22nd February 2017 – Heading North to Deception Island

22nd February 2017 – Heading North to Deception Island

This little but strange island is in the North of the South Shetland Islands and was undiscovered until the early 1900s.  This is an active volcano whose destructive power has wiped out many research stations based here in history. 

The landing beach on Deception Island.

The entrance to Deception Island is through a narrow channel with a large rock right in the middle called Neptune’s Bellows, so tricky navigation and also the reason for the name Deception Island as many ships passed right by missing the entrance.

Off the Zodiacs and into the caldera of the volcano to beaches of black volcanic sand, chunks of Ironstone and pumice, the beach was warm and as a result, gave off steam along the beach. 

It was also home to several fur seal families that seemed unbothered by our existence except when we walked too near a derelict tub which turned out to be one's home & he came out giving us a very angry reception ! Fur seals can be aggressive so we were all given walking poles just in case we needed to fend them off, but they were far too interested in sleeping and swimming to bother with us.

This wild alien landscape was littered with old buildings, storage tanks and pieces of history were scattered everywhere.  Nobody is allowed to remove anything from here but the site is not going to be restored and is to be allowed to fall apart and eventually disappear.
The constructions had developed leans due to the volcanic activity which has rendered the site impossible to use commercially.

The site was originally a whaling station and the conditions here must have been truly terrible but whale blubber was a very significant commercial product so whaling stations were important.  

Derelict landing pontoon devoured by
the islands volcanic activity

Later, it became a British Antarctic Research Station but was destroyed in the volcano of 1970s.  Later, Britain had heard rumours of an increase in interest in the Falkland Islands and the government then opened it up again a “research” station.  

Remnants of commercial whaling in the middle of nowhere.

Lick of paint, it'll be as good as new ....
with sea lions in residence !

Recent volcanic activity destroyed the station again and it was just left to rot leaving a ghostly lunar landscape now only occupied by sea lions, occasional explorers and the graves of a couple of people lost to the deadly sea.
This day, the sun briefly tried to shine though the thin mist of volcanic steam that covered the island.  It was the first time we had seen the sun but it was only for a couple of minutes.

Not the prettiest of ships but we loved her
.....especially when we could see it !!

By the time we returned to the ship, there was a major swell and the exits from the RIB’s onto the gangplank was pretty tricky and had to be timed as the ship rose & fell. Not Janette’s favourite landing !!

The final expedition due for the afternoon was cancelled.  The sea swell by then was too high for safe Zodiac launch and so our trip to see the final Chinstrap penguin colony in Half Moon Bay and the last one of the trip had to be ditched.  Janette had a  coronary trying to get of the Zodiac onto the ships steps with the Zodiac going up and down by 2m but she made it in the end although we never heard the end of the episode all night.

No-one felt let down by the weather as we had seen some chinstrap penguins on the last stop where they were living in amongst the Gentoo's. We all felt extremely lucky we had experienced so much on this wonderful adventure, plus we had all had more than our share of the smell of penguin poo !!!

We are now assuming that we are going to cross a stormy Drakes Passage and whilst everyone was in good party mood as we neared the end of our Antarctic Odyssey which surpassed all of our dreams. News was slipping out that later tomorrow, the forecast was for 16m wave height and we would be lashing everything down including ourselves.  So now everyone is reaching for their seasick patches, wrist bands, tablets or whatever they have…we’re on our way back to Ushuaia in Argentina arriving in 72 hours from now, one way or another....but who knows what the weather will be like.

Remnants of the British research station
minus the plant pots

Storage tanks now house a very house
proud sea lion family who tells us that we are not invited

21st February 2017 Mainland Antarctica Danco Island and Fournier Bay

21st February 2017   Mainland Antarctica Neko Harbour  and Fournier Bay

STOP PRESS   

Steve and Janette and other passengers celebrate having done all 7 continents !!

Today, was an earlier start than normal as we had to travel further north during the afternoon.  Many of us were still feeling a bit smug after the whale experience of yesterday, there seemed a distinct lack of traction, however, as you might expect on this continent of change and challenge, this was also going to be a good day.

They smell bad but they are hard not to love !

Kitting up with our customary 5 layers, re- sterilising and boarding the Zodiac boats, our first expedition today was to Neko Harbour to land on the Antarctic Mainland for the first time. 

Neko is home to a huge Gentoo penguin colony and pretty spectacular this was. As it was further north, some of the chicks were younger and they are so funny to watch. The chicks especially curious, walk very close and in Steve’s case, almost over his boot.  
There are of course rules when here such as don’t go more than 5m close to a bird unless they choose to investigate you, but nobody had told the penguins these rules ! Within minutes they were all heading towards us like hundreds of little charlie chaplins heading down over the ice to check out the newcomers.

