Quote of the day: “Those penguins stay up surprisingly late.” - camper who did not sleep well and attempted to blame it on the birds instead of the 4 ft of snow we got overnight.
Last night the snow arrived. While it would be great to write about how we had to brave our way through the inclement weather, instead I am proud to say that we had a late-night snow fight on the deck and managed to get a snow kangaroo and snow penguin built for the other passengers in the morning. The kangaroo may seem like a surprise to you but will hopefully make more sense when you know that we have about 60 Aussies on this boat and one of them carries around a blow-up kangaroo with him at all times. His goal seems to be to get photos of himself on the local news when he gets home but we all wonder if the real truth is just that he is really, really weird. This fact should also help to explain why there may be a stray kangaroo in some of our forthcoming photos. It’s hard to guess where Kevin, the Kangaroo, will pop up.
Today we were awakened with wonderful news, for the first time in 5 days, the sun was shining. We rushed out the door and all forgot to put on sunscreen. On the upside, we now all know what our faces will feel like when the ozone hole makes it to our home towns.
The first island was full of gentoo penguins, famous because they always have twins. Double the adorableness, double the smell of guano. We got some great pictures of the chicks and also saw reconstructed whale bones. Someone obviously spent a lot of time getting them put in order and we appreciated their effort.
The next island was the first (and only) shopping stop of the trip, Port Lockroy. Apparently, there are always some women on the ship for whom the closet-sized gift shop on the ship is not enough to get their daily shopping fix. The captain was so afraid of these women coming after him that he said he would not tell anyone whether they were on the penguin stop or the shopping trip before they left, only whisper it to the zodiac driver minutes before they took off. We were happy to get the penguin island first because we got some beautiful light for our photos. The port/museum was interesting. We are still trying to figure out why a U.K. heritage site only took U.S. dollars and credit cards. Go U.S.A.!
By the afternoon (after a typical round of eating, exploring, sauna), we were rewarded with a stunning humpback whale show. There was a mother and her calf dancing around the bow of the ship for about 15 minutes. Whitney complained that there were no backup dancers for the show, an affectionate reference to the penguins who are often swimming around. Everyone got very excited and we shared in the thrill of their appearance.
Since we’d had so many great animal sightings that morning we decided that for our afternoon zodiac ride we would round up all the rowdy 30-somethings and put them on a boat with the fastest driver. Our vision was to see some cool ice maneuvers and maybe experience some sweet jumps. Warren had said that he would join us but at the last minute could not be found. Well, did he ever miss out. In the midst of our partying we came across a 10,000 lbs juvenile elephant seal (though personally we suspect that it was actually Loch Ness’s long-lost Antarctic cousin). The seal was very cooperative in lining up perfectly with the ship in the background. Apparently, they are a very rare sight and we feel very lucky to have seen one. We then went back to partying on the zodiac and lining up “who is more adorable: the seal or the person” pictures with three other varieties of seals (fur, crab-eater, and leopard). Happily our zodiac was not attacked by any of them and we got some great pictures.
Another highlight of the day was Colin, the whale expert, sharing some of the stupidest questions previous passengers have asked. We will dutifully share them here so you don’t make similar guffaws when you go on your Antarctic cruise:
- Does water go all the way around this island?
- Does the ship generate its’ own electricity? (No, we have the longest extension chord in the world)
- While on the ship, what altitude are we above sea level?
- Does the crew sleep on the ship?
(4Tomorrow we should visit hot springs at Deception Island and then go swimming in the ocean. We don’t have any more planned penguin stops but Whitney is okay with that as she’s still getting over getting bit by one (an experience she describes as “being kissed by a woodpecker“). Every day somehow manages to be better than the last and we are so grateful to be here, together.
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