Togo - Sir Edmund Hillary

Location : Off Yucatan - 17 08 N, 081 36 W

News reached a little late on the ship, but I came to know about the passing of Hillary yesterday. I had put up a couple of stamps on the 50 years of the climbing of the Everest many months back on this page.

This stamp is part of a bigger miniature released by Togo on the occasion of the mellinium. There are apparently ten of such sheets, based on the ten decades of the century. This stamp is part of the sheet on the fifties. I would have liked to use this stamp for a better occasion. Probably the 75th year and not for the passing of that man.

Chile - Santa

Location : The Carribs - 13 55 N, 079 40 W

Things were crazy in Panama this call and I'm sorry but all got out was one paquebot. But I did send some out from Nicaragua and I hope you do get them soon. The thing with posting the mail from the ship is that you hand over your mail to relative strangers and simply trust that it will reach the other end. Its a wonder any of those reach at all. :)

With this nice warm feeing in the air, I'll leave you with a set of X mas stamps released by the Chilean postal Dept. This is one cool santa. I'm still not sure what exactly he is doing with Rudolf "the red nosed deer", but it certainly can't be what I think he is doing!!

Curacoa - Dive

Location : Panama City Anchorage - 08 50 N, 079 29 W

I haven't been around for some days and the reason for that is that I am getting off the ship and this will be pretty much one of the last posts before I get back. Thanks to you all for the comments and the wishes.

Wanted to put up a stamp from the underwater. It is a rare stamp in the sense that even though many stamps are released featuring underwater scenes, rarely do we see divers being featured in them.

Hopefully will be able to get some diving done in Honduras before I get on the plane back home.

Neth Ant Cartoon

Location : Pacific , Nicaragua coast - 09 41 N, 086 22 W

We are reaching port in the morning and as things were a little tight, I was wondering if I'd let you good fellows do the talking. I picked up this cartoon strip in Curacao, & I wonder if any of you could figure out what it stands for? Is this a famous cartoon character in Netherland? Looks like a spider to me.

Chile - The Easter Islands

Location - Pacific, Equador Coast 00 24 S, 083 08 W

The Easter Islands, though seperated from the Clilean mailland by a huge distance, have become much of an icon for the country. The reasons of course is the presence of the statues on the Island. No one really knows who or why built these statues, but
the small wooden statues being made on the bottom right are made for money and sell for as much as 2 US dollars each on the road side.

Martin, a friend from Chile says that there are teo main types of statues - one with bigger ears then the others. He said that the statues were built by warring tribes who fought each other till everyone died and the only ones who were left behind were
the gods with no one to pray to them and some to buy them for two bucks.

PS: As you can see from the position, am crossing the equator again in a couple of hours!

Chile - Sea Lions

Location : Pacific, Peru Coast - 07 59 S, 080 49 W

Chile claims a sizeable chunk of the Antartic Continent as a part of its Territory. I am not really sure how this goes down internationally because as far as my understanding went, the whole of the Antartic was supposed to be an international territory.
Regardless, the Antartic does impose a potent influence on the whole country simply because of the cold water current that flows from it up the Chilean coast. This also brings along the visitors from down under such as Penguins and Sea lions.

I did see a bunch of these Sea Lions perched on a rock off Vina Del Mar. Picture on the regular blog.

A point of interest is that even though the Chilean currency is denoted as dollars, it is actually called "Peso". This stamp of 1500 Peso's costs approximately 3.5 dollars or 130 Indian Rupees. Sometimes I think India is the cheapest Philatelic
destination in the world.

Chile - Two Nudes

Location - Pacific, The Peru Coast - 11 01 S, 079 45 W

One of the good things about moving around a city during a bright sunny day is that you can always go into the post office. The post offices in Chile are called "Correos De Chile" and are very difficult to find, simply because they are hidden in
Shopping malls.

I did get some nice stamps and sheets there and I thought that I might as well start off with this beautiful painting by Henritte Petit. I put it up here because fine art always has fascinated me. The fact that there are naked chicks on the stamps had nothing to do with it. At all.

Fruits

Location - Chile Coast - 21 39 S, 075 57 W

Well its been a hectic past week and we were in chile for the day of the new year and a few days hence. It was a beautiful port stay and I'm just about getting over it now. Apologies for not coming by earlier and updating this with more posts.

Thanks for the wishes from you people and I have put in some mail from the port. Will make a post call tomorrow. In the meanwhile, thanks for checking in and the comments. Am putting up a set of stamps released by the Neth Ant, on fruits. I think its always good to start off something like the new year with food on your plate. :)