Dear Birders. I have been reading the listServe these past few days while remembering my trip on the Princess Cruise ship last January.
For those who want a slightly different perspective on this trip, I will offer my own observations. I am a birder, not an expert like Tove and Carter. I chase birds for the joy that they bring to my personal well-being. I have some lists, but....meh.
So in the fall of 2023 when Derb mentioned this trip to me I was frankly not interested. A 17-day pelagic trip was one of my worst nightmares. But I respect Derb and took his advice and signed up. And this was one of the best birding trips of my life!
I studied a target list of those black and white sea birds from the field guides for weeks. And I read The Seabird's Cry (a great book) before the trip. With a lot of help from Derb, and 3 friendly guys from Oregon with massive cameras I was able to add a bunch of birds to my life list. I added 11 of Derb's Albatross species to my list. On land I had two King Penguins only feet from me, and immatures sleeping in the sand face down or skipping around testing their wings near by.
The life experience of seeing thousands of seabirds living out their day-to-day lives was fantastic, unbelievable, outstanding, etc. And the scenery of the Antarctic and the icebergs was spectacular. Did I mention hearing the whales breathe, penguins swimming next to the ship, seeing the Southern Cross?
As for the cruise ship experience, not bad at all. I did spend the extra bucks for a balcony room and was glad I did on the few days I had the flu. I opened my balcony doors and sipped hot tea and watched the birds fly by. I also had breakfast delivered to my room at 6 a.m. every single day so I could watch more birds fly by as I sipped my coffee. I was usually on the deck by 7 and most days Derb had beat me out there. I had some patches for the sea sickness, but the ship is so huge it wasn't rough. I proactively wore them on the Drake passage days and was fine.
I would go again in a heartbeat. Thank you, thank you, thank you, Derb.
