Penguins, Icebergs and Whales

The next morning I looked out the window and saw about 4 inches of snow covering the boat.  It was perfect snow for playing in, so I went on deck and made a snowman sitting on the bench (of course I forgot to take a picture).  We stayed at Dorian Bay, so we were able to go ashore and get our first snowshoe hike in.  It was nice to get out and hike after sitting in a boat eating tons of food for the last several days.  The views from the top of the hike were spectacular.

After lunch on the ship we got to participate in our second activity, mountaineering.  This was the activity I was most looking forward to. The zodiac dropped us off at the base of a very steep climb up to where we had snowshoes earlier.  Everyone put on harnesses and crampons (although I'm not sure we needed the crampons).  At the top of that hill we roped up and headed up towards a saddle that was about 350 meters high.  Our guides kept a steady pace all the way to the top, without any breaks.  It was nice to get the blood pumping.  Once we reached the top the clouds briefly lifted and we had great views on the surrounding bays and glaciers.  After a few pictures and a drink of water we headed back down (which I thought was harder then going up).  Both of us managed to avoid cramponing our pants which was good since we each only have 1 waterproof pair.  On our way down the clouds rolled in again and the snow continued falling.  For being a dessert we sure are getting a lot of snow!  After dinner a second group of campers headed out, again we were glad it wasn't us because it was drizzling outside.  

After gather the campers the next morning we headed through the Lemaire Channel.  Luckily the channel is really narrow because the clouds has socked us in so visibility was really poor.  Even in poor conditions the channel was beautiful and we started seeing our first really big icebergs, they were everywhere!  This was also the first time we got good views of whales.  Minky whales seemed to be popping up everywhere and the captain spotted a sleeping humpback that we were able to sail towards.  The captain maneuvered us through an iceberg graveyard and we made our next landing at Port Charcot.  We spent the morning wondering around in the rain and penguin poo.  Adam made friends with a penguin who thought his boots was delicous and I almost walked into a seal, who not so quietly told me to back off.  The wildlife was everywhere.  We hiked up to a carin built by Charcot when he landed here over 100 years ago.  His party was iced in and forced to be the first group to winter in Antarctica.  From there we had amazing views of the iceberg graveyard that stretch on forever.  On our way back to the boat we took a zodiac cruise through the icebergs, it was really cool to get up clost to them.  You really got a sense of just how massive they are.  During lunch we sailed back through the Lemaire Channel to our next stop Petermann Island.  I could have stayed at Port Charcot forever.  

After lunch we debated going back outside.  We were still looking a bit like drowned rats from our morning excursion and the wind had picked up.  We decided we were only in Antarctica for a couple days so we better suck it up and get out there.  At Petermann Island we saw a ton more penguins, but this time there were 2 different kinds.  We had only seen gentoo penguins so far, and here we were able to spot 3 Adelai penguins.  It was kind of like where's Waldo, with the Adelais hiding between the hundreds of gentoos.  After about an hour we were both really cold and had explores the island so we loaded up in a zodiac and headed back towards the boat.  We were supposed to camp tonight but with ten rain still coming down and wind howling it was thankfully canceled.  Since the weather was so bad the captain did a little tour around the bay because everyone was back onboard early.  He managed to find us a pod of Orcas and follow them for about 30 minutes.  It was neat to see the range in size of the animals.  There were 2 huge males and a tiny little baby too.  Our little point and shoot did alright, although we could have used a little more zoom!

The next morning we awoke to the same crappy weather, the wind was blowing even harder and the seas had a good swell to it.  The leaders decided to abandon our attempted landing and change the course of the boat and head back north because the weather was only supposed to get worse the farther south we went.  For being a desert we sure saw a lot of moisture the last few days.  We spent the morning on the ship sailing towards Paradise Cove.

Check out the rest of our pictures here