The wreck of the USS Riverside. She was commissioned in 1943 as a troop carrier. After the war, she left military service, and changed hands several times in the private sector. On March 31, 1968, she ran aground in this channel. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Riverside_(APA-102)

Within the Peel fjord is the El Brujo glacier, a beautiful sight, first thing Christmas morning.

Good morning, and Merry Christmas, everybody!

11:30p Christmas Eve.....and it's nearly dark outside.

An orca sighting! At least 3-4 killer whales a bit in the distance; the ship shut down its propulsion and drifted so we could watch. The orcas remained far enough away that it was easier to take pictures of the guests taking pictures, rather than of the whales themselves. Very cold and windy, but we're sailing into the narrow fjords, so the water is now virtually glassy.

Well. Some excitement on our way down the Chilean coast, toward the entrance to most of the fjords. Quite heavy seas, we heard two large clatters from the galley at breakfast, just before another guest's breakfast slid off the table and landed in her lap. Everyone staggers down the hallways, hanging onto rails and/or lurching from one side of the hall to the other. Small paper bags are discreetly placed around the ship, for obvious reasons.

Even Chiloén graffiti is impressive.

Around town in Castro, on Chiloé island.

Chiloé marketplace - brimming with fresh produce, the obligatory bags of potatoes (200 different varieties!), and strings of dried mussels and other shellfish.

Hey, Chilean churches get cold.

The wonderful palafitos - "houses on stilts" on Chiloé island.

I really liked Chiloé island, off the Chilean coast at the north of the Reloncavi sound. Their dozens of wooden churches constitute a Unesco World Heritage site, we toured three of them.

Posting to YouTube seems to be the only way to include a video here. If you can copy-and-paste this link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hl3nyauVdoM you should be able to see the Petrohue Rapids.

Upon our return to the ship from our time in Puerto Montt....well, evidently the Seabourn folks have birthdays stored in their database. At the bottom right is a layered birthday cake made out of our towels! I was also a recipient of a little birthday cake after dinner last night, real cake, not the towel kind.

The rapids at Petrohue. The lake from which these waters flow, as well as the rapids here, are a beautiful greenish color. Chile has always been a copper exporting nation, its mountains are rich with it, and as the water flows it picks up some of the copper, giving it the color.

We spent the whole day today in the area of Puerto Montt, the weather didn't really cooperate, with it being my birthday and all, but the cool drizzle and fog produced its own kind of "shades of gray" beauty.

These days, cargo ships don't really feel the need to be too deceptive about what they're shipping, apparently.