On My Way Home

Sadly, my Antarctic adventure is coming to a close and I’m heading home today. I traveled 1,763 nautical miles aboard the M/S Expedition and saw many animals, birds, and beautiful sites. Antarctica was the most beautiful place I have ever been (Beyin in Ghana has been bumped to second place for the most pristine beautiful location I’ve visited).

We landed in Ushuaia and hung out in the small town for a few hours before heading to the airport. I expected that my trip home would be slightly shorter than my trip down to Ushuaia, because I didn’t have to fly back through El Calafate. In actuality, my trip was definitely more eventful on the way home.

My flight out of Ushuaia was delayed by about an hour, so I had to rush across Buenos Aires to catch my flight out of the international airport. Luckily, there wasn’t much traffic on Sunday night (and my flight was delayed), so I made it. There was some sort of strike happening in Uruguay, so air traffic in South America was a mess. We boarded our plane late and still sat on the runway for nearly 2 hours before we could depart.

I had already missed my connection in Dallas, but I was further delayed waiting for my luggage so I could pass through Customs. My bag never arrived, which was strange because the people who checked in after me were able to collect their bags no problem. I had to wait until no more bags were coming, and then I headed over to bag service, where they advised me I could file a claim at my final destination. By the time I got through customs, the line for rebooking was very long (nearly everyone on our plane had a missed connection). I ended up trying to fly standby on the next flight, but I didn’t make it, and I was able to get a confirmed (middle) seat on an early afternoon flight. I am typing this on the plane, and I’m just grateful that I didn’t have any of these issues with flights or baggage on the way down. I am sure my luggage will arrive in the next day or two, and I have plenty of clothes and toiletries at home so it’s not a big deal. [It actually arrived home before I did, go figure!]

The crew made us certificates to show that we set foot on Antarctica, and that we swam in Antarctic waters (click to make them bigger so you can read them if you want to):



I’ll pull together some of my favorite photos and post them here this week. Thanks for following my adventure!