Wow. I'm not sure what we were expecting - probably a depersonalized boat trip, fed at the trough, rush-in/rush-out, get the tourists through and get on with it... What we got was a relaxed, educational, classy and very emotional view of a lesser travelled part of the world. We learned what a training wall was, saw several fish farms, visited a famous island penal colony and under electric power floated up the Gordon River, which is in a world heritage site in the middle of hundreds of thousands of square kilometers of wildlife reserve.
Decades ago in a powerful environment I listened to George Beverley Shae sing How Great Thou Art at a Billy Graham Evangelical Tent meeting. The song has always come back to me when I am in a natural environment that is overwhelming in some way. A prairie thunderstorm. Looking up and seeing the northern lights. Rocking through pounding waves in a storm in the Galapagos. Sitting on the back of a snowmobile in Canada's north chasing a polar bear. And today. Floating noiselessly up the Gordon River on water as flat as a sheet of glass, in the middle of a vast protected nature reserve. That song filled my head. Somewhere on that sheet of glass I was transformed. I am now on holidays.
Are you sure that polar bear wasn't chasing you? And what is this story about "visiting" a penal colony - hmm sounds suspicious!