The last Antarctican Island vanishes from our sights at night, filling the boat with a palpable sense of closure.  Weather reports have come in, and while initially there was the potential threat (and excitement of bad weather), that threat has passed, leaving us with winds and waves no more brutal or exciting as those from our initial trip southward.  Daily lectures are still given, but the interest has waned a bit; it´s far more exciting to learn about something you eagerly anticipate than about something you passively miss.

In the downtime, we play chess and backgammon, snack on the last gourmet treats I´m likely to get in a while, and test out a drinking game I spent an entire morning creating based loosely around the Antarctic tourist experience.  It´s a fun way to kill time, but we´re all aware that that´s all there is left for us to do.  Our final dinner is introduced with a champagne toast and official documents for us all, specifying that any claims made by passengers of the MV Ushuaia to have been to Antarctica are summarily ¨not bullshit.¨

A few of us are invited down to the crew section for their closing party, and we dance and drink, though the fun is cut short as other passengers discover the discrete gathering.  We head back up to the top and those of us that most want the trip to not end stay up until six in the morning, drinking and talking.  It´s a fun time that immediately becomes much less fun upon waking at 8:30 and rushing to pack together my gear in time to be the last off the boat.

No one I talked to prior to the trip that had gone regretted going to Antarctica (or even spending so much on the trip).  I didn´t either.

The rest of this post is just leftover pictures and topics I otherwise might´ve missed in the past seven installments (seven?  yikes!)

Fun with Seals

Easily the friendliest of the Antarctic seals would have to be the Weddell.  Granted, it was the Leopard Seal that came and played with us almost daily, but just look at this smile:

It´s the Weddell´s trademark, making him incredibly easy to spot.  The mouth curves up in either direction and comes together in the middle in a ´W´ shape.  Even while fiercely attacking, this guy rocks a steady grin.  The three Weddells we saw never seemed terribly bothered by us or anything.  Fur seals and Elephant seals all eyed us warily, often jumping up to give chase, but every Weddell did just about what the guy above is doing — roll over and stare briefly at us before resuming his casual lounging.

Elephant seals are the biggest ones we managed to catch, and clearly got off on using one another for warmth.  Aside from a few stragglers we saw at times in small groups, our entire Elephant encounter was encapsulated in a single orgy of blubber and whiskers.  For the most part, the pile lay dormant, but the shift of a single seal — especially from within the middle — would often set off a chain reaction of honking, biting and rolling that made for quality live entertainment.

Elephant seal orgy. Check out the massive mouths.

Finally, Fur Seals.

Granted, we clubbed their babies for centuries, but way to hold a grudge, guys.  Anyone closer than fifteen feet to these ornery guys would typically find himself immediately honked at (it´s definitely far more of a honk than a growl or scream) and given chase.  Luckily, seals are about the least graceful land animals on the planet, and can be fled from while walking backwards, laughing and taking pictures.  Like this one:

¨We are not afraid of you and we will kick your ass¨

Does not play well with others

Free Willy

A few varieties of whales pass by at times, but keep their distance from the boat, remaining thin, black lumps above the surface of the water almost out of sight.  Luckily, our crew is observant, with well-trained eyes, as we´d never spot them otherwise.  At first sight of whales, an announcement is made throughout the ship, causing near evacuation-like behavior as passengers burst out to the main deck.  Two questions are then asked:

1. Where are they?
2. Are they orcas?

Three days from trip´s end, the answer to (2) was always ¨no,¨ with a hint of sadness from the resident marine biologist due to the implied uncoolness of every whale whose first name isn´t ¨killer.¨

So when the announcement ¨Please come outside and look to the starboard side for the pair of ORCAS!!!¨ came over the loudspeaker, cramped hallways suddenly became dangerously thin mosh pits of excitement as we all made our way above.  Upon arrival, the whales, swimming tightly together as a single unit, were almost out of sight but clearly recognizable as orcas.

And then, for no reason we understood, they turned back and, like homing missiles set upon the MV Ushuaia, darted directly towards us.  Less than twenty feet from our boat, they turned sharply to run a parallel course to us, before finally dropping down into the water and forever out of sight.

Bases and Research Stations

Most of the stations down around the peninsula are closed off to travelers, with the exception of the famous Ukrainian base sporting ¨the southernmost bar in the world.¨  And sadly, even that wasn´t made available to us this go-around, due to supply restocking.  However, bases that are permanently (or even temporarily closed) are open to the small amount of general public that makes its way down here.  Base Brown is a working Argentinian base that shuts down every March for the winter.  The other base in pictures below is located inside Deception Island and has been shut down for decades and left untouched due to stipulations in the Antarctic Treaty.

Base Brown

The abandoned base on Deception Island

Check out the stylish orange gloves -- not terribly fashion conscious, but they keep the hands both dry and extra insulated

Inside one of the buildings. This is as close as we´re allowed to get.

An OLD lifeboat. Luckily the newer ones are a bit more dry and warm

Other Assorted Things Too Random to Get Their Own Header

Avalanche!

Too many of my pictures were sunny and green, so I wanted to at least make it clear things were snowy and white most of the time, too

Bernie: ¨This would be much funnier if you landed on your face.¨

Whale bones. I thought it was cool how together the skeleton remained. We were later told that the whale was put back together from parts found all over the beach.

An awesome shot of the boat, surrounded by... Antarctica

Emma and me, perched up on Neptune´s Window

Albatross!

Antarctican rainbow

Next up: Buenos Aires!

Penguins always leave you hanging

A splotch of brightly colored brochures lays sprawled across the dining room table I´m using as a work area in Ushuaia, plotting my various pre-Antarctica Patagonian adventures.  Rafting.  Kayaking.  Trekking.  Glaciers.  Deep woods asado.  Lighthouses at the end of the world.  Penguin tourism.  The specks of black and white in stark contrast to the vivid brochure colors that envelope them attest to my interest in what might be the most popular birds in the world right now, thanks in no small part to the masterful narrative vocal work of Morgan Freeman.

