Boarding Silver Cloud on Tuesday - a couple of questoins

[bethtex]

we are boarding the Cloud on Tuesday for Antarctica cruise.  We are beyond excited.

but have a couple of practical questions

it appears there is a self-service laundry on board - do they supply soap or should we bring some?

also we are in Chile for a few days before the cruise and visiting some wineries.  Would like to bring some bottles to give as gifts when we get home.  Is there a limit on number of bottles we can carry on board?  I know most cruise lines have a 2 bottle per cabin limit but haven't seen anything on Silverseas on this 

 

any other adivce on items we might need?  we will be doing a little shopping in Chile and can pick things up.

 

[Silver Spectre]

Soap (washing powder) is provided and you may bring as much wine onboard as you like, obviously within reasonable limits (Tax, customs etc).

Edited December 7, 2019 by Silver Spectre

[jpalbny]

The limitation on wine may depend on a few factors that aren't immediately obvious.

 

1. Your luggage is supposedly restricted to 50 pounds on the charter flight from Santiago to Ushuaia. Though you can carry wine on DOMESTIC flights within Chile, I don't think you can for international flights. So a couple of bottles in your suitcase might be too much weight, depending on how much else you pack.

 

2. I have no idea whether Argentine customs has a limit on bringing in wine. I THINK not, based on our experience last January. We drove over the Andes after 2 days of wine tasting in Chile, with probably 8 bottles of Chilean wine. IIRC, our tour guide said it would be a non-issue for us as Americans to do that, but she as a Chilean was subject to stricter limits. I didn't ask further and it was a non-issue.

 

In fact it was quite funny at the border crossing. The customs agent who inspected us was a young lady, so we let our male driver do the talking. She looked at the wine in the trunk and asked where we were going. Mendoza, we said. Well, why are you bringing all that cheap wine? Are you having a "pre-party" before you drink the good stuff? And then we were through. 😁

 

We aren't going to bother buying wine this time, I don't think. Too much hassle to lug it to Ushuaia and back. If we had time to stay in Santiago afterwards, it would be a different story.

 

 

[Gourmet Gal]

Perhaps the wineries can ship it to you?  Chilean wines can be lovely but with so much availability in the states I can probably think of other more lightweight gifts to bring back.  Lugging wine is no fun.

[alithecat]

More laundry info... The self-service laundry provides soap but if you use fabric softener sheets bring your own.

[bethtex]

thanks - will take pictures of the wine we like and try to buy in the states

had a 3 weeks of travel before heading to the Cloud, so are probably way over the luggage limit.  Don't want to push it more.