It was difficult to say goodbye to the intense beauty that is Antarctica. The last five days have been like a dream. The place is so unique. Much like a safari, you are dealing with wild animals and unpredictable weather so there is no guarantee what you will see. But unlike a safari, where you can … [Read more…]
It was time to head back to King George Island, but we were still not sure what time our flight would leave tomorrow morning. Time enough though for one last stop though. The journey to Deception Island would be a few hours. Maybe it was the early morning or maybe just the activities from the … [Read more…]
We have one more morning of good weather before we have to push northwards to the South Shetlands and leave the peninsula. So it was decided to get up really early and do an excursion before breakfast and then sail across the Bransfield Strait to Deception Island before heading back to King George. But first … [Read more…]
This afternoon we travelled around the corner to Danco Island – a tiny dome of ice and rock with a large Gentoo colony. By this stage the clouds had cleared and the sky was blue. Adrie however, was still dressed in four layers at the top and three at the bottom. So as we started … [Read more…]
After a very slow overnight cruise because we didn’t have to travel far, there was a sudden panic this morning. The weather unexpectedly turned worse, so our plan to go to Cuverville and Useful Island had to be changed. We decided to follow the better weather northwards, which meant a few hours of rough seas … [Read more…]
This afternoon we headed for Port Lockroy for an onshore excursion. Port Lockroy has a British scientific base (Base A) and interestingly a British post office. The tiny island also has a very noisy Gentoo penguin rookery that you can smell a long time before you can actually see it. We arrived a few weeks … [Read more…]
This morning we tried to navigate the Lemaire Channel – a few km long but only 600m wide passage between the main peninsula and Booth Island with towering mountains on either side. The area is best described as an iceberg graveyard because as the icebergs are blown up from the south they get stuck in … [Read more…]
During lunch the ship repositioned to Wilhelmina Bay and anchored. The bay is known for whales in the summer months, so they decided to dispatch the zodiacs. Unfortunately this time our group was the last to leave the vessel so we had to kick our heels watching the whales from the decks while we waited … [Read more…]
We awoke at 6.30am just as the Sea Adventurer entered the Grand Passage on route to Cape Reclus and Charlotte Bay. In parts, the passage was only a few 100 metres wide blocked on both sides by sea ice and icebergs. It is a very bizarre experience waking up and seeing an iceberg floating by … [Read more…]
Our joy of being in Group 2, the second group to get our flight to King George Island, was short-lived. Our flight was scheduled to leave at 10am, but the hour came and went… as did 11am and 12pm. Then we were told the plane needed a tire change, which meant another hour’s wait. We … [Read more…]