Penguins, and the people that take pictures of them

Perito Moreno Glacier already left me feeling as though I´d seen something unnecessarily spectacular with the icy shadow of Antarctica looming in my immediate future.  A hundred dollars to Penguin Island is a fortune for most budget travelers, though could easily classify as a ¨once in a lifetime¨ experience, rendering the high cost negligible.  My trip on the MV Ushuaia is the last of the year, and came with the caveat that it´s the east ideal time for penguin watching.

¨Will I see any penguins at all?¨ I asked.

¨You have to remember,¨ the tour broker reminds me, ¨nothing in Antarctica can be guaranteed.  Probably, though.¨

My worries are unfounded.  We see penguins.  Hundreds of penguins.  Thousands of penguins.  I think I may have mated with a penguin for life (in a strictly non-physical sense, of course).  Gentoos.  Macaronis.  Chinstraps.  Adelies.  Oh wait– no Adelies.  The most common of Antarctican penguins was oddly elusive.  But the others were in large enough supply to make up for their diminuitive, black-faced cousin.

As with anything else in Antarctica, there are rules.  Since I have listed none up until this point, I´ll print them all here:

1. 

   The typical, pre-landing boot wash

   Boots must be heavily sterilized before setting foot on land, and then again upon return to the MV Ushuaia.

2. No food or drinks may be brought onto the continent or any Antarctic islands.  The same may be said with leaving trash in any form.  This includes human waste, though luckily the cool temperatures are encouragement enough to hinder the necessary removal of pants.
3. Take nothing from the island.  This includes any trash that was left on the continent before the international treaty was signed, which will now basically fester in a frozen wasteland for eternity.  This also includes stones, no matter how small or how plentiful they may be. [Note: I solemnly swear I did not take seven or more rocks from Antarctica.]
4. Don´t walk closer than ten feet to any of the penguins.  They are naturally curious and might bridge the gap, but it´s their call.  I think most of us realized the tourguides never call anyone out before getting to the five-foot mark, and took full advantage of this despite the occasional nervous stare of an encroached penguin.
5. Don´t walk closer than 25 feet to any seal.  I mistook ¨ten feet¨ as being the limit for all wildlife, and was chased by an angry seal for my error.  Luckily, these animals are amongst the most awkward land animals ever, and can be retreated from while walking backwards, pointing and laughing at them.

Macaroni Penguins

Despite being the most abundant penguin on Earth, we saw exactly three Macaroni penguins, chilling leisurely together amidst a pack of chinstrap penguins.  Shaggy, yellow feathers riding their head like a bleached surfer hairstyle mixed with the standard lacadasical penguin attitude give them the appearance of being perpetually high.  As we had only limited exposure to the Macaronis, there´s little more I can say about them.

The comedians of the Penguin family

Chinstrap Penguins

The angry tribe spots us from atop a rounded, stone lookout point, immediately flailing in unison.  Whether inspired by curiosity, anger or boredom is unknown to us.  Assertively, a single chinstrap in the circle lifts his head in the air, thrusting his flippers behind him, flapping with an intensity that comes across as triumphant.  Immediately, most of the circle thrust their heads into the air and follow suit, and the chant-like bird dervish continues.

With mostly white faces, the chinstraps stand out from a single line of black feathers running from ear to ear, providing them with both a stylish facial design and a namesake.  The chinstraps were mostly non-plussed by our presence, stopping at times to stare warily but generally going about their business as though we were no more interesting than inedible, moving rocks.

A circle of chinstraps, chanting

A young chinstrap is mostly unbothered by my breaking of the ten-foot barrier

Carrying a rock in its beak over to its nest. At any given time, these guys were either perched upon their rock nests, or off in search of new rocks.

Penguin shit. Besides smelling noteworthy foul, these inescapable white lines cris-cros the beaches of Antarctica like a Pollack painting. Giving no warning, the bursts shoot forth in a thin line reaching about three to eight feet from their point of exit.

Gentoo Penguins

Groups of gentoos fly along the water as we pass, equally above and below the water in an unbelievably graceful wave.  The water seems to push them upwards into the air with as much pressure and drive as gravity pushes them back into the water from above.  Lectures from our guides regularly grind down to abrupt silences whenever a group is caught swimming by, and after close to a week of these sitings, we show no signs of disinterest.

Gentoos (pronounced jen-TOO) are the only group we manage to catch in the late molting process, leaving them in the scientific state known as ¨adorable.¨  Molting mostly takes places here from January-February, and most of the chicks are already fully feathered, but a few waddle about with thick, baby feathers, giving them an ultra-puffed up appearance.  Those caught in that awkward in-between state tend to look the most awkward (much like with humans), with haphazard patches of baby feathers in asymmetric patches across their bodies.

A gentoo works on his nest

Feeding

A molting gentoo in that awkward not-chick/not-adult stage

´sup, guys?

For some reason, many gentoos liked to stand against rocks, facing them, as though urinating on a wall. At least, that´s what it reminded me of.

Penguins Mate for Life

Penguins: You´re jerks.  No, not all of you.  But those of you that are, know exactly what I´m talking about.  Case in point — nests.

Penguins, working their way up an icy hill at an impossibly slow rate. Upon reaching the top, they stared at one another quizzically before heading back downwards just as slowly.

Penguin nests dot all available flat, open spaces up here, generally less than two to three feet from one another on the most prime real estate.  While most of the day is spent standing above these rock piles, shifting listlessly while looking over at fellow penguins or gazing timidly at the tourist hoards, some penguins occasionally feel the urge to strengthen their nests with the addition of new rocks and pebbles.  This typically involves a long, slow waddle down a hill some twenty feet long before returning to back supplement their now drastically shrunken piles with the new addition.

Why ¨drastically shrunken¨?

Because while ambitious Penguin A has made his slow strut downwards, three other penguins have dashed off of their own piles to each grab a stone from A´s now-unwatched trove, quickly shifting it to their own with a temerity that far surpasses that of Penguin A.  As the intrepid A returns with a small rock that doesn´t even match any of his lost materials in size, he clearly recognizes something is terribly amiss, though it´s not clear if he´s aware of what it is.  Looking about curiously at his peers, most of them go about their business; only three pointedly are staring off in opposite directions refusing to meet his eyes, their bodies frozen in penguin guilt.

