Chile & Antarctica, Day 7: The Day We Didn't Go To Antarctica

No Antarctica meant we had the day to explore Punta Arenas. After breakfast at the hotel, we walked down to the beach as we did pretty much every day we stayed in this city.

Be prepared for bird overload - I could've taken pics of these cormorants all day!

We were supposed to get word by noon on the updated plan for Antarctica, so we were just kind of killing time till then. Back at the hotel, we checked our email to see that we would know more about the weather conditions by 6:00 PM. There was a chance that the weather would be clear for a flight around midnight, and I was really hoping that wouldn't turn out to be the case. I figured that a visit to Antarctica was going to take all of my mental and physical energy, and sleep deprivation would not help things at all.

We went to the hotel restaurant for our complimentary lunch - risotto today!

I had pocketed some bread from lunch for my birdy friends, so back to the beach we went to deliver it. We quickly learned that only the gulls cared about the bread and the cormorants could care less and just wondered why I was throwing things at them.

We headed down the street from our hotel to the Museo Regional de Magallanes, an opulent mansion that had belonged to pioneer sheep farmers in the late 19th century.

We got to wear awesome booties to protect the floors.

We spent most of the afternoon shopping and stopped at our fave cookie place again.

At 6:00 PM, Isabel called our hotel room and informed us that the flight was scheduled for 6:00 AM tomorrow, and we would be picked up from the hotel at 5:00 to be taken to the airport.

We had dinner at Cafe Tapiz where they had delicious hot chocolate and pretty darn tasty grilled cheese. Dining in a foreign country is always an adventure, but Punta Arenas had some pretty tasty options in town!