Carnival Firenze - Chilean Fjords & Cape Horn: Santiago to Buenos Aires

Where this cruise calls, day by day

10 ports and 5 sea days over 14 Nights.

1. Day 1

   San Antonio (Santiago)

   ChileDepart

   San Antonio is a working container and bulk port, and cruise ships call here mainly because Valparaiso's berths are full. The town itself is thin on sights — a fishing wharf with pelicans and sea lions, and not much beyond that. Nearly everyone heads out: Santiago is about 110 km inland, the Casablanca wine valley is much closer, and Neruda's house at Isla Negra is a short drive down the coast.

   • Casablanca Valley wineries
   • Pablo Neruda's Isla Negra house and museum
   • Santiago day trip (roughly 90 minutes each way)
   • The fish market wharf with resident sea lions

   Getting ashore

   Ships berth in the commercial port; a shuttle is normally required to leave the terminal gates.

   Best months

   Nov-Mar

2. Day 2 · At sea

3. Day 3 · At sea

4. Day 4

   Darwin Channel (Scenic Cruising)

   ChilePort

   The Darwin Channel runs through the Chonos Archipelago in the Aysen region, one link in the inside passage that lets ships avoid the open Pacific. It is narrow, green and effectively uninhabited — low forested islands, salmon pens in a few places, and low cloud most days. There is nothing to visit; the point is watching the coastline go by from the bow with a chance of dolphins and sea lions.

   • Uninhabited forested islands of the Chonos Archipelago
   • Chilean and Peale's dolphins in the channel
   • South American sea lions on rock shelves
   • The inside-passage route sheltered from Pacific swell

   Getting ashore

   Scenic cruising only — a transit, with no landing.

   Best months

   Nov-Mar

5. Day 5

   Chilean Fjords (Scenic Cruising)

   ChilePort

   South of Puerto Montt the Chilean coast shatters into a thousand-mile maze of channels, islands and glacier-fed inlets with almost nobody living in it. A scenic cruising day here means standing on deck watching forested walls slide past, often in rain, with waterfalls in every fold and the occasional hanging glacier above. Ships thread named passages such as the Messier Channel and the English Narrows, timing the tight ones to slack water.

   • The English Narrows (Angostura Inglesa), about 180 metres wide
   • Messier Channel and its uninhabited forested walls
   • Hanging glaciers off the Southern Patagonian Ice Field
   • Peale's and Chilean dolphins riding the bow wave

   Getting ashore

   Scenic cruising only — no landing, and low cloud can hide most of it.

   Best months

   Nov-Mar (drier and longer daylight, though rain is likely year-round)

6. Day 6

   Amalia Glacier (Scenic Cruising)

   ChilePort

   Amalia is a tidewater glacier off the Sarmiento Channel, flowing down from the Southern Patagonian Ice Field inside Bernardo O'Higgins National Park. Ships turn off the main channel into the fjord and nose up towards the face, which is heavily crevassed and streaked with rock debris. Small icebergs and brash usually determine how close anyone gets, and the volcanic peak of Reclus stands behind the ice.

   • The Amalia (Skua) Glacier calving face
   • Reclus volcano rising behind the ice field
   • Brash ice and bergy bits filling the fjord
   • Bernardo O'Higgins National Park, Chile's largest protected area

   Getting ashore

   Scenic cruising from the ship; expedition vessels may add a zodiac cruise, ice permitting.

   Best months

   Nov-Mar

7. Day 7

   Strait of Magellan (Scenic Cruising)

   ChilePort

   The strait is the sheltered route between the Atlantic and Pacific that Magellan found in 1520, and it is still the alternative to going round the Horn. Cruising it means a day of low brown steppe on the north shore and rising forested mountains on the Tierra del Fuego side, narrowing at Primera and Segunda Angostura where the tide runs hard. Commerson's dolphins and Peale's dolphins are common.

   • Primera and Segunda Angostura, the two tidal narrows
   • Commerson's and Peale's dolphins alongside
   • The Tierra del Fuego shoreline and distant Darwin Range
   • Punta Arenas and Fuerte Bulnes on the northern shore

   Getting ashore

   Scenic cruising; the strait is a transit route rather than a stop.

