O.M.G. is the first thing heard out of Jay’s mouth this morning, waaaay before 6 am. She thought the boat was stopping so she peeked outside to confirm…..and there were icebergs everywhere as far as the eye could see!!
Knowing we have a day of strenuous activities, all in the freezing cold, we headed to breakfast to ensure we get some calories in our bodies. When we did so, the wait staff and kitchen staff all knew Jay by name and greeted her. One of the kitchen staff even sang the Star Spangled Banner when she was at the buffet!! We’re still not sure why she’s so popular, but maybe Tim will be equally popular before the trip is done.
This is our view from breakfast. Crazy that we’ve finally made it and get to enjoy this while dining!
After breakfast we descended to the Roald Amundsen’s landing deck. This is where all Zodiacs launch from and return to after off-ship excursions. The excursion today was “small ship sailing” around various icebergs and ice float. Small ship means rubber Zodiac boat that holds 10 people. That said, this was a freaking awesome experience. Possibly one of the best ones! We headed out toward the icebergs with the intention of navigating said icebergs and observing penguins (Gentoo and Adelie). We did both, thoroughly enjoying the landscape as we went along. We’ve been told how quickly weather can change and we saw it firsthand! There was a breeze when we left the ship and while we were cruising, but as we were heading back the wind picked up and it started sleeting/snowing. Imagine speeding through the water on a boat getting stung in the face multiple times by ice pellets! The wind also brought small swells with whitecaps, which were unavoidable. Waves crashed over the front of the boat multiple times as the wind kept roaring and the water kept rolling. All of that said, this truly was an amazing experience and the abrupt weather change added to it!
Before lunch we took some pics of the narrow passage as we cruised through it. We again saw weather change – strong winds (40 mph) and light sleet which quickly turned into so much cloud cover that you couldn’t see the tops of tall icebergs/mountains. So far, seeing massive icebergs and majestic mountains has not gotten old. We could add a bunch of adjectives to try to describe what we’ve seen, but there are truly no words that would adequately describe it.
Again, remember yesterday’s lottery? Jay won the opportunity to go snowshoeing at Damoy Point while Tim chose to pass. Wise choice, Tim. We’ll each tell our own stories of today’s excursions.
Jay’s story – Snowshoeing in Antarctica… Here’s Jay all geared up!
Snowshoeing was much rougher than I thought it would be. I tried to take my time as the guides suggested, but my competitive side said “you must walk as fast as the person in front of you, always keeping pace”. My competitive side won, sadly. I pushed and pushed until I finally stepped to the side to let others pass with the intention of joining near the rear.
One of the expedition team members stopped to check on me, noting that I looked quite hot. She took my two coats off then showed me how to wind them through the straps on the life vest, preventing me from having to carry them. She graciously offered to walk with me, not in a race but in a “you set the pace” way. While walking, she noted that my snowshoes had not been properly adjusted, which not only made it difficult to walk but also add more drag thus pooping me out quickly.
Wrapping up my story, I’ll admit that I did NOT make it to the top of the hill to see penguins. But, walking with my own personal guide who made me stop many times to enjoy the landscape, take pictures, and stand in complete silence listening to Antarctica’s noise, or lack thereof. As much as it pained me to drop behind the group, it was a humble experience to ask for help. The key take-away from this incredibly patient guide is this – enjoy what’s around you. See it, feel it, hear it. Put the camera aside and just take it all in.
Tim’s Story – Rather than snowshoe, I chose to do the landing (you could do one or the other, but not both). Getting to the landing was quite fun, in that while the water was reasonably still (small little whitecaps from the wind, but no major swell) making the zodiac ride relatively smooth compared to the earlier iceberg cruising. As we rounded one last iceberg to get into the bay of the landing, you saw nothing but ice flow (a bunch of small ice everywhere).
The zodiac driver instantly throttled down and began trying to dodge or go around the much larger pieces. We gently cruised into the ice flow at very slow speeds, so the boat could nudge the smaller pieces we couldn’t avoid out of the way. This is a little nerve racking when you are in a rubber boat, nudging razor sharp ice out of your way. Needless to say, we made it through without an issue.
