Preparations behind the scenes for the new journey
Europa’s adventures in Antarctica are over for this season. She is starting now her voyages in the Pacific Ocean, first setting sail along southern Chilean Patagonia, Chilean Channels, and the Chilean coast to Puerto Montt first, then Valparaiso.
Ushuaia, the main hub for Antarctic expeditions, is home again for the Europa after finishing a trip down south and before starting a new one, now heading north along the Chilean Fjords.
She has a good couple of days to get ready for her new voyage. Crew is busy from below decks in the engine room, cabins and common spaces to up aloft as well. Always something to clean, get ready, repair or keep on with her maintenance. An always ongoing process in her over 100 years of history.
For tomorrow, all will be ready for a trip facing again a route along the South Pacific. It was just in 2024 when she sailed the expanse of this ocean, now she plans again a similar route, always with some adjustments over previous schedules.
This new sailing deed starts in south Patagonia. A fantastic corner of our world with a long and fascinating history, plus its amazing landscapes and interesting wildlife.
The first native population in the area arrived and lived in this demanding environment no less than 10,000 years ago. But it took until the 16th Century to be discovered by the Europeans. It was then when Fernando de Magallanes sailed through the straits that nowadays bear his name. We have to wait until the 19th Century for Captain Fitz Roy to find a more southern connection between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, now along the Beagle Channel.
Both those trips went around the world in times when the load of adventure, hardship and discovery was at a different level than nowadays, but despite this, the sole mention of these whereabouts still fuels our curiosity and draws us here. Nowadays with a much larger knowledge of the area, modern technology and different safety standards.
Patagonia is ahead of us, with surely some of its classical adversities: harsh weather, narrow channels, fjords, glaciers, battered coastlines, the southernmost forests of the world covering the slopes and its high unspoiled mountains.