The smell was epic .........People had made reference to  the smell and in the end, we just called this fresh air.

Away from the danger area - ice chunks weighing 

many thousands of tons regularly falls off creating 

waves on the beech aras

We are not allowed to stay on the beach after landing as the Glaciers are very mobile and huge 1000+ ton chunks of ice regularly (hourly) fall off and create small tsunamis on an almost daily basis. 


 Stunning as the area is, we were always made aware of the danger and after a walk around, went on a zodiac tour of the coast with a small group but didn’t manage to get far due to sheer amount of glacier ice (brash ice) hitting the boat or clogging up the outboard prop of the boat.  

We found a happy family of crab eater seals who played with us for a while and saw some spectacular icebergs.
The scenery was about as forbidding as it could possibly be here and we could not help feeling that we were grateful that the crew checked us off the boat and checked us back in again...its hard to imagine you could survive here even in these suits for more that a day and nobody would here you.  We were exploring a 500 mile stretch of the South Shetland Islands but Antarctica is as big as Europe and Australia combined so the feeling on insignificance is always with us.

Eventually, after many fantastic pictures and mild frostbite, we went back to the boat to de-kit, de-ice and feed. 

On the way back to the ship, we took the Zodiac to explore the local glaciers and to try and get close to the mouth of one - which was forming new icebergs. This get progressively harder as you get to the glazier mouth as the ice gets more and more and wants to try and clog the propeller of the engine up so sometimes we have to reverse to free the prob.  All of our crews have radios to each other and the ship but at no time did we have any issues that required additional help - thankfully, these Canadian crew members are extremely experienced. 

No Two whale tales are alike and all
pictures of them have to be submitted for ID

There was no need for the Zodiacs in the afternoon as we ventured down the Fournier Bay.  The sister ship has emailed to say that there was a collection of whales feeding here but that was over 10 days ago.  


On deck, with our binoculars, cameras and everybody trying to wear as many hats and gloves as they could, we sat and waited as we drifted into the bay looking at the whales “bubble feeding”.  

A Group of Whales "Bubble Feeding"

Ari the whale expert confirmed this is a new behaviour in the Antarctic where the whales circle in a group and blow air bubbles to ambush the fish, then in one giant mouth full, they are consumed and although he had seen it in the Arctic, he had never seen it in the Antarctic until now

Our first group brought masses of excitement and another terabyte of photography but eventually we realised that there were so many of them, we just needed to witness this rare sight of 50-80 whales feeding and whilst we all nearly froze to death, nobody was going off deck.

Totally satisfied that we could say that we had seen a rare and new for Antarctica feeding method, a rare event for the non specialist general public to see, we needed food, alcohol and sleep…tomorrow is our last expedition day and whilst many are on the last legs of energy, nobody is going to miss anything on this continent of awe inspiring scenery and constant surprises.

Hello Gorgeous !

Did you know there is a penguin on my foot !
Steve had a penguin nearly walk across his foot.

Feb 20th - A Whaley Amazing Day...

This morning the camping crew were back bright and early, okay maybe not so bright… and we cheered them back into the ship. They immediately dashed for the loo (anything to avoid using the Yum Yum bucket on shore) and completely devoured the breakfast buffet.

After the huge success of walking through the penguin colonies, today, we visit Gerlache Straights.  This is one of the many locations where whales are feeding on Krill at this time of year and it’s not uncommon to spot them.

From the deck of the ship we could see many whales and also the scientific expedition who were trying to tag 70 of them. Camera shots were being fired like crazy…for all 97 of us, we had never seen so many whales just moving slowly right past the ship. One even just swam right under our ship.

After our regular, breakfast, briefing, re-sterilising and kitting up, we left on the Zodiac RIBs for a whale spotting expedition.  All everybody wanted to do is get a little closer to them and what happened today, had never happened to this crew before as close and as long according to the guides and the expedition company. 

After about 20 minutes, we spotted a few Humpback whales at the surface resting but one started heading for us. Now, we had only films like Jaws and Moby Dick as a point of reference and we were all starting to quietly panic.

In no time, this 10 ton humpback whale was playing with us, checking us out and generally showing off by rolling over and swimming upside down, blowing by our boat, coming up and looking  directly at us.  For nearly 10 minutes we had what the experts had said was extremely rare and for all of us, a mix of complete fear and total amazement. Gliding majestically under our boats, clearing them by only inches and coming up so close you could touch him or her, it was the pinnacle moment for us as it was for our guide and RIB driver who also had never seen this before.  There had been more than one reference to brown underwear.

