Petermann Island and Port Lockroy

They had us up at 5:30 for a 6:00 disembark. Groan. Only one consoling thought. The expedition team must have been up at 5:00 to prepare and go ashore to lay the trails.

This morning it was an early excursion to Petermann Island, home of an Adelie colony which had new chicks. Somebody should have told those pesky Gentoos. There were plenty of them hanging around, many with two new chicks. Pretty icy walking, and lots of defined penguin highways tramped into the ice to help them get up the hills. It's consoling to see that they slip and slide around as much as those clumsy humans.

We found out later that it was an early start as another boat had booked the island for the morning, and we had to be in and out before they arrived. Sure enough, as we were all coming back to the ship, the National Geographic Explorer arrived on the scene - the first tourist ship we had seen since leaving Ushuaia.

As we were coming up from breakfast, the expedition crew were coming back on board having cleaned up the island, removed our trail markers, and secured all the boats. They had less than an our to dry off, change, have breakfast, put their gear on, and start laying out the next island. They must be knackered. On their agenda today are three land excursions to plan, set up, ferry, conduct and clean up. Then there's the polar plunge, the BBQ to host, the farewell party, and the daily debrief meeting, as well as their team review and planning session. As I speak the Expedition Leader is on the intercom announcing the plans for the rest of the morning, and the Kayak leader is running a meeting for the 10 people doing kyaking. They really are amazing.

Turns out that there is one couple amongst the expedition leaders. I worked out one pair on day 4 when one guy said something about their house in Norway, and on day 5 I noticed an arm casually draped in a debrief session. Not much time for fraternising. Colin, the Scot, told us that he had one hour between cruises this time in Ushuaia. The cruise before us docked in the morning, and by the time they disembarked them, cleaned and checked all the gear, and repaired the zodiacs, he had an hour to run into town to replenish his supplies before another 8 days away. And that's their pattern for about 3 months of the year.

After breakfast there was a zodiac cruise for those that wanted it. A bit of a wander through some icebergs with a few seal and whale spotting episodes thrown in. With everybody back on board, the highlight of the day started - the polar plunge. Yep, any sane person could don some kind of swimming gear and throw themselves off the boat into Antarctic waters. More photographers than swimmers, but I suppose 40 or so were brave enough. After jumping into 3 degree water, they had a hot rum punch and a heated spa waiting for them when they got out, so they all seemed happy enough.

Lunch was a BBQ outside on deck 5. Not really balmy weather, but quite ok if you put a jacket on. It was also meant to be a silly hat lunch, but most people were concentrating on the polar plunge. Turned out to be quite funny in the end. The youngies were in the spa wearing bikinis, and the oldies were on deck wearing toilet paper hats.

We moved again during lunch to Port Lockroy which has been either a British supply base or a British research base continuously since the 1930s. It's still a functioning British Post Office (that takes US notes), and will eventually deliver your mail. Knowing how long the British mail system takes to deliver parcels from London, it will probably be months. However on the bright side, it took credit cards and had lots of souveniers, clothing and cards, so the women came away with shopping bags.

The base also has quite a good museum depicting the base in its heyday, which made for an interesting visit. Food, tins, stoves, clothing, bedding and equipment was all on display. Then there were the inevitable penguins, some whale skeletons being for a few years a whaling station, and finally at the other end of the island a colony of shags, so I finally got to see a shag on a rock. About 6 degrees and no wind or waves so it was lovely, and I wandered around without gloves on for much of the time.

So that's the end of the excursions, and getting suited up head to toe in waterproof gear several times a day. Only one kayaker has gone in, so the highlights reel is pretty bare. Before dinner it was a drinkies session to farewell Antartica, but on our way a pod of Orca killer whales (Type B Gerlache for the boffins) surfaced near the bow and caused a stampede to the rail. After watching them for a while, and getting a talk from the whale expert on the team, we went inside and I was greeted by a dumb aussie Bill Hunter look alike who said "Nah, I reckon they were only dolphins, weren't they".

Drinkies went off ok, but not as well as the auction that followed it, which sold various items including a pencil drawing of an antarctic bird by Krystal our resident artist, raising about $1500 for polar organisations.

As we sailed off for home after dinner we were treated to a cloudless sunset and mirror smooth seas, so we all hugged the rail for ages watching it all recede behind us.