The landing consisted of beaching the boat as far as you could in the bay, which given the boats draft meant it was still a bit out into the water. So we had to slide off of the boat into roughly shin deep water and wade into shore.
Getting up to Damoy took a little bit, as the mainland was about 15’ higher than the bay where we got off the zodiac. The amazing expedition crew and shoveled out “steps” up the side of the embankment as well as using buried ice picks at the top and bottom, stringing a thick robe tied to each pick as a make-shift robe railing to help pull yourself up with. One note, the reason steps was in quotes, is that they were still quite challenging, as the height of several steps were crotch to waist high (depending on the explorer)
Once at the top you could pick up walking poles and there was a flagged and compacted trail (originally from staff exploration, but then also from different boat groups) one person wide that you could follow. Staff gave strong advice NOT to leave the trail, as the trail was reasonably compact from traffic and you could hike fine. Non-packed snow you would sink into, if you were lucky, only to your knees, if you were unlucky to your waist. If it was to your waist, they indicated it would be exceptionally hard to get you freed.
Not to far down the trail was the Damoy field camp hut, that still held much of the old equipment, kitchenware, etc. We were able to go in and look around (10 people at a time), but everything in there as well as the building are all classified as historic monument, so we were instructed to treat it as you would a museum and not touch anything.
After the field camp, the trail led up a hill to approximately within 15 meters of a penguin colony that we were able to stand and observe.
The little guys mainly stood around, lifting their wings (which indicates that they are getting hot and that cools them down), and occasionally calling out donkey like sounds to each other.
There were 3 energetic lads… up walking on the “penguin highway” which is the area they walk so frequently they beat it into a trail of their own. (Yes, they spread their wings when they walk for balance, not because they are hot.)
We finally made it back to the ship but had a very short time frame to eat dinner and pack before the Zodiac left so that we could camp in Antarctica. Yes, we went camping on the White Continent!!!!!!
To do this, we each had to grab dry bags with our sleeping bags and silk sleeping bag liners prior to stepping on the Zodiac. As we neared shore of the camping site a few penguins were in the water swimming and jumping without a care in the world. They were so cute!!
Once at the site, we had to walk up the same man-made steps we’d taken earlier in the day. Yep, they were still tall man-made steps that we used earlier, but earlier we weren’t carrying a dry bag with gear in it! At the top of the steps, we had to grab a sled that was packed with our camp items (the tent, bamboo stakes to stake it down, a large foam mat to go on the tent floor to help isolate us from the snow, etc.).
We added our dry bags to the sled, and then started off along a trail until we reached an area that had flags spaced, indicating where each tent / duo should setup camp.
The tent set up was not technically difficult, but with a strong gusty wind trying to grab it and take it away, along with manipulating tent rods, etc in gloves, we luckily had a member of the expedition team come over to help give us a hand (and then ended up doing it mostly on his own while we kept it from blowing away). He’s an expert so he made quick work of setting up our tent. Once the tent was set up, Jay started working on getting the ground pad down in the tent. Once that was mostly done (it was very stubborn and wanted to roll back up) she then began unpacking the dry bags which consisted of a second individual foam pad and the sleeping bag. While it wasn’t horribly difficult, it was still a challenge for the 2 of us due to limited space.
As Jay was working with the pads, Tim was outside securing the sled. This consisted of turning it over, and then packing snow around the edges so the wind couldn’t get under it and take it away.
Here is a picture of our completed camp:
And here is a shot of some of our fellow campers, showing their camp sites (we were lined up in a linear row, with tent backs to the wind).
Around this time is when the wind really picked up and started sleet/freezing rain at us. After a few quick stories as a group, and a quick hike, everyone was released with admonitions of not straying to far from camp (as there were crevices nearby, not to mention just the sinking in the snow as described earlier. While we participated in the story time, we elected to go ahead and turn in for the night, as it was starting to get really cold with the wind blowing as hard as it was.
With boots not allowed in the tent, they were taken off and left in the vestibule (The front red flap made a protected area, with the zipper to the tent being inside of that. We didn’t want to sleep in our daily gear, which included snow pants and a medium weight Parka, and quickly learned that disrobing in a 2-man tent was a challenge. Once set up was complete, we were ready to call it a day! The rest of our camping experience is on Day 7.