A Year In Motion

One of the key factors in our decision to pick the Plancius for our Antarctic Expedition was that it would bring us south of the South Polar Circle. This can only be done late in the season once the ice has melted sufficiently for a boat to sail beyond the circle, but even then, ice conditions have been known to block the seas, so nothing could be taken for granted.

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So we were quite excited when we woke up on the morning of the 21st of March to great weather and relatively clear seas, even though on all sides we could see icebergs as big as islands dotting the horizon. Shortly after breakfast, we were summoned by our Expedition Leader to join his team on the bow of the ship, where they were busy passing out glasses of champagne to the passengers. A few minutes later, the captain confirmed our position and the ship’s horn was blown and the bell was rung in celebration of our passage south of latitude 66° 33′ 44″ South. This was a completely new sensation for Ninfa and I, although more than a few of our fellow passengers chose this moment to proudly declare that they were “bi-polar” having also been north of the Arctic Polar Circle. It was a happy moment for all on board. We had stocked up on quite a bit of bubbly in Mendoza so we ended up celebrating most of the day.

Having crossed the circle, we all now wanted to set foot on land south of the circle. Just as our passage south could not be guaranteed, a landing was even less likely. We anchored close to a small island called Detaille Island, and our expedition leader set off to inspect the landing site. We were so close, it was going to be very frustrating if we were not allowed to land. Fortunately, Rinie returned with good news. The ice-clogged bay could be navigated and we were going to land. Shortly afterwards, we were all on Detaille Island with the Adelie penguins and the fur seals, admiring the amazing views of icebergs crowded everywhere in the spectacular bays around us. Everyone was in high spirits and we had a few snowball fights in our short time on the island. Ninfa and I were on the last zodiac to leave the island, and we stopped for a quick look at some Weddell Seals before heading across the open water to the boat. And what a surprise was in store for us.

As we approached the ship, a pair of humpback whales, seemingly a parent and child, began surfacing right in front of us between our zodiac and the ship. We were even closer than our day on Cuverville Island, and the entire ship’s attention was on the show. It seemed like there was a better view from the deck, so we boarded again, and ran out to watch the rest of the spectacle. Check it out for yourself in the video below. The humpbacks, known as the species of whale with perhaps the greatest curiosity, took it in turns to surface beside our ship, and “spyhop” , a manoeuvre where the whale stands vertical in the water and raises its head above the surface to see above the water. The whales took a long time to have a look at us looking right back at them. The whole thing lasted around 20 minutes – absolutely amazing!

We bid farewell to the humpbacks and started sailing north again – going home. Going below the Polar Circle had turned out to be far beyond what we expected, and there was more to come. As we glided back north past the huge icebergs, a pod of 15-20 Killer Whales swam past us, their huge long dorsal fins cutting through the water like a knife and their trademark black and white heads surfacing against the backdrop of a huge berg. Just watching them, you could imagine their dominance in the oceans. Along with the leopard seal, they are the kings of the Antarctic jungle, the masters of this icy realm.

Our final stops in Antarctica struggled to live up to our previous experiences. But our last landing, on Damoy Point in Wiencke Island, made a fine attempt. We donned snow-shoes for a trek up the hill to the point of the peninsula. We were almost completely surrounded by a white landscape of sea, ice and mountain. We had been seeing these landscapes for over a week now, but it was still breathtaking. We continued on our trek along a wide icy slope, which actually serves as a runway for planes which land with supplies for the nearby British research station below us at Port Lockroy. And here we turned to nature for inspiration for our descent back to the shore. Penguins have a technique of climbing hills in zigzags, but prefer to descend by sliding on their bellies – there’s a very rich penguin somewhere who owns the patent for toboggans. We followed suit and slid the whole way down, a couple of hundred metres distance, on our bums. It really was seat of your pants stuff, and brought out the inner juvenile in a lot of us as we raced back up just to slide back down again. Penguins have it good!

The next day, our last in Antarctica did not have any landings, just a short zodiac cruise around the bays around the Melchior Islands. It was a wild, blizzardy day, and great to experience another extreme of the icy weather conditions. As luck would have it, we ended up on our last excursion with some of our greatest friends from the trip – John (Jack Nicholson’s double!), Will, Lance and Marja. And we all congratulated each other on a great trip, far exceeding even our wildest expectations.

