Live to Partly Live to Oh Well from Celebrity Infinity, Feb 11-25, 2023 Antarctica and Iguasu Falls

[Poconolady]

We used Estancia Tours and were very pleased. There really is no actual “tour” you  are basically paying for transportation and admission to Volunteer Point, so if your first choice is booked up, go with another of the providers listed above. You will have  the same experience , and only pay about half of what the ships tour is charging, for the same thing. Volunteer Point itself is self explanatory, you just walk among the penguins and enjoy their antics, (just don’t touch them), listen to their  singing and experience what its like to be up close and personal with such fascinating creatures. There are three types of penguins here, and each is different in not only looks, but their colony structure. The King penguins are truly the kings here, but the Magelliantics  seem to take over the beach area and the Gentoos have  their own little haven.  The ride is rough, people with back or neck problems should be aware of that before booking, the excursion ends in Stanley with time to poke around the limited number of shops and to see the church before lining up for the tender back to the ship..

[BlerkOne]

One thing the overprice ship tours do get you is worry free tendering to shore. If you aren't Elite or higher, it is something you have to deal with.

[Norwaylady]

Love your live🤩 

Great to follow along:) 

 

Believe me, Mr Norwaylady love this type of climate and type of adventure! So when the correct itinerary is back, we will jump onboard⚓️ 

 

 

[BlerkOne]

Tonight was lobster night, and it was good! 

 

[the penguins]

On 2/23/2023 at 6:53 AM, Norwaylady said:

Love your live🤩 

Great to follow along:) 

 

Believe me, Mr Norwaylady love this type of climate and type of adventure! So when the correct itinerary is back, we will jump onboard⚓️ 

 

 

Looking at your profile and country I would strongly recommend you also look at an Expedition Cruise that includes South Georgia. In addition to landings on the Peninsular being able to visit Grytviken with its unique whaling history, church,  Shackleton's Grave and 10's of thousands of King Penguins is unique. There is really no comparison between the "panoramic" experience offered by Celebrity and that of, for example, Hurtigruten. 

We have done both.

[BlerkOne]

I met my excursion at 5:30 am . Zzzzz. We’ll see if I finally make it to Iguazu. Laptop is going to the BA hotel so probably not going to post too many pictures until after the excursion.

[BlerkOne]

I hear coughing and sneezing going on.. Hopefully it won’t find me.

[joandian]

On 2/22/2023 at 7:13 AM, BlerkOne said:

Any of the Volunteer Point tours, but they were King Penguins. The ship doesn't go far enough south to see Emperor penguins. I was on a private tour.

 

Is there chopper tours to see the penguins?  

[the penguins]

5 hours ago, joandian said:

 

Is there chopper tours to see the penguins?  

Falklands Helicopter Service £350  (roughly 💲420) per person minimum 2 persons. 25 minutes each way instead of over 2 hours by road. Also shorter tours and sightseeing. Check out their website.

[the penguins]

Just now, the penguins said:

Falklands Helicopter Service £350  (roughly 💲420) per person minimum 2 persons.Volunteer Point in 25 minutes each way instead of over 2 hours by road. Also shorter tours and sightseeing. Check out their website.

 

 

[BlerkOne]

11 hours ago, joandian said:

 

Is there chopper tours to see the penguins?  

There is but I don't know how much.

[BlerkOne]

Beautiful day in Iguazu yesterday. Started that way today but then the skies opened up. Now hunkered down at the rail station. Had to break out my snorkel cam 

[BlerkOne]

We had  good sized plane going to Iguazu from the main airport

 

[BlerkOne]

We started on the Brazil side. First real glimpse

 

 

 

[wrk2cruise]

Did you do this yourself or take the Celebrity excursion?   What time was your flight?  How many nights did you spend at the falls?

[BlerkOne]

36 minutes ago, wrk2cruise said:

Did you do this yourself or take the Celebrity excursion?   What time was your flight?  How many nights did you spend at the falls?

Celebrity. This is the basic itinerary

 

 

[joandian]

14 hours ago, BlerkOne said:

Beautiful day in Iguazu yesterday. Started that way today but then the skies opened up. Now hunkered down at the rail station. Had to break out my snorkel cam 

 

What time did you leave the ship?  We are booked on a private tour to the falls with a pick up time of 7am but I know we have to board a shuttle to get to the terminal.

[BlerkOne]

7 hours ago, joandian said:

 

What time did you leave the ship?  We are booked on a private tour to the falls with a pick up time of 7am but I know we have to board a shuttle to get to the terminal.

We met at 5:30am in Tuscan Grill where they had a breakfast of sorts set up for us, and around 6am or maybe later we were escorted off of the ship to a private shuttle to the terminal and to our bus to the airport. All we had for luggage was a small carry-on with whatever we needed for overnight at Iguazu. No customs, no immigration, no nothing. We flew from EZE to Iguazu on an A330 and returned to a different airport on a ERJ90 and were taken to our various hotels where we reunited with our larger pieces of luggage.

 

We put our large luggage outside of our cabins with special luggage tags and didn't have to deal with it until we checked into our Buenos Aires hotels the following day. The tour company dealt with all of that.

 

The carry on we took to Iguazu (most took a backpack) could be safely stored while on the buses while touring the falls or you could catty any or all of it.

 

What was sadly lacking was information from Celebrity about the tour other than a brief description, which wasn't that accurate to begin with.

 

Not having to fool with any of the planning or execution was well worth the price to me. I did see a number of others from the cruise at the falls so it is certainly possible, but I don't know about their journey. Perhaps they will post here or on other social media.

 

 

 

[wrk2cruise]

@BlerkOne  That's great information about the Celebrity tour.   We are doing DYI for 3 days in April.  We were chicken about making the 10:20 flight out of the domestic airport so are taking the 14:30 flight.  I guess the earlier flight wouldn't have been an issue!

[BlerkOne]

44 minutes ago, wrk2cruise said:

@BlerkOne  That's great information about the Celebrity tour.   We are doing DYI for 3 days in April.  We were chicken about making the 10:20 flight out of the domestic airport so are taking the 14:30 flight.  I guess the earlier flight wouldn't have been an issue!

The domestic airport is a lot closer to downtown than the International airport.

 

 

[BlerkOne]

Daily upload limit reached? What the heck? Anyway some short clips from Iguazu

 

 

[BlerkOne]

 

 

[BlerkOne]

 

 

 

[BlerkOne]

 

 

[Poconolady]

Thank you for taking the time to do the “Live” report of your cruise. It was fun following along, viewing your pictures and reliving the happy memories of our cruise in January. So glad to see your clips of Iguazu. Do you have any pics of Puerto Madryn to share?