   Best months

   Nov-Mar

8. Day 8

   Cape Horn (Scenic Cruising)

   ChilePort

   Cape Horn is the headland at the southern end of Hornos Island, the last land before the Drake Passage, and rounding it is the point of the exercise. There is a Chilean navy station, a small chapel and the Cape Horn Monument — a steel albatross cut in silhouette, raised to the sailors lost here. Whether you see any of it depends on cloud; whether the ship gets close depends on the swell.

   • The Cape Horn Monument, a cut-steel albatross sculpture
   • The Chilean navy lighthouse station and chapel
   • The headland itself at the meeting of Atlantic and Pacific
   • Black-browed albatross and giant petrels working the swell

   Getting ashore

   Scenic cruising; landings are attempted only by small expedition ships and succeed rarely.

   Best months

   Nov-Mar

9. Day 9

   Ushuaia

   ArgentinaPort

   Ushuaia sits on the Beagle Channel below the Martial range and bills itself as the world's southernmost city, which is mostly true and entirely commercial. It is the main embarkation port for Antarctic expedition ships, so the waterfront is a mix of outfitters, king crab restaurants and gangways. Passengers on round-South-America itineraries usually get a half day for the national park or a channel boat trip.

   • Tierra del Fuego National Park and Lapataia Bay
   • Beagle Channel catamaran trip to Les Eclaireurs lighthouse and the sea lion islets
   • End of the World Train (Tren del Fin del Mundo)
   • Museo del Presidio, the old prison that built the town

   Getting ashore

   Ships berth at the Muelle Comercial, a short walk from Avenida San Martin.

   Best months

   Nov-Mar

10. Day 10 · At sea

11. Day 11 · At sea

12. Day 12

    Puerto Madryn

    ArgentinaPort

    Puerto Madryn is a modest Patagonian beach town that exists on cruise itineraries because of what surrounds it. Peninsula Valdes, a UNESCO site an hour or two north, is where southern right whales calve in the sheltered gulfs and where orcas occasionally beach themselves to take sea lion pups. To the south, Punta Tombo holds one of the largest Magellanic penguin colonies anywhere. The Welsh settlements at Gaiman still serve tea.

    • Southern right whale watching from Puerto Piramides, Peninsula Valdes
    • Punta Tombo Magellanic penguin colony
    • Punta Loma sea lion reserve
    • Welsh tea houses and chapels at Gaiman

    Getting ashore

    Ships berth at the Almirante Storni pier, a short shuttle from town.

    Best months

    Sep-Dec for right whales; Oct-Mar for penguins

13. Day 13 · At sea

14. Day 14

    Montevideo

    UruguayPort

    Uruguay's capital is a low-key, walkable city where the cruise berth is genuinely close to the old town for once. Ciudad Vieja gives you Art Deco and crumbling neoclassical in the same block, and the Mercado del Puerto is a shed full of wood-fired grills that most passengers end up in by noon. The Rambla runs for miles along the river-sea, and the beaches at Pocitos are a short taxi away.

    • Mercado del Puerto and its parrilla grills
    • Plaza Independencia, the Palacio Salvo and Artigas mausoleum
    • Teatro Solis
    • The Rambla and Pocitos beach

    Getting ashore

    Ships berth in the working port a few minutes' walk from Ciudad Vieja.

    Best months

    Nov-Mar

15. Day 15

    Buenos Aires

    ArgentinaArrive

    Buenos Aires is a turnaround port as often as a port of call, and either way you need more than a day. The terminal sits in Puerto Nuevo, close enough to walk into the Retiro area but far enough that most people take a taxi. The city rewards wandering: Beaux-Arts blocks, enormous cafes, bookshops in old theatres, and a tango scene that ranges from genuine milongas to dinner shows built for tour buses.

    • Recoleta Cemetery and Evita Peron's grave
    • Caminito and the painted houses of La Boca
    • San Telmo's Sunday antiques market on Plaza Dorrego
    • Teatro Colon backstage tour

    Getting ashore

    Ships dock at the Benito Quinquela Martin terminal in Puerto Nuevo, roughly 15 minutes by taxi from the centre.

    Best months

    Oct-Apr