meatballs:

While the adults had the beef stew:

And the chicken:

Service is about what you would expect for premium economy – not as good as business, but a darn sight better than what you’d get in regular economy. It felt like they didn’t have enough flight attendants for that flight, but it often feels that way. The attendants who were there were doing their utmost to make sure everyone had the best flight possible – there simply weren’t enough of them.

Midnight came and went as we waited for our dinner trays to be collected, and my wife and I were both amazed at how well the kids were doing under the circumstances. We were now a full four hours past their bedtimes, and neither had issued a word of complaint.

But soon the trays were collected and everyone drifted off for as much sleep as the Airplane Gods would grant us.

Continue reading Antarctica to Zimbabwe – Day 2.