To go where no one has gone before

So I'm heading out again on another vacation.
I fly out of Montreal early on New Year's Day, so I'm going to be staying the night at a hotel in Montreal airport - an unusual way to spend New Year's Eve.

 I'll be meeting up with my friend Bridie in Miami, and then we're spending a few days there doing some trips to the Everglades and Key West before boarding our cruise. 
Where are we cruising to you ask?  Well Belize, Honduras and Mexico.  But it's not about where we're going so much as who we're going with.  This is Star Trek: The Cruise.  George Takei (AKA Mr Sulu) is the host and around 25 of the actors from the various series of Star Trek will be on board. Scotty, beam me up!

Mosaicanada

About 4 years ago I went to Montreal to see Mosaicultures at the Montreal Botanical Gardens.  I had no idea what to expect and was absolutely gob-smacked at what the gardeners had been able to make out of plants!  Sadly, this kind of exhibition happens very rarely, and often in another country rather than here in Canada (despite the fact that the art form seems to have originated in Montreal).  So I was super excited to find that they were going to do one here in Ottawa for Canada 150.

Denise is visiting us at the moment, so it was good timing for her too.  I dragged everyone over the bridge to Jacques Cartier Park and we trouped around and saw all the fantastic sculptures. Here are a few photos of the highlights...

Passau (10th June)

Today is the last full day of our cruise.

At around 9am we sailed into Passau. Passau is built at the confluence of 3 rivers: the Danube, the Inn and the Ilz.  It's certainly a very pretty city. Once again full of narrow cobbled streets and baroque churches.

We had a walking tour of the city with our hilarious guide, Alex.  Being situated as it is around 3 rivers, Passau is subject to flooding at regular intervals - the last bad flood being in 2013. The height of the flood water is marked on the side of the town hall, and Alex helpfully stood under the markings so you can get a sense of scale of just how high the flood water reached.

 After our tour we were treated to an organ concert in St Stephen's Cathedral - which has the largest church organ in the world.  Then it was off to lunch.  Can't go to Bavaria and not have a beer.  We had  schnitzel and the local bier: Innstadt.  After that a bit of shopping and back to the ship for a lazy afternoon lounging on the sun deck.

It being the final night of the cruise we had the Captain's cocktail party and farewell gala dinner. Unfortunately, after pigging out at lunch I couldn't eat much of the 6 course meal they served up. I will definitely need to go on a diet when I get home.

So that is it - the end of our cruise.  I must admit this trip surprised me.  I expected the Hungarian and Slovakian stops to be cities full of concrete tower blocks, and I expected many of the towns and cities in Austria and Germany to be industrial.  Instead I've been treated to a series of fairy-tale towns and villages in Austria/Germany and beautiful historic cities in Budapest, Brastislava and Vienna.
Having traveled around Europe by coach, train and car before now, I'd say a river cruise is definitely the way to do it - so relaxing.

The Adventures of Becky and Ruth in Linz

We were supposed to go to Salzburg today -  but we missed the bus.  For some reason I had it in my mind that the bus went at 8.45am, but in fact it went at 8.15. So when we turned up at reception at 8.30 the bus had already gone.

Instead we decided to walk into the centre of Linz. We walked around the main shopping area and went into a mall where there was yet another Spar.  For those of you in North America, Spar is a chain of corner stores in the UK (most of which have a floor area of about 6 x 6ft).  This was nothing like the Spar stores in the UK.  For one thing it took up almost the entire basement of the mall. It even had a small coffee shop/bar inside it!  Then we had some interesting adventures trying to figure out the automated door into the public bathrooms. 

After all this excitement we made our way to the main square in Linz where we had a coffee and some of the eponymous Linzertorte.  We then went on the Linz express (and electric train type thing) for a 25 minute tour of the city with commentary in English. 

We then walked back to the ship and spent the rest of the day relaxing on the sun deck, watching the French open on the TV in the lounge and we even had a dip in the pool.  It was actually nice to spend a day mostly just relaxing instead of charging around on one excursion or another.

Tomorrow is the last full day of the cruise.  We will be in Passau, Germany.

Durnstein and Melk (8th June)

This morning we woke up to find we'd arrived in Durnstein. This is a small village at one end of the Wachau Valley.  Going into the village was a bit like going back in time. The cobbled streets are all on an incline - as the village is on the side of a hill, and most of the streets are too narrow to get a car down them. Not even a Fiat 500.

Durnstein's main claim to fame is that it sits below the castle where Richard the Lionheart was captured and imprisoned by Leopold of Austria on his way back from the crusades. Richard's minstrel, Blondel was then supposed to have found him by going around Austria singing under the windows of all the castles until he came here and Richard sang back to him.

The morning was rounded out by a bus trip to a local winery for some wine tasting.

In the afternoon we had a few hours of scenic sailing down the Wachau Valley, which is a UNESCO world heritage site.  The valley is full of small villages and castles. Becky and I sat out on the sun beds on the top deck and made the most of the view.

At around 4pm we arrived in Melk for a trip to Melk Abbey.  It's a huge place, decorated in Baroque style, so it's very grand.

That Viking Baldur ship was docked behind us at Melk ..... I'm still convinced it's following us.

