Days 17 to 19 (22 February 2007): At Sea, Drake Passage back to Ushuaia

We have been incredibly lucky with the weather on our journey so far, and it seemed appropriate that this would change.

“An Antarctic expedition is the worst way to have the best time of your life” – Aspley Cherry Garrad (‘The Worst Journey in the World’)

The Vavilov was thrown around like a cork for the best part of our return journey crossing the Drake Passage, in huge storm force 11 gales (with 55-60 knot winds) and 7m swell. Amazingly, we were fine, having now got our sea-legs. Ending our experience with a fitting Captains dinner, we thanked our Russian captain for keeping us safe on the return journey.

And a BIG thank you to all the fantastic Peregrine crew!

A Tribute to Sailors From Days Gone By
by Sara Vial
(Translated from Spanish as written on the albatross monument at Cape Horn)

I am the Albatross that waits for you.
At the end of the earth
I am the forgotten soul of the deceased sailor
Who crossed Cape Horn
From all the seas of the world.
But they did not die in the furious waves.
Today they fly in my wings to eternity
In the last trough of the Antarctic winds.

Days 15-16: Antartica

There have been so many Antarctic highlights;

· Watching as humpbacks fed on krill, opening their huge mouths in giant gulps before squeezing the water out through the baleen sieves and diving, raising their huge flukes before disappearing.

· Our landing onto the Antarctic Continent led to a greeting by fur seals, who made it clear to us that this was their land. It was a celebration and felt special that we had made it to the Antarctic Continent.

· Interacting with the penguin colonies in Antarctica and setting foot onto Antarctic land. We had the pleasure of watching the behaviour of and interacting with one of our favourite penguins – the Gentoos! Adorable is the first word that springs to mind, particularly as we were also surrounded by 100s of chicks too! Every penguin has its own character and can behave in an hilarious fashion, chasing one another, squabbling or just lying flat on their front sleeping! We often thought they displayed many human like characteristics. The chicks in particular were highly inquisitive, which was lucky for us, as we had the amazing experience of sitting in snow in what we called “the penguin baby crèche”, just waiting for a chick to come to say hello. They liked to peck our boots, our legs and gloves and Chris was lucky enough to have one lay on his legs momentarily. Other than that, these fluff-balls would just look you in the eye, which was a heart-warming experience. At one point we felt like traitors as we rushed to see a leopard seal tossing a penguin in the air only metres from the safety of our zodiacs, but then, this is nature….and the leopard seals have to eat too!

· Visiting Paradise Harbour on our last day and watching as huge blocks of ice carved away from the immense 40-50 high glacier fronts into the sea, creating giant tidal waves that sent us bobbing over the place in the zodiacs. On our way back, we came across a curious leopard seal in the water, who then circled us, his big black eyes piercing into our zodiac.

But one aspect of Antarctica that it would be great to bottle is the peace and quiet and the morning and evening light – just amazing. Antarctica is truly a pristine continent, the beauty of which words cannot do justice.

Day 14: Antarctica

Day 13: Antarctica

It is difficult even to attempt to describe the beauty of Antarctica but the scenery is simply stunning. The Antarctic Peninsula’s mountainous, ice covered landscape with awesome glacier formations, seems to change almost by the moment in the varying light and weather.

It is incredibly tranquil, with placid water with soft yellow and pink hues, only disturbed as we travelled through the water in the zodiacs.
In the four days we spent on the Antarctic Peninsula, we visited several different bays and natural harbours, making landings on the Antarctic continent; including Antarctic Sound, Graham’s Passage, Charlotte’s Bay and Portal Point, Neko Harbour, Cuverville Island, Curtiss Bay, Mikkelsen Harbour, Wilhelmina Bay and the Gerlache Straits.

On the first night we had anchored just south of Paulet Island and in the morning we went for a zodiac cruise. This proved to be one of the most memorable events of the trip. We had spent the morning in the zodiacs looking at a huge 5k wide tabular iceberg broken away from the Ronne Ice Shelf.

We were the first Zodiac back to the Vavilov and we both went straight to the top deck to continue to look around. Within a minute we had spotted Orcas (killer whales) and hundreds of birds in an apparent feeding frenzy, about 750m away, 8 o’clock to the ship’s lie.

We frantically shouted down and sent those zodiacs still out motoring over to the scene and we shortly joined once we had got back into a zodiac. What appeared to be a few Orcas from a distance turned out to be a pod of 12 Orcas collectively pack-hunting a Minke whale at about 15 knots, gradually tiring out the Minke by jumping on top of it and pushing it under the ice. It also became apparent that this was also a training exercise as the larger Orcas watched as the younger Orcas played the lead role in the hunt.

We stayed with the chase for over an hour, watching as another pod of Orcas in the vicinity joined the hunt. All in all, we were in the midst of 20 orcas and were so close at certain points that an orca actually dived under our zodiac.

Eventually we had to give up as the Orcas moved away under the ice. The Minke was already clearly tired (it would normally be able to outpace an Orca in open water) and would not have lasted too much longer; although we did not see the conclusion, we had witnessed one of nature’s amazing spectacles.