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Day 7 & 8
Nov 25, 2022
The now familiar “good morning good morning…” woke us up. To be honest I did not need it. After 2 long sea days the excitement to step on Antarctica was enough. I was up, showered, and ready, waiting for the morning activities to start. The first activity was to just get on land and explore a bit. The crew had chosen Portal Point for that, and we were supposed to board the zodiacs and head out by 8AM, but the conditions, the water around the ship and the winds made it extremely dangerous. The landing site was blocked by huge amounts of ice, making safe access with zodiacs nigh impossible. Additionally, due to the recent heavy snowfall, there was no direction from which the zodiacs could approach without the snow walls collapsing on us. So, the landing was cancelled, and we kept sailing on. This slowed things down a bit on the ship and the initial buzz died down. Outside, the landscape was filled with vast icebergs floating all around the ship. Penguins made brief appearances beside the ship. To fill the gap the crew organized a lecture on whales.
Whales evolved from the land and not the other way around.
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All hopes now flowed towards an afternoon landing and as the mist descended all around our vessel, flurries of snow started to come down as well. Through the gaps in the mist, we could see that we were surrounded by mountains on both sides as we meandered slowly between them. There was no way I was going to miss any of it so the few of us who were willing to brave the cold were out on the bow of the ship soaking it all in, literally and figuratively.
We settled in for some scrumptious lunch. By this point our little group had established our booth in the dining hall and it seemed like everyone took notice as it was always available for us. After lunch at around 1:30pm we reached our Plan B site, Stoney Point. The conditions were much better here so we got into as many layers as we could manage and boarded the zodiacs to finally step foot on Antarctica for the first time. The excitement was building as the zodiacs did their best to zig zag and navigate around the floating ice bergs and stay above the swells caused by the wind. We were constantly getting pelted by snow on our faces, which added to the whole atmosphere.
As we neared land, there were gentoo penguins swimming, or rather jumping in and out of the water, and a whole waddle of penguins
to greet us. After putting on our snowshoes we were free to roam and explore on our own, although the crew had gone ahead and marked out spots to make sure we did not step on an ice shelf or a crevasse or disturb the wildlife. I never in a million years would have expected to be walking right
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next to penguins or seals and those buggers were not scared either. After spending 2 memorable hours just walking around, we got a radio in from the captain to come back as the snow and wind was starting to pick back up, which was causing the ice to start packing at the landing site.
The zodiac ride back was an adventure. The visibility was so poor and with the wind and snow, we just plain got lost. Our navigator could not find his way back as the shifting snowpacks and iceberg completely changed the landscape, making all previous landmarks useless now. We ended up cruising around in the cold for almost an hour. The first 20 mins were fun but after that we were starting to freeze, and it was getting uncomfortable. Even the motor on our zodiac broke down once as it crashed into an iceberg, but it was fixed within 10 mins. But this also gave us a chance to spot an extremely rare sight, a baby leopard seal on an ice floe. After an hour the zodiacs all decided to make their way back to the landing site and start all over again. The captain had to bring the vessel in closer, which was risky, but we had no choice at this point. The captain then slowly guided us back. Our ship was barely visible
until we got within a few feet of it. We were frozen stiff by this point, and it was great to just get back onboard. That was an experience I’ll never forget, to skip over ice, break through ice floats, push away icebergs with paddles and getting drenched in the cold Southern Ocean spray. We were scheduled to go back out camping that night, but as expected it was cancelled. So, it was dinner, drinks, rummy, and poker the rest of the night, till midnight. The day ended with me getting a nickname
from one of the solo travelers in our group – 'Sunny'.