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Our journey back through the Drake Passage proved a little less smooth than our trip down. Expecting the worst, the ship’s doctor was dispensing free travel sickness medication to the whole boat. Waoh – this was promising to be fun! And what die we get this time? Two or three hours of waves and then calm seas and fine sunshine. At least I thought so, but our short Drake introduction had loads of people engaging in inappropriate dinner conversation of how sick they’d been. Ninfa spent more or less the whole return journey hibernating in the cabin while the expedition team kept reminding us that being this lucky both ways on the Drake Passage is almost unheard of. And we ended up arriving back to Argentina ahead of schedule, giving us an opportunity to witness the Beagle Channel in all its glory, and even spotting Cape Horn, the southernmost point of the Americas, in the distance.

So how to summarise a trip to Antarctica – it’s difficult to close to find the words appropriate to close our story. One of the things we hadn’t expected was to meet such great people on board – in addition to John, Will, Lance and Marja, a big thanks has to go to Doug, Scottish Nicholas, Kathy, Cindy, Andrew and everyone on board for making our trip so great on board and off. But, the last words have to belong to Rinie, our expedition leader, who in our last ship’s meeting told us about his Antarctica bug, and what the polar regions mean to him. I’ll relate it as best as I can remember. Rinie has been working on Antarctic expeditions for over 20 years, and told us that when you are in Antarctica, you can be surrounded by thousands of penguins and yet your presence is felt, you are significant. He compared this to how he felt when he returned home to Amsterdam after his first voyage, and stood for a moment in a central city square. Here again, he was surrounded by thousands of people, and yet he felt insignificant. And since then, he has never stopped returning to the poles. It was a poignant and heartfelt story, and a fitting end to a voyage which we will always remember as something, indeed, very significant.

When I was a child, I had a large picture of a red Ferrari TestaRossa hanging over my bed. I used to dream that one day, I would own a Ferrari, or at least drive one. Well, when I was 19, I actually got to do that, drive one, not own one. A few years after the Ferrari, I replaced the Ferrari picture with one of a Humpback Whale, diving and holding his fluke tail perfectly against the horizon. Alas, here I was, already past 30, and I still had never seen a Humpback fluking. But that was about to change, many times over, in Antarctica.

Our twice daily excursions on our expedition to Antarctica were generally composed of around an hour sailing around in a zodiac of about 10 people, and another hour or so exploring the land by foot. And the zodiac tours were the absolute highlight of the trip. We had anchored overnight off the coast of Cuverville Island amidst numerous icebergs and an island covered in glaciers. The bay was covered in icebergs and we set off on a zodiac cruise first to get a closer look. As we cruised around the bay, one of the group caught a glimpse of a whale surfacing for air. Chris, our driver, approached slowly so as not to scare them off, and within a few minutes we were within 25 metres of a pair of humpback whales who were feeding. We watched them as they swam lazily around blowing a fountain of misty breath high in the air, and then diving deep, waving goodbye with a long, graceful flip of their fluke. Left me wondering what I’m going to hang on my bedroom wall next.

On a high, we headed for the island to check out the Gentoo Penguin colony. There are regulations that oblige tourists to keep a certain distance for the animals, but the animals themselves are not bound by this law. In general the penguins will move away from humans as we are quite big and they don’t know what to make of us. But a common trick is to lie on the ground, so that the penguins no longer feel intimidated, and wait. It’s pretty hard to find a clean piece of ground to lie on in a penguin colony as it’s stinky and more or less covered in pink penguin poo, and at this time of year, feathers. We were in Antarctica at the end of the moulting season when young and old shed their downy feathers. I found a relatively clean spot and lay down. Sure enough, not long after, the curious penguins were nipping at my coat and boots. They were very playful and some of them were even sneaking up on unsuspecting visitors while they were sitting down having a rest.

It wasn’t all fun though, and the Gentoo colony proved some of the harder facts of life. Some penguin chicks were visibly smaller than their peers, and it seems that they were either born too late in the season, or perhaps their parent had fallen foul of a predator and never returned. These pitiful penguin chicks were a tragic beauty. And all around the rookery, shady groups of Skuas, surveyed the scene, working to isolate and attack the weakest. The penguins would group up and scare off the skuas, but some penguin carcasses among the rocks suggested that the victor was not always the penguin. The Skuas are very aggressive birds, and several fights broke out among them. Check out the photos here.

That afternoon, we set sail for Neko Harbour, and our landing on the actual continent of Antarctica itself. Not a lot of cruises include a continental landing as it can be very hard to get past the ice, and the continent is typically steep cliffs and overhanging glaciers, almost impossible to access. We were all excited that we were going to land on the continent, but I don’t think anyone was expecting it to be so beautiful. Here we were, under a clear blue sky, surrounded on three sides by majestic snow-covered peaks and glaciers, cruising through a blanket of brash ice, past little icebergs with Crabeater seals drying off in the sun. It was spectacular!

