ANTARCTICA!!
The day before we're supposed to be leaving for Sydney, Australia and we're just leaving the Antarctic area. Our schedule is now 3 days off and we won't be arriving into Buenos Aires, Argentina until the 12th putting us in Sydney late on the 14th (the day before we embark the Amsterdam). Yes, my Valentine's Day will be spent on a plane instead of exploring a fascinating and new city. All for the price of Antarctica. It was an amazing journey though. After we finally left Ushuaia and headed south on super bowl Sunday, we entered the Drake Passage. This passage is well known for it's strong currents and sketchy weather conditions. It wasn't as rough as our first attempt, but we did have some weather as we tried to get through the passage that tossed our ship a bit. The next day we arrived at the Palmer Station in Antarctica. 
This facility is one of the facilities on the continent used for research studies and is located on Anvers Island. Permanent ice keeps it connected to the mainland. As we pulled in, I couldn't believe what I was seeing. It was just mountains of snow and ice. The air was freezing cold of course and the added wind made it bone chilling as we were pulling in. It wasn't so bad once we slowed down to a crawl when we got nearer. The research team came on board and held a chat with our passengers about life on Antarctica and their missions. There are several nations that own pieces of the continent and come to these research facilities to work. There are 3 that I remember. There's Palmer station, which only holds say 44 during the summer season (now), the South Pole (also very small), and a larger colony more inland that can house about 200 or so. They study anything from biological systems to space research. Even NASA comes here to study the ozone and run experiments on the continent since it has similar qualities to other planets or moons. They mostly work the summer season since their winter season gets to be too cold and icy for anyone to get in or out. After the researchers got off we headed to the Lemaire Channel, which is the southernmost part of Antarctica that we'd get to see. I couldn't believe the beauty of this place. 
All day long I was all over the place snapping pictures of icebergs, mountaintops, sheets of blue ice coming down the side of mountains. It was truly amazing. I must have over 100 pictures from the 3 days because the landscape always presented a new way to look at it with the sun and clouds. It was very cold and I got my 3 days of winter out of it for me. That's just like the winter I'd like to have. Brief. You come see all the beautiful ice and snow in pristine condition (no slush) and say goodbye to it. We attempted to enter the Neumayer Channel, but the weather was too foggy and the ice in the water was too dense. We set sail for open water and circled throughout the night. You can't drop anchor here because of the delicate ecosystem, so we just sailed around outside the continent.
The next day was an amazing experience. I got up a little later, but I caught a whole lot throughout the day. Wow. I got up just in time to catch the end of passing through the Neumayer Channel and into Paradise Harbor. Once again so much beautiful scenery and very large icebergs passing by. Icebergs are so amazing because only a small portion of them sticks out above the water.
The rest of it is floating underneath the water. These icebergs, I'm told, are very strong and if we did encounter a navigational error and hit one of the large pieces, it would rip through our ship like a knife through soft butter. We got pretty close to some of those big ones too and believe me; I don't want to sink in these icy waters. Whoa. Throughout the day once again I was in and out. I kept my coat and camera handy since I didn't want to miss anything. I happened to be in the hallway when all of a sudden one of our girls comes down and says there are penguin sightings. I ran upstairs to the bow and got there just in time to see some. Next there were penguins swimming alongside the ship.
Just breaching like dolphins do. We came upon an iceberg and there were penguins sliding down the face of it and into the water. I stayed out there long enough that my hands were absolutely freezing. We came upon another research station and in the distance you could see there were hundreds of penguins lined up on a dry hilltop. I stayed out there still and we approached another iceberg. This time I got my digital zoom ready on my camera. As we came to the island there were at least 50 penguins just hanging out on the iceberg? I wasn't sure how close we were going to get, so my digital zoom was ready. As we approached, I got some great video. They must've been spooked, as we got closer because they all started shuffling their feet and moving to the edge of the ice and diving in. One by one and I caught it all on tape. A-MAZING!!! It was a great day for seeing penguins and boy did they STINK. Whew. As we passed that little iceberg there was a stench in the air of rotting fish. Yuck!! If you've ever been to the penguin encounter at Sea World, you know of this stink. It was potent. For the next hour or so, they were just swimming along with us and poking their heads up to see what was happening. I went back inside to warm up a bit. That night we were rounding Deception Island. This island probably so-called because all the ice on the island was encased in ash. I guess it's a very volcanic island and the glaciers looked more like mud than the pristine blue ice I was so familiar with.
Our last day in Antarctica wasn't too exciting. It was a stormy one with snow throughout most of the day and a lot of it was getting from one island to the next. We were out of the icy channels and in the open waters. I guess we couldn't get to Hope Bay because the ice was too thick in those areas so we set a northerly course for Elephant Island. We got there later in the day and after our lovely dinner in the Pinnacle Grill; we went upstairs into the Crow's Nest to check it out. Just beautiful and serene. Although I'm pretty upset for missing a 3-day vacation in the beginning part of our contract and a day in L.A. to catch up and get things done, I'm very pleased to have seen the wonder of Antarctica. It's something that I probably won't see again or I'll come back in my distant future. I wish we didn't have to experience the extremely rough waters to get here, but I guess it was very much worth the attempt. When in my life would I have actually seen penguins wild in their own environment? I'll have memories to last for ages.