Nov 26, 2022
The day started with strong wind gusts as we approached our destination for the morning operation at Jougla Island. As soon as we arrived the wind started gusting at 60 knots and the planned landing had to be cancelled. But that wouldn’t be the end of our morning as we headed further south to the
British station Port Lockroy, where we found a Chilean warship idled. Our vessel came to a halt right in between what looked like a massive inlet of sorts surrounded by mountains and enormous glaciers. The weather was starting to improve now, and we were supposed to board our zodiacs to head to Port Lockroy which was manned by a group of 4 ladies living there for 6 months. Just as the announcements were being made the weather turned again and it got really bad this time, but our expedition leader Pippa contacted Port Lockroy, and convinced them that she would go ashore to ferry some of their staff onboard with the promise that no matter how worse the weather got she would drop them back. They brought over with them souvenirs and lots of postcards and stamps which were a big hit! All of us wanted to mail a few postcards, after all it’s the southernmost post office in the world and you can buy stamps you would get nowhere else on this planet.
At mid-day after lunch, we started to prep for our second opportunity to land in Antarctica. The plan was land at Damoy island, which is a protected little bay close to massive glaciers and numerous gentoo penguin colonies. Luck finally started to go our way as the sun started to peak out and we saw blue skies for the first time in 3 days. By this time, we got our routine nailed down… layer up, throw on the lifejackets and wait your turn to board the zodiacs.
This landing spot was by far one of the most scenic ones I would encounter on the entire trip. Perfectly smooth stretches of snow, as far as the eye can see, just like a desert landscape but white and by the shore there were 2 red and teal huts buried in snow. The perfect contrast to a blue sky and penguins. Those penguins were just hilarious to watch, and we got close and personal with them. The sight of them waddling around clumsily, half-sliding-half-
swimming on their bellies on the snow was extremely entertaining to watch. We followed the penguins up and down the hills in our snowshoes for a while. We were told to never get in their way and never stand in what they called "penguin-highways" which are basically the walking paths they carve out as they walk through the snow. We were hit with a short snowstorm that came out of nowhere and were caught in it for a few minutes. Nothing we could do, other than just turn our backs to the winds, crouch down and wait it out. After that we made our way back to the zodiacs and just as I started my climb down I was blocked by 2 penguins who decided it was time to question our un-invited presence. Face-off!! Those 2 little fellows were literally staring at me and holding up the entire line. We were told ahead of time that, if wildlife gets in our way, then stop and back away if we can. It didn’t take long for those 2 inquisitive penguins to clear our path, but it was a funny sight to see a line of people waiting for two penguins.
Back onboard and after dinner we got the good news that the conditions were good for us to go camping. We were not allowed to bring food of any sort and no bathroom breaks, so dinner made for a careful balancing act of how much food and water we planned to consume. One thing was decided though, no wine tonight. This was the most exciting and by far the number 1 thing every single person in our group wanted to do, if nothing else on this trip and we finally got the go ahead. We collected our sleeping bags and other gear and loaded back onto the zodiacs at around 8pm. We basically went back to the same spot we went to in the morning. The tide had come in and getting off the zodiacs was a bit trickier. We had to go from the zodiac straight onto a snow wall and lug our sleeping bags up to a flat spot.
We found an open spot as a group and started digging our little rectangular pit in which we placed a mat and on top of that our sleeping bags. We used the snow to create a bit of a wall around it to try and keep away the wind. Through all of this we got a single curious 3-4 ft black and white watcher who came waddling by to inspect our progress. After our sleeping arrangements were made, we gathered for a commemorative photo. The sky had gotten cloudy and dark, with a light breeze in the air. It was a bit off a struggle to get into the sleeping bag, but once inside it was comfortable and warm.
After we were all in, we got two nightwatchmen (penguins) walk by to inspect our finished product and give us the cursory “allowed only 1 night here” stare before we managed to go to bed just before midnight. I don’t think any of us got any sleep that night. How could we? We were camping in Antarctica surrounded by vast fields of snow set against a backdrop of snow-covered mountains covered in mists of dark clouds with the Southern Ocean in the foreground, so far down south on this planet Earth.
Days 7 & 8 photos
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