Guaranteed that we would have an hour on shore, Ninfa and I opted to go for a kayak first through the brash ice which covered the bay. This was a lot of fun, as each paddle stroke had to push through the slushy ice on the surface. Numerous collisions occurred as we paddled up leads that led to dead-ends, ran aground on growlers (small icebergs, not angry seals), and paddled frantically to dodge the ship which had not dropped anchor for fear of an excessive impact with an iceberg. This was what we had expected, and we had a great time kayaking this day. But we were all eager to get on to the shore, the continent.

We climbed out of the kayaks into a zodiac and sped onshore. There was a trek through the Gentoo colony and up a steep rise to a lookout point. As we made our way briskly along, we stopped to watch an avalanche cascade down the slope of a mountain on the far side of the glacier between us. Further along, we stopped again, this time our heads turned by the roar of a huge chunk of ice being calved from the glacier, the birth of an iceberg. Before racing to the top, as the clock was ticking, we stopped to savour the moment. Ninfa, who I’m convinced is the only Honduran to ever stand on the Antarctic continent (subject to independent verification), sported all her national loyalties, a green scarf for Ireland (my eyes welled), a football shirt from Honduras, and a headscarf from Palestine, honouring all aspects of her noble heritage. I, true to character, withdrew from my bag a bottle of Jameson Irish Whiskey and, although I generally don’t drink it on ice, raised a toast to setting foot on the White Continent. As we returned to our zodiac, we passed a few stragglers who were posing with hastily made signs of 7/7, meaning they had now visited all 7 continents on Earth. It was at this point that Ninfa and I remembered we were only on number 6. Aah, I knew there was a reason to go to Australia or New Zealand. Alas, the finish line is in touching distance.

That night, the routine dinner in the restaurant was promising a twist. We had been told to dress warmly and assemble on the rear deck. Our expectation prior to booking was that the majority of passengers would be wealthy senior citizens, and not a lot of fun. It turned out however that the majority were young travellers, a lot of whom had booked last minute, and a generally lively and fun set of seniors. So when we assembled on the rear deck, and were told we were dining al fresco at an Antarctican barbeque, we knew we were in for a good night. Not only that, but there was free booze for the first hour too. On my first night on board the ship, I had worn my Philippines tracksuit top to dinner, and proved to be the guest of honour as all the restaurant staff were Filipino. We were best buddies, and as a result, the party night involved free booze all night for Ninfa and I and a few of our friends. And what a night, watching the sun set on Paradise Harbour, Filipino DJ, everyone on a high from our continental landing. And when the booze finally ran out, the Russian crewmen came, and Sergey, Sasha and Yuri took out the crew’s store of vodka. Cue arm-wrestling competitions and bare-chested dancing in sub-zero temperatures, and an amusing moment when a handstand went hilariously wrong due to an evil trick by the mischievous assistant (sorry Andrew!).

The following morning, we sailed through the Lemaire Channel, a narrow path through two looming cliffs and covered in icebergs. It’s supposed to be beautiful – we slept right through it. We did manage to get up for our morning expedition though as we hoped the fresh air might revive us. We had anchored in a foggy morning just off Pleneau Island, and were about to depart on a zodiac cruise through Iceberg Alley. If we didn’t know we were in Antarctica already, this was the moment. Antarctica is the only continent on Earth with no indigenous population. It is the land of ice and very few animals can even survive here. This was our opportunity to pass through its secret garden of immense, statuesque icebergs sculpted by the extremest forces of nature. We floated slowly around in the silent vastness of the bay, alone except for the Arctic Terns, tiny, graceful birds which migrate from pole to pole every summer, and a few Crabeater Seals resting on their immense beds of ice.

A more brutal side of the animal kingdom was revealed to us as we approached Pleneau Island. A rampant leopard seal had just killed his prey, a Gentoo penguin, and was peeling its skin by gripping the carcass in his huge jaws and violently thrusting his immense neck from side to side. Around it, petrels hopped on the water luring krill to the surface and gulls swooped in a mad scramble for scraps of flesh from the penguin. This was not a land intended for man.

