Well, maybe it was the heat, humidity and stifling still air of Paraguay. Or maybe it was the continual crowds that you run into when you are on the 'gringo trail', seeing the highlights of South America with the other tourists. Or maybe it was just 'because it's there'! But I was ready for cold. And dry. And windy. And desolate.
And Antarctica answered those needs quite well!
Unlike the frozen seas of the Arctic in the northern hemisphere, the Antarctic is a land mass, one of the seven continents. It is massive, about 5.3 million square miles. And only about 2% of that land is visible because all of the rest is covered permanently in ice. A sheet of ice that averages nearly 7000 feet deep! And for the mountain lover in me, it is also, on average, the highest of the continents.
Antarctica is surrounded by the Southern Ocean, some of the most turbulent water in the world. As the warmer and more saline waters of the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans meet the colder, less saline waters of the Southern Ocean, the Antarctic Convergence Zone is formed, often violently mixing these very different waters together. On top of that, the prevailing westerly winds are uninterrupted by any land mass in their circling of the planet. These factors combine to help to create the rough seas that are so common as you cross to the Antarctic continent!
But what's a little rough water compared to the sights to be seen! My father and I, along with 47 other adventurers, boarded our ship, the Professor Multanovskiy in Ushuaia, Argentina, ready for the adventure. We had read about the animals, the sights, the land, the water. And in our two day, relatively calm crossing of the Drake Passage from South America to the tip of the Antarctic Peninsula the three guides presented us with even more information concerning what to expect. Shoot, we even studied a bit of Russian since the crew of ship was Russian.
But no amount of study could really prepare us for the incredible adventure that was beginning.
As the Professor Multanovskiy approaches King George Island and we cross 62 degrees latitude south, we catch our first glimpse of land in two days. The island looms dark on the horizon with sheets of light shimmering through the generally heavy cloud cover. So mysterious. So enticing. We spot a whale fluking far off toward the island. And the ship is surrounded by penguins 'porpoising' as they ply the waters around us. Ah!
Our first landing was on Penguin Island. The big ship pulls in close to land. And we troop down the gang plank to board the little rubber zodiac boats to be ferried ashore.
Upon land, thousands of penguins crowd the land. Scurrying about, generally unbothered by our presence. Their screeching sounds are incredible. And never stop. Each breeding pair along with their chicks lives there in that narrow strip of land between the snow and the water on their nest of rocks. Either the mother or the father is always there warming the chicks. And protecting them from the ever present Skuas. Skuas are large, predatory sea birds that are always looking for a nice dinner. Like a wayward penguin chick. But, while one penguin parent is busy warming and protecting the young, the other is often out at sea collecting squid and krill, their main food sources. Upon their return to land, they waddle over to their nest to feed the chicks. Or, if the chicks are a bit older, they have a nice game of chase before the strongest and fastest chick finally gets fed. And feeding is a sight to behold. The chick noisily scrapes his beak over the parents beak, aggressively begging for his food. Then the parent opens its beak, the chick places its open beak up into the parents mouth and hungrily consumes the regurgitated delicacies!
Oh, and one more thing about penguin colonies. The smell is absolutely overpowering. You see, there isn't much land exposed in that narrow strip between snow and sea. And at least part of what goes in that hungry little beak is going to come out in the end! Almost everywhere you walk, you are surrounded by streaks of white penguin 'scat'. At least it almost creates a nice artistic pattern!
In our time in Antarctica we saw four different species of penguin, the Gentoo, the Chinstrap, the Adelie and the colorful Macaroni.
Each day we generally had two excursions like the one described above. Almost always, there were penguins waiting to greet us. But often we also met seals! The Antarctic Fur Seal is easily identified by its external ears. It is in the same family as the sea lion. Fur seals have a dense, luxurious coat made of guard hairs and under fur. This arrangement protects the fur seal from the cold. By contrast, the 'true seals' depend upon their blubber, a oil rich layer of fat beneath their outer skin to protect them from the cold. Among the many 'true seals' we saw were the Southern Elephant Seal (with its huge, trunk like nose), the Weddell Seal, the Crabeater Seal (the most common in the world) and the Leopard Seal (which are often trolling along the beach waiting for a penguin to scoot by and become their dinner).
Seals are carnivores, diving in the ocean for their meals. And they have some marvelous accommodations to allow them to make their deep, long dives. Compared to a similarly sized human, they have about twice as much blood. And that means that they can store a lot more oxygen in their blood so they can go longer without breathing. On top of that, their heartbeat, usually about 100 beats per minute when on land, slows to 4 or 5 beats per minute when making a dive!
Generally, the seals too were unbothered by our presence. But if you happened upon a dominant male proudly guarding his harem of females along with the young, you knew to keep your distance!
We were also very fortunate to make numerous whale sightings as we sailed from landing to landing. Basically their are two groups of whales. The toothed whales include dolphins and orcas (also known as killer whales). Orcas are actually large dolphin. We made numerous sighting of their smaller bodies, a glossy black with a strikingly contrasting white belly, cutting quickly and playfully through the water. Each killer whale has a distinctive dorsal fin on its back. One of our guides was busily snapping photos on each sighting, assisting a scientist friend in beginning to catalogue the various pods of orcas in the southern seas.
The baleen whales are the other group of whales. They feed by filtering plankton through their baleen, a horny set of plates that hang down vertically from the roof of their mouths. As the baleen whale moves through the water it opens its mouth and expands its throat in order to take in a large amount of water. The water is then filtered out through the plates of baleen, trapping many small animals such as krill and tiny fish on the dense bristles of the baleen. Among the baleen whale that we sighted were the Minke (the most common whale in the world) and the Humpback.
