Antarctica - The Antarctic Sounds

Sadly this is our last day sailing in the Antarctic, and we woke to clear skies.  Not the blue we would have liked, but clearer than yesterday.

We went out on desk to find it covered with ice and verrry cold.  The landscape was shades from white to black, and flecks of fine powder snow swirled around everywhere.

The day was spent sailing through bay and past enormous glaciers, and seeing some whales spouting.  We went through one passages and we were sitting up in The crow’s nest, so we could see the whole straight in front of us.  There seemed to be whale spouts everywhere in front of us, we must have seen more than twenty.

Late afternoon we sailed past St George Island, out of Admiralty Bay and into open water.

Bye bye Antarctic Sound.. it was brilliant.

Antarctica - The Danco Coast

Tuesday -2nd day in the ice

The weather report was right and we woke to grey, low cloud covering the hills.  We were up pretty early and spent the morning the Crow’s Next only going out for the occasional foray onto desk.  It was bitterly cold and snowed a little.  Got some quite brooding, almost monotone pictures before the fog came down even further.

We sat inside but must have seen at least ten whales spouting be it from a distance, until three came in front of the ship, and dived right in front of us.

Unfortunately the fog set in completely then, there were high winds which meant going out on deck was a bit hazardous.   Let’s hope tomorrow is more clear.

We chilled, read, did a little jigsaw puzzling, had lunch, had Spanish and English lessons with Antonio and Mercedes, and I sorted out my pictures etc etc.

Antarctica - The Palmer Archipeligo

Icebergs

Woke up at 6.30, looked out of the window to see icebergs floating past.  We got dressed hurriedly, all five layers, hat and gloves , and shot up to the top deck.

 Amazing, wonderful, awe-inspiring, what more words can I use. Wish we had woken up earlier, would be lovely to see the dawn rise.  Growlers (small bergs), Berglettes (1 to 5m) and reeeeally big buggers floated past.  We saw some hump back whales from a distance blowing steam, hundreds of penguins flying across the water, a few seals slipping away, glaciers and more bergs.  Some icebergs had penguins on they, others an odd seal or two.

Then at lunchtime we saw a group of Orcas. At first we thought had found a shoal of fish, but after a while realised they were hunting properly, a few others joined them you could see hey had trapped something, then the sea exploded into a mass of red and blubber.  We think they had killed a baby humpback, or sick whale.   A bit gruesome but fascinating.  We could come on a hundred of these trips and not seen that.

As the ship continued after this spectacle the fog came down, it was quite spookey and the light was great, and then it started to snow.

The captain came on to say we were going to be joined by some people from the US Antarctic team, and they came over from the Palmer Station and gave us a talk on life out here and what they are doing, fascinating.

Cape Horn and The Drake Passage

Feb 7th

Saturday – Cape Horn

At 10am we rounded Cape Horn and the Drake Passage spent all morning on deck watching the end of the earth pass by.  The morning had been grey and drizzly, and we saw the Horn draped in fog as we approached.  Then suddenly all cleared and the towering rocks came into view.  There is an Argentinian base with a lighthouses.

What a bleak place.  Probably only about 15 people stationed there.  A pilot had been with us since Ushuaia, and a small naval boat came out from the base to pick him up. It took a couple of goes to get him off, with a couple of suitcases, hoping with some good stuff for the boys there.  It must be tedious for them.

Spent most of the morning with Antonio and Mercedes, they are so much fun. We've been giving each other reciprocal English/Spanish lessons.  Whether we've improved remains to be see, but we've picked up some rude words to top up our vocab.

That was our last look at land and we headed off into the open sea, with only the occasional bird following.

The show tonight was a guy named Neil Lockwood, ex ELO, who did a sort of tribute to Elton John. We sat at the back so we could slope off if the show was naff.  But it was great fun and he was pretty good.

Glacier Alley

February 6th

We were again early at 6.30 as we were due to sail through Glacier Alley or Kodak Alley as more commonly known. What can we say, sun shone against a blue sky as we passed glacier after glacier, some huge, some small, with water falls between them.  And we saw whales, seals and bouncing penguins.

As we sailed out of the alley, in the distance you could see the city of Ushuaia, we are now in Argentina, and at one o’clock we docked. Unfortunately we only had the after noon and early evening in the city.  I was hoping to get some wifi connection, but no luck and as we had booked a trip out, we didn't have enough time to seek out connection in the town.

We were picked up by four wheel drive and taken out of town up to a lumberjack trail.  After stopping to pull another 4 x 4 out of the mud, not a jeep I might say, we had no problem.

In the 80’s they introduced beavers into the country, they are now having to deal with the devastation these not native animals are doing to the area.  They have no natural predators here so have flourished, but they are creating havoc in the forests and with the small rivers, which of course they dam everywhere.  They are considered pests and the government are trying to correct the situation.

We drove out and up to an outdoor centre, that in winter is at the centre of the ski area.  Our guide Nacho told us that they are down to hosting the winter olympics next year, but doesn’t know how, as there are no infrastructure, facilities and certainly not enough hotel bedrooms here.

We then drove up through woodland with houses scattered everywhere in the trees. Nacho told us that people have built there own homes here, as they don’t pay for the land.  But there are no facilities, water, electricity, dirt roads etc.  It must be a nightmare in winter as it was difficult enough in a 4x4 now. People have to be self sustaining. And, no doubt as the government start to maintain the roads, put in water and electricity, the area will be de eloped more and people will have to pay.  I wonder if the people there already will be evicted?

From there we drove up to a house on the top of the hill.  A great view, tasty snacks and two house cats, who treated us with disdain.

A  nice day but also felt sorry that we didn’t have much time to look around the city-  Ushuaia is the gateway to Antarctica, and along side us at the dock was a Russian tour vessel and a very posh and smaller cruise ship.  Also in the harbour were numerous yachts which will take you down to Antarctica for  a tidy price.

At 8pm we set sail for the unknown and Antarctica, out of the sheltered harbour and into the ocean with nothing in sight.

Cockburn Channel/Beagle Channel

5th February Sailing the Beagle Channel and Cockburn Channel

Punta Arenas and Strait of Magellan

Punta  Arenas 5th February

We paid sorely for the rich meal last night, I didn’t sleep very much and woke up still feeling like I had had this enormous meal.  Think I will have to give up rich food from now on.

So today we were in in Punta Arenas, the last stop off in Chile for us.  We were up at 6.30 as we had  trip booked out to Magdelena Island to see a penguin colony.

We took a large speed boat out to the island which took a out 45 mins, and then hour just over an hour with 120,000 Magellan penguins.  I wouldn’t have thought I could get so excited about penguins, but they were absolutely wonderful, I was bowled over and so was Rod.

Penguins, Penguins everywhere.. Wonderful.

They dragged us all back to the boat and we very reluctantly left the island and headed for Marta Island.  This time we couldn’t get off the boat, so we just chugged around it to see massive seal lions and thousands of cormoronts.

To top it all I am sitting outside at the back of the boats when two dolphins leapt out of the water and started spinning in the air beside us... magic.

Wot a great morning.  We walked around Punta Arenas which I thought was a great place, about 17,000 Population and a hint of a pioneer town.  Walked along the sea front and wandered back to the ship early afternoon.

Still feel bloated from last night and really tired. Fell asleep inthe afternoon, had dinner with the guys and went to bed early.  can’t keep the pa ce any more.