It´s just like The Grasshopper and the Ant, only the ant´s clearly screwed this time around.  I guess that´s kind of hopeful, given my perspective.

After several days of being ignored by penguins, I find myself eye to eye with one while on the ground nearby.  I had been examining a stone that I almost certainly would not be taking with me, when I caught his (or her — I never actually saw any penguin genitals over the course of the week that would let me be certain) gaze upon me.  Thrusting his head in the air, the gentoo starts flapping wildly while SQUAWWWing out loudly in my direction.

A cluster of penguins, swimming

¨Oh yeah, pal?¨ I say, throwing my arms behind me like wings and matching his motions as elegantly as a tall, lanky non-bird of my size is capable of doing.  ¨FLAP.  FLAPFLAP FLAPFLAPFLAP FLAP.¨  The onomatopaeia is unnecessary, but I throw it in for good measure.  By this point in the trip, we´ve tried calling out to the birds and offering them stones, seaweed and other found things on the beach.  I´ve seen singing performed in their general direction, and waving, cajoling motions with arms and hands.  All have been ignored to this point by the seemingly unflappable penguins.  So I guess it makes sense that it took flapping to finally get their attention.

Upon finishing my ostentatious display, the penguin immediately shuffles a few feet forward and flaps madly at me again, repeating his screechy penguin-song.  I repeat my earlier actions with a bit more zest, and after several volleys, the penguin and I are now eye to eye.  We stay together for ten minutes or more as he sizes me up, chews at my gloves or screeches while steadfastly maintaining intense eye contact.  While playing, several others come up and flap along with us before moving on, but my initial friend stays planted firmly by my side.

As we sit in silence, an idea forms in my head.  Reaching down, I select a choice rock from the ground and place it on the driftwood that sits between us.   His head stays locked upon my hand through its entire path of movement, and he continues to stare down at the wood for several moments after the stone is dropped.  I repeat the action with a second stone, and then another, and another.  Eventually, a pile is formed, and while I´ve yet to resume our game of frenetic wing-flapping, his attention hasn´t wavered in the least.

Eventually I stop.  Short of picking up rocks coated in layers of penguin guano with my mouth, there´s little more I can do to ape the ways and traditions of the gentoo before me.  We sit silently, our eyes locked on one another with our sad, silent understanding of a love that cannot be.  Breaking eye contact, the penguin starts to waddle away, making it about two to three feet before stopping abruptly and picking up a small rock with his mouth.  Turning back towards me, the penguin shifts its body and slowly returns to me, dropping the rock down in a fluid gesture — whether of supplication or confusion, I can´t tell — directly at the base of my newly formed pile.

At this point, I think I started yelling out excitedly to those around me that were taking pictures, and apparently this was too much for my potential cross-species life mate.  Turning back in the opposite direction of where he´d picked up the rock, the gentoo slowly makes his way toward the water.  I sit, locked in place, part of me hoping he was simply in search of a new and more perfect rock for our home.  But upon reaching the water, he jumps in, never once looking back in my lonely direction.

The penguin and I, deep in conversation

He seemed more interested in my glove than any other part of me. I can´t tell if this is how penguins make out, or if he expected it to be more flavorful than it was.

Other penguins join in on the chat. Other people had come up as well, though most were cool enough to keep their distance while I had my penguin moments.

Ok, it´s possible that flapping your arms for fifteen minutes while squawing at penguins might be ¨weird¨. So what!

Our nest. Yet another comfortable home I was forced to leave behind.

Goodbye!

¨I mean, think about it, man.  When else are you going to be able to go swimming in Antarctica?¨

It´s a more persuasive argument for me than it seems to be for anyone else, though I´m not immediately sold.  Cold water is just so… cold.

It´s our first landfall on the continent itself; everything else has been on Antarctica´s surrounding islands.  A refuge had been here, but cleared failed at its job as a particularly harsh winter only recently leveled it, littering the ground with wood, glass and supply containers as of yet unclaimed by nature.  The base of the refuge has been taken by penguins who seem more densely gathered there than over the more natural surroundings on all sides of it.

The trek upwards is one of the longer and most exhausting hikes our group has attempted thus far, but leads to a spectacular view.  And if penguins can make it up there with their awkwardly short leg spans, how tough can it be?

From the top, immense views spread out over 270 degrees, including a great vantage point of our boat, and a tremendous glacial wall spreading out just below us.  It´s a great spot, and gets my blood just pumping enough for what has to come next.

Making the long hike up to the lookout point.

Looking back down at others still working their way up to the top.

No complaints.

Our Ushuaia, as seen from above

I´m actually in no danger in this picture.

The Swim

Mildly sweaty from the walk down, I knew that this had to be the time and any hesistation might kill the likelihood of my actually making it into the water.  So I didn´t hesitate.

¨Can you hold this? ¨ My camera.  ¨And maybe take some pictures of me?¨

¨Sure,¨ the Australian woman says, smiling.  ¨Where do you want to pose?¨

¨From there.¨ I nod my head in the direction the water while flinging my coat off and onto a nearby rock.  As if clothing removal were a speed contest, I rip everything off as quickly as possible while a crowd forms, and fling each thing down onto the steadily growing pile of necessary (or not) Antarctican protection.

Down to my boxers, I run with as little grace as possible into the water, making it down to my waist in less than four steps.  The rocky ground bumps uncomfortably at my feet, but they´re already numb enough as to not mind.  I´m not cold from the water yet — it´s too cold to have hit me.  Now past my belly button, I drop quickly, hissing a sharp burst of air from my mouth as I sink down to my neck then shoot forward again in a giant, dorky splashing motion.  Another drop down and subsequent splash (I felt the need to do something grandiose for those watching) and immediately I begin my sprint out to the warm embrace of my clothing.

Undershirt, pants, t-shirt, right sock, left so–

¨You shouldn´t have your foot in the water,¨ a woman tells me.

I look down and see I´ve set my right foot, freshly socked, into an inch or so of water.