This facility is one of the facilities on the continent used for research studies and is located on Anvers Island. Permanent ice keeps it connected to the mainland. As we pulled in, I couldn't believe what I was seeing. It was just mountains of snow and ice. The air was freezing cold of course and the added wind made it bone chilling as we were pulling in. It wasn't so bad once we slowed down to a crawl when we got nearer. The research team came on board and held a chat with our passengers about life on Antarctica and their missions. There are several nations that own pieces of the continent and come to these research facilities to work. There are 3 that I remember. There's Palmer station, which only holds say 44 during the summer season (now), the South Pole (also very small), and a larger colony more inland that can house about 200 or so. They study anything from biological systems to space research. Even NASA comes here to study the ozone and run experiments on the continent since it has similar qualities to other planets or moons. They mostly work the summer season since their winter season gets to be too cold and icy for anyone to get in or out. After the researchers got off we headed to the Lemaire Channel, which is the southernmost part of Antarctica that we'd get to see. I couldn't believe the beauty of this place. 
All day long I was all over the place snapping pictures of icebergs, mountaintops, sheets of blue ice coming down the side of mountains. It was truly amazing. I must have over 100 pictures from the 3 days because the landscape always presented a new way to look at it with the sun and clouds. It was very cold and I got my 3 days of winter out of it for me. That's just like the winter I'd like to have. Brief. You come see all the beautiful ice and snow in pristine condition (no slush) and say goodbye to it. We attempted to enter the Neumayer Channel, but the weather was too foggy and the ice in the water was too dense. We set sail for open water and circled throughout the night. You can't drop anchor here because of the delicate ecosystem, so we just sailed around outside the continent. The next day was an amazing experience. I got up a little later, but I caught a whole lot throughout the day. Wow. I got up just in time to catch the end of passing through the Neumayer Channel and into Paradise Harbor. Once again so much beautiful scenery and very large icebergs passing by. Icebergs are so amazing because only a small portion of them sticks out above the water.
The rest of it is floating underneath the water. These icebergs, I'm told, are very strong and if we did encounter a navigational error and hit one of the large pieces, it would rip through our ship like a knife through soft butter. We got pretty close to some of those big ones too and believe me; I don't want to sink in these icy waters. Whoa. Throughout the day once again I was in and out. I kept my coat and camera handy since I didn't want to miss anything. I happened to be in the hallway when all of a sudden one of our girls comes down and says there are penguin sightings. I ran upstairs to the bow and got there just in time to see some. Next there were penguins swimming alongside the ship. Just breaching like dolphins do. We came upon an iceberg and there were penguins sliding down the face of it and into the water. I stayed out there long enough that my hands were absolutely freezing. We came upon another research station and in the distance you could see there were hundreds of penguins lined up on a dry hilltop. I stayed out there still and we approached another iceberg. This time I got my digital zoom ready on my camera. As we came to the island there were at least 50 penguins just hanging out on the iceberg? I wasn't sure how close we were going to get, so my digital zoom was ready. As we approached, I got some great video. They must've been spooked, as we got closer because they all started shuffling their feet and moving to the edge of the ice and diving in. One by one and I caught it all on tape. A-MAZING!!! It was a great day for seeing penguins and boy did they STINK. Whew. As we passed that little iceberg there was a stench in the air of rotting fish. Yuck!! If you've ever been to the penguin encounter at Sea World, you know of this stink. It was potent. For the next hour or so, they were just swimming along with us and poking their heads up to see what was happening. I went back inside to warm up a bit. That night we were rounding Deception Island. This island probably so-called because all the ice on the island was encased in ash. I guess it's a very volcanic island and the glaciers looked more like mud than the pristine blue ice I was so familiar with.
Our last day in Antarctica wasn't too exciting. It was a stormy one with snow throughout most of the day and a lot of it was getting from one island to the next. We were out of the icy channels and in the open waters. I guess we couldn't get to Hope Bay because the ice was too thick in those areas so we set a northerly course for Elephant Island. We got there later in the day and after our lovely dinner in the Pinnacle Grill; we went upstairs into the Crow's Nest to check it out. Just beautiful and serene. Although I'm pretty upset for missing a 3-day vacation in the beginning part of our contract and a day in L.A. to catch up and get things done, I'm very pleased to have seen the wonder of Antarctica. It's something that I probably won't see again or I'll come back in my distant future. I wish we didn't have to experience the extremely rough waters to get here, but I guess it was very much worth the attempt. When in my life would I have actually seen penguins wild in their own environment? I'll have memories to last for ages.
posted by Chris | 9:53 AM
1 Comments:
Chris, you looked cold standing there with your thoughts out over the water ( if that was you SHIVER ME TIMBERS MATE ). Also I loved the way you put the you tube video out there. I know I appreciated it cause to see all those penguines(<---spelling) and too boot how they like all birds followed the leader. This is why I love to watch wild life. Too think of how they communicate in a non verbal way. I have also seen how some like us mankind can be crule and reject some. Also how they can accept some that is not there own specie.
I can only imagine how cold the water temputer was and I shivered looking at em. Oh and I got some great comments from some people about your blog site and how professional you write. Maybe you should think of writing a travel book, who knows evertime I think of the direction you should go you end up surpise me in a different one.
Well just to let you know I read most of all you write so keep up the good work and the pictures, cause those pictures you could be in photography. Laughing, just to think another profession, but I think the pictures put the story in flow don't you think so.
Love ya Dad
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