uva185

I just finished up a trip to Antarctica last week and wrote up a "trip report" in my blog. For those who are interested I copied it below.


After two days of crossing the Drake Passage we caught our first glimpse of an iceberg (with penguins on it!!) and then saw land….the South Shetland Islands.



On November 24th we made our first excursion onto the South Shetland Islands at Aitcho Island located at 62°24′S 59°47′W. The ship dropped anchor near the island and then we boarded zodiacs to take us ashore. This was quite a thrilling experience to race toward the islands with the cold Antarctic wind blowing in your face! Once we were ashore we were given instructions as to where we were allowed to go and then given free time to explore. There were hundreds of penguins (Chinstrap and Gentoo), Weddell Seals, and lots of Southern Elephant seals. I really enjoyed just being able to wonder around and take in the sights without being crowded by a group. I chose to hike 1km up and over a hill to the backside of the island.










Our next stop was at Yankee Harbour located at 62°32′S 59°47′W. The conditions were getting worse at this point. The winds had picked up and it was snowing…sideways. We were still able to make our landing but the zodiac ride was a bit rougher than before. Once ashore I started to venture around but due to the blowing snow I could really only go in one direction and photograph in one direction to prevent getting my camera lens covered in snow. I personally enjoyed the inclement conditions because it felt like that’s how visiting Antarctica should be.








The following day we progressed down the Gerlache Straight toward Neko Harbour. There was quite a bit of ice in the water which delayed our arrival. It also meant the ship could not get as close to shore so we would have a longer zodiac ride to the shore. It was neat navigating through all the ice to get to shore. There were several colonies of penguins and a large glacier nearby we could periodically hear calving (cracking / breaking off). The second landing site for the day was at Paradise Bay. We started by taking a cruise in the zodiac to get an up close look at ice bergs and glaciers. We then visited Brown Station. This landing was much more fun than I expected. We started by hiking to the top of a hill/mountain which offered incredible views of the area. Then, instead of walking down we slid down the hill. It was so much fun we hiked up and slid down again.










Brown Station was also the location of our overnight camp site. We had dinner aboard the ship and then were taken back to Brown Station where we set up camp. It was a unique experience not only to say I have slept on the continent of Antarctica but it never gets dark this time of year. So even though went to bed at 1am, it was not any darker than 9pm. In the “morning” we woke to found a large amount of ice had formed between us and the ship. For moment we thought we may be stranded to a bit but the zodiac drivers did an excellent job navigating through the ice and getting us back to the ship…minus the one zodiac that headed for the wrong ship