After another restful sleep, I was up at 7am for breakfast this morning.
I’m actually shocked at how well I’ve been sleeping on the ship and, dare I say, even better than when I’m at home.
Long gone are the worries of being seasick on this voyage.
Of course there’s still the trip back through the Drake Passage in a few days but, for now, all is great.
Today we reached the midway point of our 6 days here in the Antarctic Peninsula and, with that, began to head back north.
Petermann Island
After breakfast we went on our first expedition of the day.
The landing today was on Petermann Island which is also known at the iceberg graveyard.
Well, color me intrigued.
The sun was fully out today and it was pretty warm today.
All of a sudden my multi layers underneath a heavy parka seemed a bit much.
Sure enough, I never put on my gloves or beanie and it wasn’t long until I was holding my jacket instead of wearing it.
After climbing a hill for awhile I got to the top and my answer to what the hell is a iceberg graveyard was answered.
In the bay or lagoon of the tiny island was a collection of pretty decent sized icebergs all floating next to each other.
The icebergs were drawn into the lagoon and were trapped there unable to float out.
Of course there were also gentoo and adelie penguins everywhere you looked so, you know, a bunch more photos and videos.
After an hour I headed back on a zodiac filming a hyperlapse video as we went back to the ship.
The hyperlapse had to be cancelled because there was a whale sighting and that called for an immediate abrupt detour to where it was.
People asked me before I left what kind of animals I’d see while down here and, honestly, all I could ever come up with was penguins.
Well, how stupid was I?
Here was this glorious humpback whale spouting water into the air mere feet away from me.
Our collective awe and astonishment on the zodiac was palpable but, boy, we had no idea what was in store for us later on today…
Port Charot
After being back on the ship for a few hours we arrived at our second landing site for the day.
At 2:30 we arrived at Port Charcot.
It’s named after a French explorer Jean-Baptiste Charcot who other explorers admired and revered.
His passion was solely for cartography and he spent the foremost years of his life doing so here around all the Antarctic Islands.
He’s single handily surveyed a total of 1250 miles of coastline and newly discovered territory.
His scientific data collected filled 28 volumes and was illustrated with some of the 3000 photographs he had taken.
Keep in mind, this was back in the early 20th century so 3000 photos is a ton.
His maps were so precise that they were still being used 25 years later by sealers and whalers.
He treated his crew with respect giving each their own private area and enough wine and cheese for the entire voyages.
He won two silver medals in the 1900 Olympics for sailing and married the grand daughter of Victor Hugo.
In 1936 he sadly went down with his ship, the Porquois-Pas? and his final act was to free a caged bird they had on board.
So, yeah, he was quite a man and praised by many, even now, almost a century later.
Sweating in Antarctica
I mentioned earlier that the sun was out and it was quite warm. Well, it turns out it was 15C (50F) outside today.
This second landing involved even less clothing than this morning.
No more long sleeve shirt and no more sweatpants.
I still had some layering but after I removed my jacket when we arrived on land, I was pretty much just walking around in a tshirt and pants.
Like many of our landings, there was a pretty good climb to the top of the island.
And, as I have many times before, I questioned whether I really wanted to get to the top.
But I started climbing and climbing and, well, before I knew it I was high atop the island.
There’s a navigation beacon from the 1950s here and a 360 degree view of the amazing landscape below.
Yup, it was worth he climb but, boy, did I work up a good sweat.
In fact, this blog was originally going to be titled “Sweating in Antarctica” but then something amazing happened…
A couple of humpback whales say hi
At 4:15 we headed back on a zodiac to get back to the ship.
Sometimes there’s extended zodiac trips around the area to see things but this time was just supposed to be a basic 5 minute ride back to the ship.
And then word came over the radio on Matt’s shoulder – there had been a whale sighting.
So we gingerly drove trying not to disturb the waters over to where the other zodiac was.
And then it happened.
You first hear the spout blowing air out of the water and then you see the magnificent whale in the water.
And then another whale appeared on the other side.
We were given a show of a lifetime!
I mean, you know it’s cool when your expedition guides are breathless.
Pretty soon there were 4 different zodiacs surrounding the area keeping their eyes affixed on the water waiting for the whales to reappear.
That 5 minute ride back to the ship ended up being a full 45 minutes of joy and wonderment.
I got an amazing video on my phone, and I can’t wait to share it on here when I get back to land and have the internet power I need to upload everything.
Summer BBQ surrounded by ice
Back on the ship it was time for our daily recap and information session before dinner.
Needless to say there was a lot of buzz in the air and a lot of chatter about what we had all just witnessed.
We got a recap of what happened today and a rundown of where we’ll be going tomorrow and what we’ll be seeing and doing.
And then another surprise for us – dinner tonight was going to be up on the deck with a summer bbq buffet complete with an actual bbq grilling all kinds of meats.
I swear these guys just find a way to top themselves day after day.
Imagine sitting at a table on the deck of a expedition ship looking out at the glaciers and ice floating in the water as we passed through a channel surrounded by mountains.
That was my dinner tonight!
I gorged myself so much it was ridiculous.
Even though I had to pass up the bbq ribs and chicken because they had gluten in them (damn sauce), I still managed to eat prime rib, burger, steak, coleslaw, vegetables, caesar salad, Spanish paella, fruits, and dessert.
Yup, I definitely over ate.
Randy even brought me out a gluten free panna cotta for dessert which I had with homemade strawberry ice cream.
Oh and they served us some nice mulled wine to keep us warm.
Yeah, it was a perfect ending to an amazing day.
I can’t wait to see what tomorrow has in store…
Edit Note: I am currently still sailing in the Antarctica with limited expensive internet. I’ll be uploading all my photos and videos into a gallery at the end of this post when I arrive back on land.