¨Oh.  I didn´t see that.¨  I didn´t see that.  That´s not good.

Most of me has warmed up nicely, but not my feet.  Back in the zodiac and my body feels fine, other than feet that I only am vaguely aware of.  Tense and release, tense and release.  No sensations.  How great a story would this be for the losing of my toes.  It was a really great photo op!

Such grace...

I really did get neck deep. This was the best picture the lady got, unfortunately.

yay.

Back in the boat, my feet come back to me eventually.

On the plus side, Patrick´s gathered up some dark ice — most of it is white and porous and would make for bad cocktail ice.  But the old, really dense stuff tends to float a little lower and appear darkly transparent rather than lightly opaque.

Good ice for drinking!

Cutting the ice down to acceptable sizes with a steak knife. ¨But Yancy, why not use one of those many axes we see all over the ship in pictures.¨ Well, I did. Turns out this is frowned upon.

Salud!

Our good cheer is short-lived. The boat bar has a weird policy where you can`t use their glasses for your own alcohol, and confiscates the glasses upon providing us flimsier plastic alternatives. Suddenly, my ice cube is over-large...

Zodiacs, stored at the MV Ushuaia´s stern until needed

The Zodiac Company first started making the rigid-hulled inflatable boats successfully during WWII, leading to a success that´s been so strong and consistent that all similar boats tend to be called ¨zodiacs¨ these days.  We rode the real deals.  It´s a good thing, because in freezing choppy waters filled with icebergs, killer whales, leopard seals and other cold-blooded threats, it´s nice to know you´re riding the best.  With the MV Ushuaia safely anchored in deep waters, it´s the zodiacs that serve as our primary means of getting in, on and around Antarctica.

Typically, zodiac rides are less than five minutes to set destinations, though in some cases, the ride is the destination.  ¨Iceberg Alley¨ is a reliable source of massive, imposing monoliths of ice, even more awe-inspiring from the fact that only about a third of the floating chunks are above visibly above water.  The sunken wreck of the Norweigian Governoren still remains a popular tourist attraction nearly a hundred years after it sank.  And any number of massive glaciers rendering my visit to Perito Moreno almost pointless by racing out to the water´s edge in monstrously forbidding walls of ice.

A flock of petrals takes to the sky as we pass a particularly interesting ice formation.

A flock of penguins swim by in their classic swim arch

More penguins. There was worry that we wouldn´t see many given that this trip was late in the season. We saw thousands.

Conditions were extremely choppy at times.

Brad, our tour master. Dropped out of an uninteresting life in HR back in the 70s and was amongst the first guides in Antarctica.

Chillin´

Passing by a tremendous natural ice bridge

Leopard Seals

Nearly at the top of the Antarctican food chain (it´s not a big chain) sits the leopard seal, who is actually fairly playful assuming it doesn´t perceive you as food (sorry, penguins).  Only the orcas — killer whales, a.k.a. ¨Willy¨ — look at the formidable seal and think ¨food.¨  Unlike the Weddell and Elephant seals (which we also get to meet), the leopard seal doesn´t swim too far below the surface of the water, focusing instead on penguins and krill for food.  The former are typically beaten to death before chowing down with sharp teeth and an extremely wide jaw (opens up to 150 degrees).  The latter — krill — are gathered by by swimming through krill-infested water and catching them with specialized molars.

While their necks are primarily white, they´re covered with black spots which helps give the seal its first name.  They tend to leave people alone, though have a strange attraction to the black ends of the zodiac pontoons, and have been known to puncture them, and we did notice a leopard seal take an interest in another zodiac on our trip, following it halfway back to the MV Ushuaia.  However, the one that came closest to any boat I was on was extremely playful.

A lone leopard seal swims around and under our boat playfully for twenty minutes, curiously checking us out.

This one caught a penguin and continously swung it back and forth on the water until it stopped moving before he proceeded to chow down. Brutal.

Iceberg Alley

Intermittant rain and slightly harsh conditions at times made this section of open water with an extremely high concentration of broken-off icebergs chillier and more damp than what would probably be optimal.  This would´ve been a great time to have a waterproof camera.

On the positive side, everyone in our crew traded pictures at the end of the trip, meaning that few great photo ops were lost.  On the negative side, this means I literally filtered through over 4000 pictures upon making it back to Ushuaia.  Fun day.

Getting up close and personal with an iceberg. I licked it. It was salty.

Whale Oil is Flammable

And around the turn of the last century, it was extremely valuable as well.  The ¨valuable¨ part is what brought so many whaling vessels this far south, despite such harsh conditions and a still mostly unexplored continent.  Sadly, the ¨flammable¨ thing is what put one of them, the Governoren, permanently out of commission and firmly locked into the Antarctic tourist circuit.

Celebrating the end of a season and a boat filled with the valuable — and again, flammable — whale oil, the crew participated in the tradition of having a tremendous party in the lower decks, complete with dancing, drinking, revelry and fire.  The latter turned out to be a problem.

The fire made the boat less than seaworthy at a rapid rate, but as a credit to the captain, no one was lost in the sinking.  Thinking fast, he grounded the boat just off of Enterprise Island where everyone was quickly evacuated.  Whaling was enough of an industry in the region at that point that it wasn´t long until they were rescued.

Now, an artifact from an industry that once pillaged natural resources stands as a monument for nature´s slow but eventually reclamation of everything.

Perito Moreno Glacier Was Probably an Unnecessary Trip

Don´t get me wrong: Perito Moreno´s a beautiful spectacle in every way.  But it loses a bit of its spectacle in comparison to almost anything here.  What else on Earth anywhere is like Antarctica?

Back to the MV Ushuaia

For close to six days, the MV Ushuaia snaked through the hundreds of Antarctic islands while making its way down the peninsula.  Our plans were rigid enough that we´d all receive a rundown of each day´s activities on the prior evening, but flexible enough to change given bad weather conditions or other unplanned mishaps.  Unfortunately, our safety always had to come first, meaning bad weather could potentially keep us from certain activities, and not all tourist attractions on our itinerary would definitely be covered.