Quickly, by radio, the other RIBs were called and in no time, 6 RIBs were almost together and all experiencing the thrill of a lifetime.

We then realised that we were being treated to some great luck and despite the extreme cold temperature on the ice sea, nobody but nobody was allowing the RIB to go back to the ship.

For Live Action - Check out the Video below !!

Pretty soon, we were surrounded by whales, some sleeping, some were moving with their young and some just on the way to someplace else.  Soon after that, Minke whales, moving quickly to avoid attack from Orca whales, a sea lion family, tons of Arctic Terns and for as far as the eye can see, Gentoo penguin families leaping in and out of the water… and as cloud is beginning to break, add breath-taking scenery of the sunlit mountain peaks in the background for good measure.

We have travelled a fair bit as had many of the fellow travellers, but we all agreed that this moment was the most breath-taking we had ever seen and few us believed that it would ever be surpassed.  Like everything in this continent, there are no easy ways to describe it, photograph or forget it.

This rare amazing event was summed up in the announcement for lunch by the head man, Boris, which went something like “Good afternoon ladies and gentleman, its one o’clock and lunch is served…..What the hell just happened out there?..”   Sometime later, the whale experts said that event was rare and they had never known it to happen for as long as that, so we know we had been blessed with great luck. They think it was probably a young adult whale who was just curious.

There was a little shore landing in the afternoon for more penguins, but we, like many, were still reeling from this morning and declined to go out again today.  Many people struggled to avoid a sleep after the long adrenalin rush of the morning….a phenomenon we had not seen before and even Janette who never sleeps in the day, crashed out in the afternoon.  Steve, now officially an old person also fell asleep.

Check out the Whale Action video – you’ll see some pretty amazing stuff !!

Feb 19th Steve's 60th Birthday !!!

Feb 19th 2017  Steve's 60th Antarctic Birthday Dream

Steve’s 60^th Birthday dawned clear & bright and he opened his eyes to a birthday banner & balloons along with a cartoon card of him in Antarctica. 
(691)

He was about to have his birthday wish of standing on the ice in Antarctica on his 60th although he would prefer 40.

Today, we set sail to Dorian Bay. Going back down the Lemaire Channel with a higher cloud base, we were now able to see the stunning beauty of this navigation passage only discovered in the last 100 years.  

The air is thin here so sun block has to be worn despite the thick cloud and sometimes snow. Steve learnt this early as he sported a red nose before even getting here.

At Lemaire Bay, we were first on the Zodiacs for driving round the icebergs, seeing the penguins, sea lions and of course the whales.  

Strange and mesmerising ice sculptures are everwhere.
The Turquoise once are particularly stunning.

The Crab eater seal and a fur seal share a park bench for a snooze.  Temperature is minus 4.

There is a team of scientists on board studying the travel movements of hump back whales and they had been out with us on the Zodiacs and stuck a radio transmitter on a hump back whale. Fortunately this one hadn’t travelled very far so we were able to see it.

Back to the ship after getting close-up and personal to some stunningly beautiful icebergs of many colours and textures, we were back on the boat to re-sterilise, feed and drink before we set out again 2 hours later.

The last stop of the day was to Danco Island, home to many thousands of Gentoo penguins all of which seemed to want to have their picture taken.

In the Antarctic, man has not been a threat and so most animals and mammals do not fear us.  We had never been to a penguin colony before but the smell was a memorable as the sight.

After a 3 mile hike across the snow and Ice, another terabyte of pictures, we ended up at another deserted dwelling, a “refugio”, a safe place to stay built by the Argentines in the 50s for use if the weather turned.  

This place was once again, breathtakingly beautiful but extremely cold and tonight, almost half the entire ship would return to “sleep on the ice” in a bivvy bag, sleeping bag and thermal mat only (no tent) for a night in the open.  No way on gods earth were we going to do that on Steve’s 60^th birthday ! We opted instead for the relative calm of the bar with some of our new found acquaintances.

Janette had sorted Steve’s birthday out with the crew, so dinner started with champagne for our little group of 6 , Mick and "Ang" from Australia and Val and Nick from Nottingham, and the ship had made him a cake which was presented by a little Asian crew member in a Penguin suit.  

The cake was improved immeasurably by the addition of the icing penguins which Janette had brought from the birthday cake Danielle, Steve’s daughter, had made for his birthday cake before we left.

