05/12/12 - Lord Nelson

Day 48 5th Dec. Just a quick note from yours truly as all the voyage crew are bustling about the ship finding props etc for the SODS (ships operatic and drama society) performance, but today has been very busy and will be mentioned at length tomorrow no doubt. Of course one of the big events was Mr Chipps’ birthday…. Following breakfast, the Marine Sanctuary Arquipelago dos Abrolhos was just starting to appear on the horizon… As we came into anchor…considering the charts said it was a no landing and no anchoring area we felt especially honored to be allowed to visit these amazing islands. After anchoring we were visited on board by 2 of the locals who explained that we couldn’t go ashore until after 1630 as the island would be too hot and the tide was too low to approach the beach without damaging the coral….. So we all went for a swim from the ship.. even cookie decided to join in and as the picture shows he just neglected to change into swimwear… After swimming and lunch parties of us were taken to the coral reef to snorkel……amazing fish and coral.  Later the majority visited the island and its lighthouse but I will leave the details to the guys tomorrow to further expand on their experiences ashore. A BBQ on the stern platform and now the sods opera what more could a group of adventures want…
Steve Medical Purser