And yet that afternoon, man’s relationship with this harshest of environments was revealed to us as we made a stop at the Vernadsky Research Station. Vernadsky is a Ukrainian station, known until the 1990s as Faraday Base, when the British sold it to Ukraine for the symbolic price of one sterling pound – the pound coin is kept in a case in the bar. Yes, a bar – of all days, I had just sworn in the morning that I’d never drink again – we were so enthusiastic that we were the first ones off the boat and had to wait for about 5 minutes before anyone else was even ready! The raison d’etre of Vernadsky is mainly to monitor climactic conditions in Antarctica and understand their relation to the world’s weather, as well as keeping check on the Ozone Hole which lies directly above Antarctica. One of the resident meteorologists gave us a brief tour of the small station before leading us upstairs to the leisure area. Here we were able to get our passports stamped and buy some postcards. The post service is highly unreliable in Antarctica and we are yet to hear of any of our postcards actually arriving yet. Next year, perhaps? Next to the post office is the Faraday Bar. The bar is famous as the southernmost bar in the world, and the Ukrainians at the base have a talent for brewing their own vodka – Antarctica’s official drink. We had been split up into 3 groups of 30 for the station visit, and as soon as we walked in, Keller, a Texan in our group, took out a hundred dollar bill and bought a round for the whole group. This saved Ninfa a dilemma as women are offered free shots in exchange for a bra which they hang in the bar. Although it’s $3 a shot, the barman called drinks on the house for everyone for the duration of our stay – no more money and no bras – which resulted in 30 quite tipsy tourists leaving 15 minutes later.

Our last stop at the Research Station was Wordie House, which was originally built in the 1940s and was the predecessor to the current station. The British Antarctic Society has preserved it as a museum where the life of the 1940s explorer and researcher can be imagined. It’s a small wooden building which looks all too fragile for its surroundings. Inside, cans of Bovril line the shelves and old woollen socks hang from the bunks. We even found an old cookbook with a recipe for Tournedos of Seal. It was one of three old houses that we visited in Antarctica, each of them seemingly frozen in time. The images of these houses and their contents enlivened my evening readings of the heroic voyage of Ernest Shackleton and the crew of the Endurance, testaments to the heroic age of Antarctic Exploration.

All that remains for us to complete our Antarctic Exploration is to cross the Polar Circle in the morning, and for news of that grand finale to our expedition, you’ll have to read our next post. For photos from this leg on our journey, see some of the highlights below, or the full story here: the historic Antarctic base at Wordie House, the modern research station (and bar!!!) at Vernadsky, lots of close-ups of seals in Port Charcot, icebergs, petrels, terns and a violent leopard seal in Iceberg Alley and Pleneau Island, the amazing Neko Harbour where we landed on the continent and where we kayaked, and Humpback Whales and thousands of Gentoo Penguins at Cuverville Island.

The 15th of March in Ushuaia was the kind day that’s just perfect for a pair of shorts and a snug skijacket. As we made our way with our bags to the port of Ushuaia, we were setting off on a summer trip with a difference – a 12 day, 11 night trip to the white continent of Antarctica and across the polar circle. From the very outset of our round the world trip, we had both agreed that Antarctica had to be a part of our journey, and it was one of the most anticipated destinations. And this was it.

Soon after boarding, we set sail, cruising into the glassy waters of the Beagle Channel, Ushuaia fading into evening in the distance behind us. Our first activity of our cruise was the Captain’s welcome and the entire boat assembled in the lounge to join a giant Russian man in a toast to a successful trip, and good weather in the Drake Passage. The Drake Passage, three words that can strike fear into the heart of the most seasoned seamen. Let’s hope for good weather he said. Let’s not! spoke the eyes of all the passengers around us, clearly trusting more in their own bravado than the wisdom of our Siberian captain. We would be sailing for the next two days across the Drake Passage between the tip of South America and the Antarctic Peninsula, the meeting place of the Atlantic and Pacific, stretching across the latitudes of the Furious Fifties and Shrieking Sixties, some of the wildest seas on Earth. Everything in our cabin was bolted shut and locked in place as we turned in for our first night’s sleep, awaiting the raging seas of the following day.

And so the 16th of March dawned, a glorious day, bright sunshine and calm seas. Maybe the captain took a wrong turn? Maybe he knows a shortcut? We trusted to his judgement, and admired the birds diving and disappearing behind the crests of waves, and others gliding effortlessly on the breeze behind our ship … groups of beautiful Pintado Petrels, lonesome albatrosses, and far off in the distance, a group of feeding Fin Whales, the second largest animal on the planet. The next day, our last on the world’s wildest seas, was just as calm – now where are we sailing? As Rinie, our expedition leader, explained to us later, we had in fact spent two days not on the Drake Passage, but on the Drake Lake, a rare and privileged destination through which very few people pass. Alas, the old Antarctic superstition goes “Drake Lake, wild weather in Antarctica”, therefore no views and few landings. Had we used our quota of fortune on the journey?