We were mostly lucky in this regard.  The only stop in high demand that was denied to us was a Ukrainian scientific base that makes its own vodka and hails its bar as the southernmost one in the world.  There, women drink for free, on the condition that they sacrifice their bra to the bar´s decor.

Every year, old bras are removed to make room for a new year´s additions, with the exception of one which is a permanent fixture. See if you can guess which it is.

While the ¨free drinks for your bra¨ plan didn´t offer me much other than potential live entertainment, I was definitely looking forward to paying a quick visit to their equally southernmost post office to get out a few quality postcards stamped from Antarctica.  Sadly, the only day we had available to pay them a visit found another ship already in port — they´d be restocking all day in preparation for the cold winter months and couldn´t handle any tourists.  Weak.

We successfully stopped at all other initially planned destinations, so in general our hit rate was fairly high.  Twice each day — once in the morning, and once in the afternoon — we would make landfall on the zodiacs (small but incredibly strong inflated rafts), with a few hours in between for the MV Ushuaia to take us to the new destinations.  Through the night, our ship would generally be moving along as well, though once out of the Drake Passage, movement was smooth and barely noticeable.

The following pictures were all taken from aboard the ship.

Dark black rock juts out from the sea, covered in brightly contrasted white snow and ice

The steady mist that covered over things much of the time gave things (like strange, ominous, dead islands) a consistently eerie quality.

Skies were generally gray and overcast, but there were moments of exceptional beauty.

The further south we get, the more the nearby ocean is littered with chunks of ice and large icebergs

Great shot of an entire iceberg, due to the clarity of the water

Low clouds and blowing snow often gave nearby landscapes this effect

Along the continent, a small, low base of dark rock would often be covered by hundreds of feet of ice. This effect gets more intense further south, such that Antarctica is the lowest continent in terms of land (massive weight of the ice pushes the land downwards) and the tallest (from the ice itself)

Oh yeah, that reminds me:

Facts About Antarctica

• If all of Antarctica´s ice melted, its land mass would slowly rebound upwards by more than 500 meters (the ice had been keeping it down).  More significantly, the waters oceans would rise by 65 meters.
• Despite being covered in ice, Antarctica is still mostly a desert.  It has not rained in the ¨dry valleys¨ for over two million years.  Antarctica holds records for being the coldest, driest and windiest place on Earth.
• During the winter months, the accumulation of ice around Antarctica doubles its land mass, adding on additional surface that is close to twice the size of the United States.
• 90% of the world´s ice is in Antarctica and 65% of its freshwater reserve.  Perito Moreno glacier was the third biggest freshwater reserve.  What´s number 2?  Greenland.
• At its deepest point, the ice in Antarctica is about two miles deep.
• Krill.  They´re like shrimp, but smaller and less flavorful (for humans, at least).  Yet they´re the primary food for both penguins and whales.  It might seem like they´d be too small to feed monsters like the blue whale, but they travel in tremendous swarms.  In 1981, one was tracked that weighed upwards of ten million tons — that´s like 178 million people all moving as a group.

Neptune´s Bellows. A small channel leading into Deception Island, which is basically a hollowed out volcano that you can cruise into. Yeah.

Rough Seas. These are the nastiest waters I ventured outside to snap a picture of.

Blurry, but you can kind of make out the enormous wave of whiteness exploding upwards over the stem.

A rainbow after the storm

Sunrise at the bottom of the world.

...and sunset

A fairly cool ice formation floats by.

Ice-gazing

Slicing through some of the denser ocean ice

...and the trail we leave behind.

It Started With a Dare

Things had gotten cold outside, as one might expect.  First a picture is taken in our t-shirts and sandals.  Next someone is walking around barefoot.

So really, it was only a matter of time until this happened:

The Infamous Drake Passage

Sir Francis Drake was one of the greatest sea captains, naval strategists and explorers of his day, unquestionably circumnavigating the globe amongst his other many exploits.  But it´s very unlikely he ever made it as far down as the passage that now has his name applied to it.  Popular lore is that after making it through the Strait of Magellan, only one of his ships remained unscathed and was blown down to the treacherous meeting point of the southwestern Atlantic and southeastern Pacific Oceans.  No logs or testimonials have ever backed this, which makes one wonder who doles these names out and how I might get one.

Daily weather reports like this were shown regularly during both crosses of the Drake. The orange section on the left had the crew a little scared, but amounted to nothing.

Due to the complete lack of any land masses at this latitude, we end up with what´s known as the Antarctic Circumpolar Current.  With nothing to block the tremendous flow of water, the Drake ends up with the most powerful, steady ocean current in the world.  This is naturally a blast for sailors and cruise-goers.

I knew nothing of this, Captain Drake, or the immense stretch of water we´d be crossing prior to our departure, save snippets told in worried tones from those in Ushuaia freshly returned from one of the expeditions.  At least three people provided me with seasickness pills  — ¨You´ll need them for the Drake.  Trust me.¨ — and I was told to track down ¨the patch,¨ a slow-release sticker like the nicotine-saturated one used for quitting smoking.  While universally lauded (for good reason — I was never once ill with the patch on), it´s something of illegal contraband in Argentina, meaning they must be purchased in advance in the less pharmacologically strict Chile.

The front of the ship, with the bridge on the top deck.

¨Brother,¨ says an Irishman fresh off the boat (an Antarctic cruise, that is), ¨The Drake was one of the most ridiculous experiences of my life.  The boat tilted fifty degrees [Edit: It apparently never went past forty, though that is still a nightmarish angle] in either direction, back and forth.  Like, think about a ninety degree angle, man.  That´s like half of that!  [Edit Two: I required no assistance with this math]  At one point, a few of us went outside to the railing just to say we did it — as the boat rocks down and these massive, cold waves crash up against you and you just look down at this insane ocean and you think ´If I fell in that, I´d be dead.´  There´s no rescue out there.  It´s incredible!¨

It´s ¨crazy,¨ maybe.  But while I should be shaking my head incredulously, I´m completely sold.  ¨Sadly,¨ we had two of the smoothest Passages (going and coming back) that our guide had ever seen from a single trip, leading to the nickname of ¨Drake Pond¨ being given to those segments of our sea travels.