Our most incredible sighting of Humpbacks was close to the end of our trip, as we sailed through Dallman Bay. The captain circled the ship around several times as the Humpbacks fluked and spouted for us, often close enough that you seemed to be able to see the barnacle growths on their gray bodies.
Dad and I were particularly fortunate one evening. We had decided to forego the usual end of the day 'wrap up meeting' that the guides held for us. The scenery was just too incredible to sit inside talking! And as we took in the incredible vistas, suddenly, right to the starboard of the bow of our ship, a Minke whale spouted and showed himself to us. It was the closest we were to be to any of the whales in the entire trip.
While most of our Antarctic excursions were landings centering on the animal life of Antarctica, there is a human side to this continent also. Historically, the exploration of the Antarctic is a story fraught with incredibly dangerous conditions, heroism, and triumphs of the human spirit. Perhaps most famous is the 1914 to 1916 expedition of the ship Endurance lead by English explorer Ernest Shakleton. Shakleton had first attempted to reach the south pole in 1901. However, his dog sleds were turned back upon reaching 82 degrees south latitude, short of the 90 degree south, south pole. Shakleton returned in 1907 in command of the ship Nimrod. This time he attempted to cross the Ross ice shelf with Siberian ponies pulling his sleds. However, the ponies didn't last long and his expedition was reduced to man-hauling the sleds. He reached within 97 miles of the pole this time, before being forced to turn around. His third attempt for the pole actually had the goal of being the first expedition to cross the Antarctic continent. His plan was to land on the continent from the Weddell Sea and begin the 1800 mile trek with a party of 6 men. Meanwhile, a second ship was to land on the opposite side of the continent from the Ross Sea and trek inland to meet Shakleton at the Beardmore Glacier with supplies so they could finish the trek.
From the first, things seemed to be stacked against Shakleton. The summer of 1914 (December through March) was an especially bad one for ice in the Weddell Sea. On January 19, 1915, the Endurance was hopelessly trapped in pack ice. The long winter began. The days got shorter and shorter. Until finally the sun rose no more. Day after day, week after week, month after month of darkness, stranded in their ship, locked into the ice. Food began to run short. Then the ice began to crush the ship! They had to abandon the ship and set up camp on the ice on October 27, 1915. They remained trapped on the ice until April of 1916, when the frozen expanse of ice finally broke up enough that they were able to launch their three life boats and sail to uninhabited Elephant Island (155 miles distant). And although their were no good sites for a camp in that narrow strip of land between snow and ocean, there was finally plenty of food. Penguin and seal!
From here, Shakleton set off with 5 of his men in one of the life boats to cross 794 miles of the Drake Passage in search of tiny South Georgia Island, the closest accessible inhabited land! He left two thirds of his crew behind on Elephant Island, awaiting his return and their rescue. Miraculously, Shakleton and his tiny boat survived the crossing, covering the treacherous seas in just 16 days. However, upon landing on South Georgia, they still had to cross the precipitous, unexplored mountains of the island to reach the Norwegian whaling station on the other side of the island.
After successfully reaching the whaling station and help in early May of 1916, Shakleton immediately began to mount a rescue effort for his men, still stranded on Elephant Island. It took three unsuccessful attempts before, on his fourth try, in the Chilean vessel, Yelcho, he reached his men on Elephant Island on August 30, 1916.
And in all of this incredible trial, this mind boggling tribulation, not a single man of his crew died.
Our adventure, exciting as it was, was much calmer! Much more predictable. The most dangerous moment for me seemed to be the moment that I stood on the beach at Pendulum Cove on Deception Island in the 33 degree air, quickly peeled down to my swim suit and dove into the 29 degree water! Luckily, the warm waters of the hot spring that trickled down the beach, warmed the water to a bearable temperature. At least on the front side of my body!
Today the adventure of the Antarctic does continue for the daring souls, from many countries around the world, who man the numerous Antarctic research stations. By international treaty, the Antarctic is an international trust land. All countries who have laid claim to land in the Antarctic (New Zealand, France, Australia, Norway, Argentina, Chile and the United Kingdom), have promised to shelf their claims and to use the land only for research in a peaceful and environmentally responsible manner. Today, numerous countries operate research station on this desolate continent.
We visited two of those stations. Or at least we tried to! Port Lockeroy, a visitor center and environmental study center is a former research station established by the British. We had a visit, seeing the cramped, yet cozy quarters that the researchers enjoyed. Then we invited them out to the ship for a on deck barbecue. At 32 degrees!
The other station we attempted to visit was also the point furthest south on our trip. As the ship gently hit iceberg after iceberg and the captain skillfully used the ships reinforced hull to push them to the side in the narrow sea passage, we sighted Vernadskiy Research Station, an Estonian research station. But as we came closer, it became increasingly clear that it would be impossible for our little rubber Zodiac boats to carry us to land. But the researchers were not to be curtailed from seeing their first visitors of the brief summer! Four scientists piled into their tiny wooden boat and began paddling their way through the ice flows. Pushing one flow to the side and stroking forward while another flow closed in on them from behind, they carefully picked their way through the dangerous waters, reaching our ship for rousing round of applause from the tourists and an even warmer greeting from the Russian crew!
One last thought, one last image to add to these stories of the Antarctic. While I find myself partially able to imagine the months on end of darkness that the Shakleton expedition went through, I had no imagining before this trip, of the incredible feeling and light that we would experience in this land where the summer sun stays up 24 hours a day. By our late January trip, it was no longer 24 hour a day sunlight. But it was incredible to watch the sun hover above the horizon for hours on end before slowly dipping below the mountains. And then just for a few brief hours was it gone from view before gently reappearing and again hovering above those mountains. And the beautiful, almost orange quality of the light as it hung so low in the sky, casting long, crisp shadows in the dry air! It created an even more surreal atmosphere to add to the amazing adventure.