That evening, conditions did begin to deteriorate as we sailed through a misty Southern Ocean, but maybe it’s the luck of the Irish (it was Saint Patrick’s Day after all), because there in the mist to our port side was our first glimpse of land in Antarctica, the snow-covered desolate landscape of the South Shetland Islands. It was an amazing sight, seeing these rocky shores spread out before us in the fog like a deserted no-man’s land, a truly mysterious setting. We decided it was a perfect time to crack out some bubbly and braved the biting chill in the air to celebrate our anniversary with a few swigs straight from the bottle.

Aside from bird-watching, our two days at sea had been spent attending briefings from the expedition teams on the marvellous lives of penguins, the classifications of icebergs (there’s five different types), identification of seabirds, weather, sea … a whole diploma in Antarctic everything. Oh, and organising the kayaking. We had seen when we were booking that Kayaking was offered free of charge on our expedition. When we booked in Ushuaia, however, our travel agent was very skeptical, so we asked her to confirm with the company. As it happened, the kayaking was free, but you had to confirm a space as only 14 people could be accommodated. We got lucky – there was a last minute cancellation and the company gave us an e-mail saying we could swap the space between us. During our two days at sea, it turned out that a third (30-40) of the passengers thought they were going kayaking for free. It was the soap opera of the voyage, and in the end a plan was made to let “The 14” kayakers as much as they want, and all the others to have one go.

Given all the hullabaloo about kayaking, I opted for that on our first stop in Antarctica when we dropped anchor just off Half Moon Island in the South Shetlands. Ninfa decided to go onshore. As we disembarked, we had to turn our cards from green to red to show we were off ship, and then turn them back when we boarded again. Straightforward, no? When we returned from our morning activities, I heard over a crew’s walkie talkie – “Tony Byrne, we’re missing Tony Byrne, does anyone know where he is?” Still not sure how that happened, but seeing as I’m the one writing the post, I think it’s because Ninfa turned the wrong card.

Deception Island is a volcanic island, and Whaler’s Bay, the harbour where we would anchor is actually a huge caldera, and despite all that is known as one of the safest bays in Antarctica!!! The entrance to the bay is through Neptune’s Bellows, a narrow channel which we couldn’t even see the as we sailed by because of the fog. There must be a science to fog, but as we didn’t get a briefing on it, I don’t know. But when we entered Whaler’s Bay, it was clear again, a long finger of fog stretched in vain behind us as we eluded its grip for the safety of the shore.

Whaler’s Bay is known as such as it was a major base for the whaling industry in the early 20th century. Having hunted the whales in the Antarctic Ocean almost to extinction, a volcanic eruption which covered the bases in sludge was the final nail in the coffin of the whaling industry on Deception Island. The vista of the bay is one of a derelict airport hangar, rusted industrial tanks, and the weather-beaten skeletons of old wooden huts and boats, against a black volcanic earth, and imposing glaciers crowning the mountains behind them. And that’s not to mention Neptune’s Window, a natural gap in the cliffs looking out to sea.

This time Ninfa and I both declined the opportunity to kayak, and transferred to the island on one of the zodiacs. Ah, the first feeling of Antarctic land under my feet was great. While Half Moon was all about the animals, Deception is a poignant look back at man’s first contribution to Antarctica – to pillage what resources they could, hunting whales almost to extinction. It’s comforting to see that industry in ruins, but the massive boilers are a testament to the once huge industry which operated here. Rusted tanks, similar in size to the huge circular fuel tanks you see in ports and airports, once contained whale oil. We passed the grave of a Norwegian whaler who died here, and past the less civilised remains of whale bones scattered along the beach. While most of the passengers had gone for a trek, we strolled over to Neptune’s Window for a view of the sea and the bay, with only a few lazy Fur Seals and a couple of groups of Gentoo Penguins for company. Waoh, the ship looked small against the background of the bay and the mountains around us. We were after all on one of the smallest islands in the South Shetlands, which should give you an idea of the scale of Antarctica. Each of our twice daily excursions lasted between two and three hours, and before we knew it, it was time to head back to the ship. There was only time left for a few of our Japanese shipmates to take a dip in the icy waters, and well, that didn’t take long at all.

Our next post will continue our adventure south, to set foot on the actual continent itself (as opposed to its islands) and down below the Antarctic Polar Circle. Check back soon for the rest of our adventure.

For photos, click on your choice of the Drake Passage, Half Moon Island, the South Shetlands, and Deception Island, or have a look at some of the highlights below.