Our beds. Note that the small, white metal rail by my pillow was the only thing keeping me in place while asleep. I still have no idea how there are never any accidents from this.

I don´t mean to imply our Drake was as smooth and bland as an old person´s staircase chair lift — uneventful or not, it was still utterly seasick-inducing for plenty of passengers.  The patch kept me free from nausea (if slightly exhausted and dizzy at times), but was far less potent with others that sought its help, leaving many bedridden and miserable for close to 48 hours.

Those able to attend were invited to two lectures per day on a variety of Antarctic-themed topics, though attendence obviously waivered based on weather conditions.  Sample classes included Penguins, Geology of Antarctica, The International Antarctic Treaties, The History of Antarctic Exploration and The Weather of Antarctica (all of which were graciously placed on a DVD-Rom for us at trip´s end).

Early hours in the Drake had many of us braving the unsecured chairs of the common area (some mornings, we´d wake to find every chair in the room tumbled onto the floor) to play cards, chess, backgammon, rummikub or scrabble; by late into the Drake, most of us had retired to the relative safety of our beds to read and/or do absolutely nothing.

A game of chess

On the plus side, I got a ridiculous amount of reading done (even if I was limited by what books currently made up the MV Ushuaia´s library): Ayn Rand´s The Fountainhead (surprisingly readable, despite preachiness), The Kite Runner, The Neverending Story (it turns out the movie ends about 1/3 of the way into the book, with Bastion and his adventures comprising most of the book´s story), Cormac MacCarthy´s Cities of the Plain (cowboys and a complete lack of quotation marks), Paul Theroux´s Hotel Honolulu (pre-eminent travel novelist) and Paulo Coelho´s The Witch of Portobello (I see why chicks dig him).

As I read, there´s a tremendous BAMMM from in the room and a pained ¨MWHhuuhhhhhnMPHhh¨ that slowly dies down into a weak whimper.  Quickly looking over the side of the bed (but not so quick that my momentum combines with that of the ocean to carry me flying off of it as well — I never feel 100% safe in this narrow bed), I find over 250 pounds of septegenarian German sprawled on the floor, his head mere inches away from the hard, wooden edge of our bed.  He´d been sitting at the desk and a particularly persuasive sway of the ship brought chair and German both down painfully.

I run to the medical center (It´s actually right next door to our room.  Still.  I am a good person.) and drag the doctor back with me to find Helmut still laid out uncomfortably on the ground and moaning.  Nothing´s broken, but he´s probably looking at a few bruised ribs, we´re told.  A slight cough shows Helmut´s in the early days of what ends up being a debilitating trip-long cold.  Between that and the fall, he doesn´t have the smoothest vacation, but still makes nearly every landfall and lecture despite this.

At dinner, in our room, in common areas, anywhere with chairs: Helmut never really seems to trust them again.

Fallen chairs in the common room. We came in to find them like this after particularly rough seas.

A Brief Tour of the MV Ushuaia

After more than twenty years of Antarctic oceanographic research for NOAA, the blandly named ¨Researcher¨ (already changed once from the equally uninspiring ¨Malcolm Baldridge¨) was purchased the Ushuaia Adventure Corp, to finally provide all those people with no reason for being on Antarctica (raises hand) with a means of actually getting there.  Adding to the list of clever names this boat has worn, UAC rechristened her ¨The MV Ushuaia,¨ which doesn´t make blogs with lines like ¨leaving Ushuaia on the Ushuaia¨ confusing in any way.

One of the many narrow passageways through the lower decks

Hallways are claustraphobic, but serviceable, with no shortage of grippable things to hold onto anywhere on the vessel.  Rooms and common areas have been remodeled within the past ten years, but a brief tour through the engine room with its big dials and blocky consoles finished in a lime green that hasn´t been applied anywhere since the 70´s helps to give away the boat´s age.  The tour is  interesting but amongst the least informative of the trip; tremendous noise from all the heavy machinery keeping the ship afloat and unfrozen blocks out all but the loudest yells from our guide.

Aboard the Ushuaia, they inform us early on of the ¨open bridge¨ policy, wherein passengers may wander about the bridge in all but the worst of conditions.  As we stand about the bridge talking, brushing dangerously close to dials, buttons, levers and consoles that we´ve been instructed not to molest in any way, the Captain stands at his station staring forward as though unaware of our cloying presence.  Before him sits a line of plastic dolphins and fish — toys — with a single plastic horse mixed in confusingly.

A collection of whales, fish, dolphins and, um, a lucky horse

¨Why the horse?¨ I ask.

He doesn´t answer at first.  I stare forward for a time, and then make to leave the bridge and head to the front of the ship.  As I open the door, he simply says: ¨Horse is luck,¨ without ever taking his eyes off the fixed point in space somewhere in the forefront.

Massive black chains attached to a pair of winches hold the anchor at the front of the boat, though it´s only a small part of what makes this the most popular outdoor location on the ship.  The King-of-the-World spot at the tip of the stem nearly always has a few of us perched against the steel flagpole, as though being seventy feet more forward than anyone else might get us to the continent quicker.

A far larger deck — whose height allows a better 360 degree view as well — sits above the bridge, and the lack of ship lights at this level make it the primary lookout point at nights for expansive, Milky Way-filled night skies.  It´s here where we stand in the cold one night after being instructed that our latitude gives us the best chance of catching the Aurora Australis (the southern counterpart to the Aurora Borealis).  No such luck, unfortunately.

Into the Engine Room: Only eight of us could be guided through the loud, cramped section of the boat at any time

Our guides to the engine room, while we could still hear them

Note the ear protectors

The captain wasn´t posing here; he always looked this intent.

I wasn´t posing here; I always looked this intent. Note that there´s definitely an official eye on my hands on the steering wheel.

