5. Deception Island 62°54'60" S 60°36'0" W Ashes And Snow

Deception Island is actually an active volcano. The last eruption was in 1969. At the moment it is dormant though and it is a safe anchoring place, inside the crater. Who can say that he was on a ship inside an active volcano?
We had a long day ahead of us, with visits planned to the largest colony of Chinstrap penguins, (about 250.000), making our own jacuzzi by mixing the almost freezing ocean water with the scalding hot water that wells up from the volcano and visiting Whaler's Bay where the remnants of an old whaler's station is decaying to time. So we were up for an early start.
However, the weather in Antarctica can be a hazard. We arrived with very strong winds (7 Bft), the sea was rough and it was snowing once in a while. To make things worse, the motor of one of the zodiacs did not seem reliable. After some tests with it the captain decided to cancel the landing. There was a serious risk if the motor would break down in this weather and you always need to have a backup, what if the good one would run into problems as well?

Deception Island is also very accessible for bigger ships and a popular stop, so we encountered a few other touring ships, some of those approaching us to take pictures of the Europa. It must be a stunning sight if you are on another ship and then suddenly see a tall ship in this environment.

When the weather calmed down a few hours later we could net go directly to Whaler's Bay, because of the regulations, no more than one ship can visit the same place at the same time and so you need to reserve a time slot in advance. This might sound restrictive but is for the best, we are only visitors and one of the aims of all the rules is to have as little impact on the environment as possible. So no more than 100 visitors are allowed on one visit. And actually, you do not want to neither, you want to have the places more or less for your own, feeling as if you are truly exploring.

In the evening we visited at Whaler's Bay the whaling station, which was abandoned in 1931 and remains of a research station that was destroyed by the volcano in 1969, both left to their own. Because of the late hour and little light, the fresh thin layer of snow on the ashes and the still blowing wind this was a magical place.

This album here has pictures of Deception Island, Gentoo and Chinstrap Penguins, Skuas, a Fur seal and Whaler's Bay at dusk.
It has 46 pictures.

click here for the album



Here a video:

6. Trinity and Spert Island 63°21'0" S 60°35'0" W Touring The Ice

On the 15th of February we left the South Shetland Islands to go deeper south, into more 'icy' territory.
The first half of the day we were mainly crossing the sea after which we sailed along the coast of Trinity Island on our way to our anchoring place close to Spert Island.

We encountered our first big icebergs from relatively close.

Late in the afternoon we would go on a tour with our zodiacs and sloopy to navigate the small channels here between high rising rocks and getting up close for the first time with icebergs in the so called iceberg graveyard.











What amazed all of  us was the incredible blue color of the ice.


Some Chinstrap penguins were trying to keep afloat a small ice floe, we all wondered how a group of these little fellows had climbed a quite steep ice slope, encountered a big dead jellyfish and enjoyed a truly magical sunset.

Anchored here, next to towering icewalls with no human presence in sight except our own, staying the nigh was an impressive experience . I do remember I went out at night alone on the deck just to take in the breathtaking scenery and enjoy this to the fullest.







 This album here has pictures of Trinity and Spert Island, Chinstrap Penguins, a lot of icebergs, sunset, us touring on the zodiacs through the ice and a dead jellyfish.

It has 53 pictures.

click here for the album with thumbnails below

12. Penola Strait and Peltier Channel 65°10'0" S 64°6'60" W Back North Again

After our visit to Petermann Island we would head up north again, backtracking a bit of our route through the Penola Strait and Lemaire Channel to head up to Port Lockroy, passing through the Peltier Channel.

Circumstances were completely different from the day before. The sky was clear, the sea was smooth, it was great to see this again in this changed weather.



We were lucky enough to see more whales and in the afternoon the setting sun again showed us how magical this place can be.

This album here has pictures of The Lemaire Channel, Penola Strait and Peltier Channel, a whale and the Bark Europa.
It has 18 pictures.

click here for the album

14. Neumayer and Schollaert Channel 64°47'26" S 63°8'21" W An Ice Spinx and Whales In A Golden Sunset

In the afternoon of the 21st of February we sailed again northwards, through the Neumayer and Schollaert Channel. The last days we were really lucky with the weather and this was no exception.










We passed along many icebergs, one remarkably shaped like a sphinx.













At the end of the afternoon we heard a familar shout: "whales!"
A small group of Humpback whales were around giving us a proper farewell. Though they remained at a distance, it was a stunning sight with the golden light of th late afternoon.
When they seemed to have left and I returned to do some work at my netbook, the shouts came again. And this repeated itself several times until I finally had a kind of overload and decided to try to finish some sorting of my pictures. Of course that was when they started to jump...

This album here has pictures of the Neumayer and Schollaert Channel, Icebergs, Whales and the Bark Europa.
It has 31 pictures.

click here for the album