Up and at ‘em early-ish today for our landing at Brown Bluff this morning! While eating a quick breakfast, the announcement was made that due to wind and swell our landing at Brown Bluff was cancelled. Disappointing, but Hurtigruten is very conscientious about safety and if they decide we shouldn’t land then we really shouldn’t.
Hurtigruten is well adept at having multiple backup plans, as you can imagine when weather plays a major factor. So, we set out for Plan B. Plan B was a different landing site farther south, so we began heading south for that location. When we reached the Plan B location, once again the announcement was made that due to high winds (they were running in the 20 to 24 m/s range) we would not be able to start an operation at this landing site.
We once again headed north. While it might have been Plan C, we also know that Hurtigruten is very good at looking for opportunities, so despite the day looking to be a total wash because of mother nature, we remained mildly hopeful, but truth be told, were just happy to be here.
With Antarctica deciding to show us who was boss, and who held total control of this area, just sailing down here you see the most incredible things, like sailing through this narrow belt of ice flow (below).
We came upon an area that was still entirely iced over. A lone emperor penguin was seen floating on a random ice float, so many ran to the top deck to see this rarer find.
Seeing a sea of ice as far as you could see was pretty cool as well. After all, that is what most people associate with Antarctica, not necessarily the volcano’s and other rock islands, but just ice, ice, ice. Okay, seeing this went waaaay beyond “pretty cool”… it’s just indescribable.
As we were observing the Emperor, they announced over the PA that they were sending an expedition team over to the ice to drill a core and see/measure the ice sheets thickness so they could evaluate it for safety / see if we could we make a landing on it. About 20 to 25 minutes later, word came back that the ice cores performed looked good, and that the sheet would be acceptable for supporting a landing.
We were all excited, but a little leery. Exiting a zodiac at a beach is one thing, climbing out of a zodiac onto ice… wellllll… we were going to have to do it, but it still sounded kind of dangerous / challenging and there were definitely a lot of nerves mixed in with the excitement.
But as we continued to psych ourselves up for climbing out of a zodiac onto ice, they made yet another announcement over the PA. Dear Guests… We were going to back the ship up and then throttle forward and ram into the ice seeing how far we could plow forward, hoping it would be far enough to utilize the gang-way to access the ice sheet as a landing activity. Plan C or just Hurtigruten making lemonade out of lemons, we don’t know… but that is why we love Hurtigruten and would absolutely recommend them to anyone!
Oh, and their technical term sounds much safer and more professional than “ramming the ice” (even tho that is exactly what we were doing), the maneuver as they called it was attempting to “bow in to the ice”, and to be sure, the Roald Amundsen is a Class 6 ice ship (which means it has extra plating to withstand/break ice up to 1.5 meters thick).
So we backed up a good bit and then began sailing forward into the ice sheet. There was a slight tremble in the deck as we hit and began plowing through the ice. Finally we evidently made it as far as the momentum and engine power could push us, but instead of just purely wedging ourselves in, larger pieces of breakaway began floating off.
On evaluation (basically no ice on the port side where the gang-way is located) it was determined that it had not worked. They indicated that would try to ram into the ice one more time, but if we failed a second time, we’d have to revert to zodiac operations.
So once again we backed out of the ice quite a way, and then drove forward into the ice a second time. Again, similar vibrations as we hit the ice. It felt like we plowed a little farther, but upon looking, no, there was insufficient ice remaining on the port side for the gang-way to come down. A second failure.
But wait, not with Fred (the Expedition Team leader). Fred looked at the starboard side and said I think we can open the launch pit, with the ice close enough we can span that.
So for 20 to 25 minutes the expedition crew and boat crews worked to make a crossing off of the launch pit (that opening we’d shown you in Whaler’s Bay) with a portable aluminum gang-way, and we eventually achieved this:
Notice how it spans right over to some good ice. (We’ll come back to that.)
Anyway, about 25 minutes later, we had boat groups heading out onto the ice in turn, including ours. Here we are, standing on a sheet of ice in Antarctica (not land, not an island, but floating ice (again as far as you can see) roughly 3’ thick.
Here’s Jay showing off the magnificent Expedition Ship that brought us here, the Roald Amundsen.
And here is a view of the Amundsen bow first into the ice:
The natives were extremely curious, and came out to see what was going on. A whole platoon of penguins were curious enough to come take a look-see.
They came up out of the water to check us out… then went back (this is the going back), then turned around and came back for a second look. Again, they were not in the least shy, actually running at people, and as can be seen below, not a bit intimidated by the stupid humans invading their space.
Even a couple of seals wanted to check out what was going on.
Since there wasn’t a lot to see, just an experience to experience… the landing was for 15 minutes per boat group. Jay and I are always conscientious to be sure to follow the rules, so we headed back after about 10 minutes, to make sure we met the 15 minute mark. As we got to gang-way, the ice it was connected to had cracked and detached, and was beginning to separate.
The expedition staff at that time made the call to get everyone off the ice as quickly as possible as it was getting more and more dangerous.
They had tried to pin and rope the 2 sections together, and even brought in a zodiac to “ram” the ice and then keep the throttle open in order to try and keep it pushed tight, but it just wasn’t being effective, and for safety they evacuated the ice before everyone had made it off the ship (roughly between 1/3 and 1/2 of the passengers), so we feel very lucky and blessed that we were able to get on the ice!
They were going to try to bow into the ice one more time at a different location, in order to get the rest of the folks an opportunity to get on the ice, however, being the Antarctic, the weather conditions can change on a dime. Winds kicked up to 24 to 25 m/s and it was just too dangerous to continue a landing operation, so we had to move on.
That pretty much wraps up the day… what started out looking to be a major downer (with landings canceled due to high winds and weather), turned into a wonderful opportunity that they themselves rarely get to do. (I think I heard one staff say maybe once every two or three seasons.)
Well, till tomorrow and our last landing in Antarctica at Penguin Island.