The anchor mechanism

Lifebuoy

Big waves and bad weather on a relatively small boat that is potentially hundreds of miles from other vessels both tend to cause small bits of anxiety from travelers at times.  To counter this (and potentially to prepare for the worse), we go in small groups to the lifeboats for a quick tour/drill.  The fully sealed vessels are fashionably orange to be quickly spotted and have everything a small crew would need to survive for up to three days in the worst of conditions.

Half-full for the drill and it´s already uncomfortable in here.  With its full complement of 45, there´s little room for movement, and no room for any personal items.  When the last cruise vessel sank in 2007, anything that couldn´t fit into pockets wasn´t permitted into the tight quarters.  Food and water are in short supply, but enough is kept below the seats to keep survivors going until a rescue.  Most importantly, a GPS signal sent outwards makes us immediately trackable to any ships near enough to assist with a rescue.

Australian Helen and I demonstrate proper non-panicking

The inside of the lifeboat

I´m Alive!

Nobody Has Better Sea Legs Than Waitresses

Breakfast, lunch and dinner took place at the same times daily, regardless of sea conditions.  While we sat, white-knuckled from gripping the secured table to keep our chairs and selves from suffering the same fate earlier displayed by Helmut, the three women on the wait staff effortlessly carried out trays of food and drinks to every table.  Only once in eleven days can I recall a food disaster of any kind.

Lunch and dinner both are beautifully presented daily with no repeats, always following the standard Salad/Main course/Dessert format.  The breakfast buffet never alters but covers all the basic standards: eggs, bacon, sausage, medialunas (literally ¨middle moons,¨ these are small, super-greasy croissants that are all the rage throughout Argentina), cereals, fruits, yogurt, coffees and juices.  Afternoon snacks are a daily standard as well; no one goes hungry here.

Breakfast Buffet. Another counter of cold food was set up to the left of the hot food above

A picture of food

Me taking a picture of food. People seemed to find this amusing for some reason.

Mockery did not stop me from taking future pictures of food, however.

Argentinians go nowhere without a parilla (large asado grill). Even to Antarctica.

A plate of meat from the parilla night. Sadly there was just one.

A group of us share lunch

Questions I Get About Antarctica, Starting With the Most Asked One

So what’d that run you??

A lot.  More than the rest of my trip combined thus far (with the exception of the Galapagos excursion).  More than any single vacation I’ve ever taken.  More than anything I’ve ever bought before that wasn’t a house or car.

In short, 3,900 dollars.

Could it have been cheaper?

Probably.  But not by as much as travel gossip would have one believe.  Countless people told me stories of last minute travelers with time to kill that hung out in Ushuaia, waiting until a cruise’s embarkation day, only to giddily secure spots on-board for a fraction of what I paid.

Last-minute travelers on my cruise did not find this to be the case.  I was surprised at how many people purchased their tickets within two days of the cruise, but every single one spent the same 3,900 dollars that I did.  On top of receiving no discounts, since there were open spots in some of the larger, upper-deck cabins, those that purchased tickets well in advance (me) were bumped up, with the lower decks now being filled with last-minute  stragglers.

This isn’t to say that these deals don’t exist; quite possibly they do.  But as our late March voyage was to be the last tourist cruise of the year, the crew didn’t seem to have much of a problem filling it up.

We tended to egg each other one when it came to being tremendous dorks for the camera.

Do you expect the price to change?

I couldn’t say for certain.  Looking in advance, there were some boats that offered deals as low as $3,500, and at times tour companies would run promotions knocking an additional five hundred off of that, but these deals typically were impossible to find, and meant the traveler had to be beyond flexible with dates for making the voyage.

There is also the threat of a fuel surcharge added on top of ticket prices at embarkation based on the current cost of gas.  Luckily, gas prices had sunk back down to reasonable prices by March, but back when my ticket was purchased in the fall, I was warned that travelers were paying an additional six hundred dollars upon arriving on the boat.

As these are boat trips are to some of the wildest, most unpredictable climates on Earth, costly accidents happen more regularly than one might hope.  Less than a month prior to my trip, the Ocean Nova ran aground and just in December, the MV Ushuaia — my ship — suffered a similar fate.  Both required evacuation to other nearby vessels while the cruise ships could be freed and repaired, but pale in comparison to the 2007 sinking of the MS Explorer which went full-on Titanic and sank after hitting an iceberg.  Everyone was safely rescued, but not before losing everything they’d brought along and sitting for several harrowing hours in the lifeboats waiting for help.

The Freestyle group unloads all of our gear from the taxi

Combining all of the above with general increasing demand, I wouldn’t think there’d be much of a decrease in price any time soon.

Why Antarctica?

When I announced my intentions to head as due south as possible on this trip, people either “got it” immediately, or were fairly incredulous.  It is a large, freezing and mostly dead place, and about as much of an opposite as you can get from traditional vacation destinations.  Despite this, the place has a calling to it that some people feel the need to answer, and since I was a child I’ve had a strange compulsion to make it there at some point in my life.

If someone says they intend to visit all seven continents in their lifetime and hasn’t yet been to Antarctica, the claim is laughable.  The same claim made after said trip is imminently believable.  So I’ve got that going for me.

As all cruises head out from Ushuaia, and as it was unlikely I would just happen to be down in this region again at any later point in my life, now was clearly the time.  Tickets from New York to Ushuaia never drop below a thousand dollars, so honestly I was saving money by taking this trip when I did!

Right.

A map displaying Antarctica and the boundaries of the Southern or Antarctican Ocean. It was only officially declared an ocean in 2000. The peninsula is the section at 10 o'clock.

So you went to the South Pole?

No, we just barely touched down on the Antarctic Peninsula, which juts out past the Antarctic Circle.  It’s a continent, so it’s still fairly large (fifth largest, it beats out Europe and Australia for size, even in the summer — it takes up nearly twice as much space in the winter due to ice).  At our furthest point inland, we were about as far from the South Pole as we were from Ushuaia.

How big are the boats?

They vary in size, though I was careful to select one that carries less than one hundred passengers.  That seems to be the magic number with regard to the amount of tourists that can land on any given site along the penninsula.  Over 100 and by international law, some people have to stay behind on the cruise ship while others frolic in the cold, barren Antarctic tundra.  They usually keep track of those left behind so that no one has to do it more than once, but given that none of us will likely be back on the continent again, every visit counts.

