Antarctica - Day 2

With the very strong winds yesterday we had a very choppy voyage across Bransfield Strait from King George Island to the Antarctic Peninsula. I took to my bed with sea sickness late yesterday afternoon and did not lift my head until this morning, missing the Captains welcome cocktails and dinner. However this morning I felt much better as we had entered the Antarctic Sound and it was calm waters once again. Apparently the dining room was not full last night with many others also suffering! Our new boat has the latest and best stabilisers that modern technology offers, so I would hate to have been on another boat in these conditions - we were just unlucky to have rough conditions for our first day.

After breakfast we set off on the zodiacs for a landing at Brown Bluff. On the rocky shore we found many gentoo penguins, a few adele penguins and fur seals. The penguins were mainly chicks moulting before they migrate to sea for the winter. These grown chicks were so funny to watch, and they were very curious coming up really close and trying to peck our camera bags. We spent a couple of hours wandering around taking photos, but I found my fingers got so cold that I could hardly hold the camera. I was wearing 5 layers of clothing and gloves but after a while being exposed to the cold my fingers just stopped working!

On the zodiac trip back to the boat we went past some large ice bergs which we photographed, as well as a leopard seal lying on a smaller ice berg. 

It’s a busy non stop day as we had lunch as soon as we got back to the boat, and then after lunch we went out again for a zodiac cruise to photograph some magnificent ice bergs - again we saw seals, this time Weddell seals, Crabeater seals and another leopard seal. The ice bergs are enormous and so interesting to look at with their layers of compacted ice, particularly as we had a lecture from the geologist on the formation of them before our outing so we knew what we were looking at. The tabular ice bergs are like enormous cliffs of ice towering above the zodiac.

It got so cold on the zodiac so it was a treat to get back to the boat, decontaminate our boots, and be greeted with a warm lemon and honey drink. We then had a composition talk from our photo leader followed by lectures from another expedition leader before going in to supper. It has been a busy day. 

Each day the captain decides where to go according to the weather and conditions. Being a smaller boat of only 70 guests means everyone can go ashore in one sitting as landings are limited to 100 people at a time. At supper last night the boat passed an incredible sight of thousands of chinstrap penguins clinging to an ice berg in the middle of the sea - the captain slowed down the boat and did a circular detour a few times around the iceberg so we could get photos. My blip shows this extraordinary sight - if you look closely you can see penguins sliding off the bottom and trying to scramble back on to the ice berg again. This was taken at about 8.30pm at night so the light was not great.

In extras 1. An exhausted little gentoo chick 2. Two moulting gentoo penguins looking out to sea, probably wondering when they will finish moulting so they can start the winter migration to sea! 3. Two gentoo penguins 4. The incredible tabular icebergs 5. A Weddell seal