March 7 - Drake Passage II; Land Ho!

The second day crossing the Drake Passage was a little rougher than the first, and the weather also got progressively worse throughout the day.  Still, I had no hint of seasickness, so everything was fine.  Today was another busy day of preparing for our first day of landings, expected to take place tomorrow.  After breakfast, each of the four color-coded groups had to report to the Main Lounge for the Bio Security Screening, which consisted of a VERY thorough vacuuming out of knapsacks, camera bags, and any items of outerwear like hats & gloves.  They were quite serious about this, and each person or couple was assigned a member of the expedition team with a vacuum cleaner, who looked over their items carefully, down to using a needle to pick out even the tiniest speck of schmutz that the vacuum might have missed.  Then walking sticks & tripods all had to go out on deck, dipped in disinfectant and brushed down.  

This was followed by an 11:00 lecture on the geology and climate of Antarctica, all about the ice cap and the ice shelves, the history of various treaties affecting the continent, growth of tourism, etc.  During the lecture, the captain came on the speakers to say that we were nearing the South Shetland Islands, and as if on cue lots of seabirds suddenly appeared alongside the ship, after the morning lecture.  Lunch (in the restaurant on Deck 2, with the windows occasionally submerged by the rough sea outside) preceded a couple of hours of downtime before an afternoon lecture on everything you could possibly want to know about penguins.  

Between a short break between the penguin talk and the next event, we wandered out onto the observation deck on the front of the ship and were greeted, in the distance, with the first glimpse of Antarctica itself - a huge snow-covered mountain suddently bathed in sunlight.  It would have been very exciting but for the fact that about 2 minutes later, a gale came up, with blowing snow and wind so strong that you could hardly stand on the rocking deck much less admire the view.  Still, we finally had made it!!

During the final briefing of the day, covering tomorrow's activities, the sea calmed considerably as we came out of the Drake Passage and passed some of the South Shetland Islands and entered the strait between Brabant Island and Anvers Island.  

At this point, EVERYBODY poured out onto the decks in their new, red parkas, to see the magnificent scenery.  There were a few whales spouting and breaching in the distance, but they were hard to see and appeared for only seconds at a time.  The views were amazing, like nothing I've ever seen before.  All I could think of was finally understanding the early explorers, and particularly Shackleton's expedition, and how they must have felt trying to put ashore and realizing, with increasing desperation, that there was NOWHERE to land.  And the view changed constantly as the ship proceeded past islands on both sides.

Tomorrow will include a morning landing on the Antarctic Continent itself in Neko Harbor.  After that, the ship will reposition itself into Paradise Bay and the afternoon event will consist of sightseeing in the bay (but not a landing) from the Zodiacs.  When I got back to my cabin just before dinner, I had a notice in my mailbox that in the afternoon I would be on the sea kayaking expedition in lieu of the Zodiac tour, which was perfect....those who were selected for the morning sea kayak event would not get to land in Neko Harbor.  

Even better, the Red Group was assigned to the second landing times in the morning, so instead of going ashore at 8:00 am with the Francophones and the Yellow group, our disembarkation time is at 9:40 am.  They were a little vague about the weather for tomorrow, except to say that the wind was predicted to be almost calm all day.  But as I type this blog entry at about 10:30 pm, there's a blinding snowstorm going on outside the ship!

So, after a week of travelling, a day's travel to Ushuaia and two days crossing the Drake Passage, we're finally here and it looks like tomorrow (weather permitting) will be a tremendously busy and exciting day.

And here are some additional photos of the day:

What magnificent scenery during supper!