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Published: March 20th 2017
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Wow, what a day!!! We began the morning with our captain navigating through a narrow passage that had us squeeze between a mountain and an enormous iceberg. It's hard to even describe but it was an amazing thing to witness. The passageway is a wonderland of icebergs, whales, and seals with a few penguins scattered in. We saw Minke whales this morning which is exciting. Also our first sighting of crab eater seals that were chilling out on the ice. Going through the narrow passage also made you keenly aware of the huge mountains of ice and snow just over your head and brought back thoughts of watching Ice Road Truckers when they would have to close for snow control and blow up snow caps to avoid avalanche. It was truly amazing to take it all in! Nature is a wonderful thing and a little inhospitable.
So, it turns out we are the LAST ship down here this year so we literally have the continent to ourselves except for year round scientists.I think every landing has been my favorite. The diversity is incredible and each landing has had a special impact. This morning we visited Peterman Island which has a
science base on it but is closed for the winter. What we found was an amazing display of blooming algae all over the snow. I've read about it but never knew when it happened. One of our staff told me that it wasn't blooming on the last cruise so this is extra special for us. I took tons of pictures and will share when I get to reliable internet. It had greens and reds in it with penguins and seals dotting the landscape. Absolutely incredible! On Peterman there were a lot of Gentoo penguins learning how to swim in natural pools along the ocean. It's also rained everyday so there were puddles with penguins playing in happily. You can't help but feel joy watching them. We came upon one Adelie penguin in the group and the kayakers saw some more on the other side of the island. Most of them have already gone to sea for the winter so it was a great sighting. The fur seals are everywhere and grumpy. One charged at a few people and was not pleased to have us invade his rocky seat. At this point everyone wants to be pecked by a penguin...an Antarctic
massage! :-) I got my boot pecked again but they seem to be drawn to bright colors. Most people in neon rain pants have been pecked and they seem to like my blue backpack. According to our bird guy the ones coming up to us are chicks and they're super curious. All I know is that it's completely adorable! Of course when they projectile poop they aren't as cute. Eeek! They poop far!
After lunch we went on our next landing at Vernadsky Research Base which is run by the Ukrainians. It's a year round base so the men there have been there for a long time. They were great and showed us around their science building. The man leading my little group is a biologist and showed us his lab. There was a fish tank with some plant and sea life. We also saw the lab that deals with the depletion of the ozone layer. This base does a lot of work studying the ozone layer and the biologist looked at me and said this is a very dangerous place for you because you are so white. Let me just tell you...we NEED our ozone layer! I have
a burned face and had on 55 SPF sunscreen on a rainy day. After learning about their projects we went up to their bar and gift shop to get our passports stamped. The excitement of getting Antarctica in our passports is incredible! Most of our group celebrated the stamping with a shot of Ukrainian vodka while others (and me!) hit the gift shop. Most of the stuff is made by the scientists and staff during the winter months and the money goes towards their research. Made in Antarctica has a nice ring to it! And I am now the proud owner of an Adelie penguin wood carving!
After our visit with the Ukrainians we went around to the other side of their base to visit the museum which was where scientists stayed originally. Well, not originally because the building that was there first was swept away by a tsunami and had to be rebuilt in the 1940's. Imagine coming down here thinking you had shelter and it's gone! I think you'd start to question your navigational skills! It was neat to see how they lived and back then they brought sled dogs down. They have these dog charts that
they write in their breeding info, the good and bad behaviors and any additional information. Since then animals are not allowed to be brought down here. This museum sits right next to a giant glacier that we were able to climb up but due to cracks in it we could only go to the top and back down. It's totally snow covered so we got our exercise and snow time today.
We finished our afternoon by crusing around the enormous icebergs in what is called the iceberg graveyard. They break off in other parts of the continent and with the flow of the ocean end up there. Massive is an understatement! It's like art in the sea. Absolutely incredible to see in person. And tonight after we watched a movie we were told to go out to the decks because the skies had cleared enough to see the stars. We couldn't see the whole sky but did see some twinkling overhead.
Side note, the infirmary is not like the Love Boat. I woke up with a sore throat and very swollen glands so had to pay a visit to our ship's doctor. He checked me out and declared I will live but need to give it a little time to recover. So, my swollen glands and sore throat have carried on!
Time for bed and more adventure tomorrow!
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