A newer trend in Antarctic travel is the taking of massive cruise ships down to the penninsula with upwards of 500-3000 people.  These involve no actual landings on the penninsula, which seems to defeat the purpose of going this far south.  In addition, little has been done to these ships to modify their hulls and make them ice-ready, so there is a good deal of Titanic-level worry about these new routes.  All the danger, none of the fun penguin harrassment!

The (St. Patrick’s) Day Before We Leave

Four of us have already pre-bonded together at our hostel the night before our cruise departs.  As two of them are Irish and this is St. Patrick’s Day, this bodes well for the evening.  They agree that the US has co-opted this holiday, often making it into far more of a green, drunken spectacle than you would ever find in Ireland, but they’re certainly not above celebrating.  As Ushuaia’s got a population of 6000 or so, I suppose it makes perfect sense that there are three Irish pubs here.

The St. Patrick's Day crew

Prior to any evening revelry, I’ve checked off every remaining task from  my official and unofficial pre-Antarctica to-do lists.

• Check in with tour company
• Pack, dividing things into “cruise gear” and “stored gear”
• Arrange return lodging at Freestyle and place any gear not coming along in their storage closet
• Rent winterwear — Coat and pants.  They rent boots as well, though these are provided by the cruise ship, and thus are not necessary.  All tour companies recommend the same rental shop, where a full set of gear runs one hundred American dollars, requires an additional hundred security deposit and refuses to take credit cards — a tremendous hassle.  Luckily, Patrick (one of the two aforementioned Irish, and a great guy) found a spot on main street that rents as well as sells winter gear — for about a third of the price ($25).
• Buy rum.  Food is apparently fantastic on the trip, and is part of the cost.  Alcohol, on the other hand, is charged to your account.
• I send my emails, make my calls and say my goodbyes.  For eleven days, I’ll be effectively cut off from everything.

It’s eight o’clock and an Israeli and I are the only ones in the Irish pub.  The decor and name may be Irish, but its hours are definitely Argentinian — it won’t fill up til around midnight, but it’ll keep going until dawn.  Despite knowing this, the Israeli and I start drinking while we wait for Patrick and some others who’d mentioned getting in around the same time.  The night picks up nicely, but my early start has me drained and exhausted by one in the morning, and I retire early to get well rested for my big trip tomorrow.

Embarkation

Adam and I post with our gear at the port with the MV Ushuaia in the background

The group that met at our hostel spend the bulk of the day killing time, blogging and recovering from the prior night’s Irish-themed excess.  A man in his 20’s from Hong Kong arrives in the morning for our trip, only to discover that his luggage was lost in transit and would not possibly arrive in Ushuaia before the boat departs.  He spends the day navigating the various clothing stores that are actually open (Arriving at noon, and having to leave by four places him directly in the midst of siesta hours) to re-purchase every piece of winterwear he’d only just bought in Hong Kong the week prior.

Our things are scanned as we pass through customs, though food and beverages aren’t issues here.  There are extensive international treaties keeping all types of food and human waste off of Antarctica, but on the cruise ships, nearly anything goes (excepting stuff that, you know, explodes).  Two or three other boats sit in port, but only the last one bears the marking “MV Ushuaia.”

I'm the tall one in the distance, watching Ushuaia disappear. The hanging orange thing on the left of the shot is one of the two lifeboats.

After an excessive photo shoot, our group of six present our boarding passes and walk the gangway onto the ship.  Immediately noticeable are the life boats, held aloft to either side of the ship and painted a vivid neon orange and shaped like futuristic mini-submarines.  A small line has formed around the bar, though it’s not open for drinks yet.  Names are being removed from the list and insurance forms are being checked — one prerequisite for the trip is to be insured for emergency medical evacuation up to $100,000.

One deck below, I meet my roommate Helmut for the first time.  I would’ve preferred one of the younger people I’d already gotten to know at the Freestyle to the German in his late 70’s, but he was a really nice guy, and I appreciated that his age didn’t preclude him from more adventuresome travel.  Daily conversations never really strayed beyond small talk, but he was a good guy.

The room itself is small; not as cramped as the broom closet masquerading as a shared bedroom that I slept in while on the Galapagos cruise, but still fairly minimal.  Bunk-beds are built into the wall along the far side of the room, and while the top bunk’s lack of a railing seems particularly frightening given that the Drake Passage is known to regularly rock boats as far as 35 degrees in either direction, it does come with a window.  Helmut being in his 70’s, my precarious placement above is assured without question.

Other than that, decorations are sparse: A desk, a shared closet, a picture of some ice (it must be assumed anyone on this trip likes ice), a sink.  There’s a bathroom as well, which is shared with the adjacent room.  Showering and/or urinating while in rough seas is particularly entertaining, and a surplus of steel handrails in key positions only makes it slightly easier.  I don’t know why it took several days for the idea of sitting down to pee to occur to me, as the normal alternative can be very messy in these conditions.

The "Welcome Aboard" buffet

A champagne toast and impressive buffet of meats, cheeses and assorted finger foods start us off, and as introductions are made, the MV Ushuaia departs from port.  The younger travelers tend to gravitate towards each other and acquaintances are made as the city of Ushuaia shrinks down to nothing behind us.

Hours later, inhabited land is long gone, but we’ve consistently been alongside the various islands around the tip of South America since departing.  Argentina requires that an official “pilot” remain with the ship as it navigates out from the southern islands of South America.  They’d announced that he would be leaving as soon as we were safely in the Drake Passage, though none of us were exactly sure how this would happen.  Just after ten, lights on the water announce the presence of another vessel, much smaller than our own.  Without either boat even slowing, the Argentinian pilot descends over the edge of the MV Ushuaia on a small ladder, jumping down onto the coast guard ship matching our speed alongside us.

As the smaller boat turns back towards Argentina, the last hints of land disappear into the horizon and out of sight.

We’ve reached the Drake Passage.

Champagne meet-and-greet