2-2 Antarctica (day 3)

2-2 Day 28 Antarctica (day 3)

The anticipation of early morning whales woke me up before the alarm was to go off at 7 a.m. However, the only thing to be seen outside our cabin window were lots of icebergs . . . not a very comforting sight. And those were only the ones on port side!

Still, I wanted to check what it was like outside, so I began at the Crow's Nest so I could see the entire front of the ship – and go quickly between port and starboard sides. There were only a very few people up there since there was nothing to see – it was fogging in. And then it began to rain, and eventually snow. It was way too windy to spend any time out on deck. And there was no point since there was nothing to see.

On my way back to the room to meet Doug, I stopped by the Lido deck – which was now covered in snow. So, I got Doug and we went back up to get our picture taken in the snow and with a snowball in hand. The staff from Indonesia who had never seen snow were having a wonderful time out on deck – making and throwing snowballs. Someone even made a little table top snowman!

The captain was on the PA speaker many times during the morning – announcing a change of course due to weather. He originally hoped we could go to King George Island into the more protected Admiralty Bay. Then hsi goal was to just go close along the coast of the island. However the weather only worsened and he was getting reports of strong gale force winds and more icebergs, so in the end he said we were just going north to Elephant Island (our last scheduled stop in Antarctica.) It would take hours normally, but even longer now due to the icebergs. He had to go much more slowly to avoid them. And they were everywhere – but much harder to see due to the limited visibility.

So, it turned out to be a reading day since the only thing to see looking out the windows was fog. We decided to have lunch in the main dining room and were seated with a very nice and interesting couple originally from India. It was probably one of our more enjoyable dining experiences! Halfway through lunch, however, the captain made a very quick turn of the ship and once again, the sound of dishes and glasses shattering on the floor filled the dining room. Fortunately, we were able to hold onto ours so nothing fell from our table. The captain came on and apologized for the sharp turn, but said it was necessary to avoid an iceberg!

The rest of the day was pretty much the same – relaxing, etc. I went to my creative writing class and read.

As we sat down to dinner, we saw Elephant Island out the window. They don't broadcast the narrative in the dining room, so we missed most of that. Barb and I went out on deck to take a few pictures – but it was still pretty foggy. The captain was able to go around the entire island so we saw all of it. The importance of this island is that this is where Shakelton left 22 of his men while he and a few others headed off to get help. His men were stranded on this island for four months. But Shakelton did return and rescued all his men. We saw the point on the island where they first landed – near some rock outcroppings – the only fairly level place to land. Most of the island is just sheer rock/ice cliffs going straight into the sea.

On the other side of our ship was an island that was actually making its own cloud as we went by. I have a good picture of that. Also, as we came to the end of Elephant Island there was a huge iceberg nearby with two groups of penguins on it. They looked pretty forlorn with the rough seas and the fog around them.

After dinner and lots of pictures of Elephant Island, we went to see Love Actually (we had seen it before), but it was a cute movie and a good way to end the day.

We were disappointed that our 3rd and last day in Antarctica was such a loss, but grateful that two of the three were so good and that we were able to see whales, penguins, and seals. Apparently, our 3rd day was pretty typical of what this area is like much of the time. It also helped us appreciate the early explorers and what their voyage had to be like in this kind of weather, but in much smaller vessels. It's a wonder anyone of them survived this harsh environment.