Val & Nick headed off to sleep on the shore (mad …completely mad) and we sent them flashlight messages from the ship moored offshore 2 miles.

As the level of activity and effort is very high, everybody is completely knackered by 9.30pm although tonight, we manged 10.00 remarkably. 

Thanks to all for cards & presents. The photography gear has been getting maximum use and we look forward to inviting you round when we get back to view our 10,000 slide show (only joking...honest)

All in all a pretty unforgettable 60th Birthday !!

OK...i'm off

Hope the ship doesn't go without us !

18th Feb - Antarctic Ahoy !!

18th Feb - Antarctic Ahoy !!

We woke up at 5.30am and for the first time on this trip, the ship was not listing plus or minus 30 degrees so washing and getting dressed seemed very civilised.  It’s cold now, about minus 4 degrees and a low cloud base hangs over the continent. We very excited to see icebergs as far as we could see and we are not talking lettuce here !

On deck, the most breath-taking sights that everybody on this boat had ever seen, the famous Lemaire channel with its low cloud base hanging tantalisingly over the 2000m tall peaks.  Interestingly, this was the first time a ship has managed to go down this channel this year as it has been frozen to a depth of 3m, so the crew were as excited as us to be able to do this.

Tense moments on the bridge as the Russian captain and crew navigated the channel watching out for some pretty large icebergs but the scenery was stunning.

The light was so unusual, it looked like it was from an alien planet – a strange mix of grey and turquoise water and ice mixed with the green and orange algae, the icebergs had formed into stunning ice sculptures and on many of the floating ice sculptures, seals, penguins and sea lions carried on with their day as we all stood in total amazement.  Then on top of that, total silence with the occasional ice explosion where the glacial ice clinging to the mountains, fissured and fell off into the sea.  For all of us, stunned silence as nobody could believe what they were seeing….everybody was pretty speechless.

After breakfast, we were then to kit up for the cold.  This does involve about 3 -5 layers topped off with the external gear they supply, waterproof & warm dungarees, waterproof jacket and giant green gumboots. It took us about half an hour to get everything on and after we had got all sorted, we couldn’t move, breath or regulate our temperatures so we needed to get outside quick as we were boiling up.  

After the sterilisation process and the difficult process of getting your boots on when you are trussed up like a turkey, we then wobble down the gangplanks to get on the Zodiacs and off to our first experience on dry land at Peterman Island, which is the furthest south we are going to go.

From a distance, the place looks cold and forbidding but teeming with penguins and unbelievably,

a small French sailing boat had sailed down the Drakes Passage but was now occupying the inflatable landing bay and refused to move so we had to get off the Zodiacs on the rocks which did not impress Janette one bit.  Our first Antarctic paddle !! Steve did his thing about the French again.

We spent about 2 hours in here paying particular attention to the routes marked out by the guides which seemed to be the ones with the most penguin poo and ice that breaks as you walk on it….still, we were waterproof to a depth of about 45cm….Steve had found a 46cm drop getting on the boat and learnt what “Ingress” meant.

Back on board our Zodiac RIBs and then we were given a real treat.  A tour around a real active research station. 

The Verdansky station, formally owned by the British, presumably from the time we were Great Britain, was now an active Ukranian research station. For many years, we have always wondered about the origin of the Money Supermarket Meerkat. Now, at last, we had met him, he is actually a scientist studying in Antarctica called Boris and talks exactly like Sergey.  When we asked him what he was working on, he didn’t seem sure but we noticed that here in the middle of Antarctica, where no boats or planes can land, they had a great bar and sold Vodka Shots and had a pool table so we assumed that this was accounting for most of the research.

Research Station although we believe that these are more about

occupation than research.

There did not appear to be much by research equipment and most of the activity seemed to be showing tourists around.

It might be a research station but it had a great bar selling vodka.

This is the only place to post postcards, so we sat in the research station & wrote the postcard for Mum. Probably the most remote post office in the world !!

Back on ship, a quick sterilisation with industrial strength gunk cleaning fluid, quick lunch and back into the kit up room and back for round two…

When they said we were going to “Wordie Hut”, we had not quite realised the significance of this.  It was a perfectly protected (by temperature) research station originally run by the British still with the original office, living accommodation and desks but the significance of all of this is that it was here that the hole in the Ozone layer was discovered– god, see how nerdy we have become !!

After taking in the significance, we re-boarded our RIB, re-sterilised, de-kitted, dined, drank and crashed out.  With the boat now anchored for the night….sleep was for the first time undisturbed.