Vienna - 7th June

Today was a full day in Vienna.

We started off at Vienna museum of the fine arts.  This was a special tour before the museum opened. They started us off with a bellini cocktail before taking us to see the Bellini painting. We saw several interesting paintings including Bruegal's  Tower of Babel, and Hans Holbein's portrait of Jane Seymour. But my favourite one was this:

After the museum we were taken on a coach tour of the city, and then a short walking tour, which included a visit to the Spanish riding school where we were able to watch the Lipizaner stallions practicing.

The afternoon was free for us to explore Vienna by ourselves. After a brief visit to St Stephen's cathedral we made our way to the Hotel Sacher for lunch.  When I first started going out with my husband he promised he'd take me to Vienna one day for some Sachertorte.  We've been married 26 years now and there was still no sign of him making good on his promise, so I had to take myself here instead.  Becky and I had a scrumptious lunch in the cafe at the Hotel Sacher, followed by some really wonderful special coffees and Sachertorte for dessert. So my birthday cake was Sachertorte - that kind of made my day.

After some souvenier shopping we made our way to the shuttle bus and back to the ship where we've been hanging out in the the Leopard Bar before dinner and sampling some nice cocktails. We met some nice people in the bar ... so the plan is to sit with them at dinner.

Becky has been driving me mad all day singing Vienna by Ultravox....

Greetings to the readers from North Carolina.

A very full day - 6th June

Becky and I were up at 5.30am to go up to the top deck and watch the ship traverse the first and largest of the locks we will pass through on our way down the Danube.  I can't believe how many river cruise ships there are, and one in particular, the Viking Baldur, seems to be following us all over the place. It even joined us in the lock.

Later in the morning we arrived in Bratislava, the capital of Slovakia.  We had a walking tour of the city, which is quite small for a capital city (a population of less than 500,000) and full of quaint little cobbled streets. Quite a lot of the city centre is pedestrianized - probably because many of the streets are probably too narrow to get a car down. My sister says I probably used the word probably too many times in that last sentence....

After lunch it was back to the ship to carry on down the Danube to Vienna. Bratislava and Vienna are the 2 closest capital cities in Europe (and possibly the world) being only 56km apart. Uniworld had laid on various afternoon entertainments, including a strudel making class and a waltz class, but Becky and I decided to spend the afternoon relaxing up on the sun deck and watching the world go by with a pina colada.

After an early buffet dinner we were then taken off to a Mozart/Strauss concert at a Vienna Concert hall, which was highly enjoyable.

Budapest - June 5th

Today we went on the Budapest city tour.  A bus tour around both Buda (on the hills one side of the Danube) and Pest (pronounced Pesht) on the other side of the Danube.  It's actually a surprisingly beautiful city with many lovely historical buildings and plenty of character.  I must admit, that this being my first visit to an ex-eastern block country I was kind of expecting a city full of 60s style concrete apartment blocks, but it was nothing like that at all.

Many of the buildings have colourful roofs made from ceramic tiles.  Budapest is famous for its embroidery and lacework.  Becky and I had a number of Forints (the Hungarian currency) to get rid of, so after our tour of the city we went shopping and bought various lace/embroidered products.

As it was the Pentecost holiday lots of the local children were dressed in their national costumes.

In the afternoon we were treated to a Hungarian concert pianist performing works be Liszt in the Salon on deck 3.

We left Budapest at around 5pm and sailed by this iconic building that I'm sure many of you recognize from the Viking cruises adverts.....

All Aboard - Sunday 4th June

First of all. Let me apologize for not posting until now.  I'm afraid the "free wi-fi" on the ship is virtually non-existent.  We have had no connectivity at all until this afternoon, and even now it's a bit flaky. So I may have to add photos to my posts later.

Becky and I got up to the news of the terror attack in central London that had happened overnight. Fortunately we were staying out by the airport and were nowhere near the incident.  Police presence at Heathrow was very visible when we got to Terminal 3, but everything seemed to be running smoothly and our flight to Budapest was on time.  We were met by the Uniworld rep at Budapest airport and loaded onto a coach for transport to the ship.

Fortunately, the coach was air conditioned because Budapest was very hot and humid (30c). Budapest is known as the city of spas, but those of us from the UK could be forgiven for thinking it was the city of Spars (as in the corner shop) .There was a Spar grocery store at the airport - and we must have passed half a dozen more Spars on the way to the ship, also a number of Tescos and a Costa coffee.

The ship is very posh. Done out in Austro-Hungarian Empire style. Lots of gold leaf and mirrors and a nice spiral staircase with a large portrait of Empress Maria Theresa (who the ship is named after). There's a small but very beautiful swimming pool, 2 bars, a Viennese cafe (which is virtually next to our room), and a lovely sun deck that Becky and I have made extensive use of in the nice weather.  Sadly Becky and I are confined to the "basement" - i.e. the lowest deck of the ship.  We chose a cheap room thinking that all the rooms would have a window, but our window is very narrow and close to the ceiling. The ships can't have too many decks of course, or they wouldn't get under the bridges, so there are only 4 decks altogether including the sun deck.

 

At dinner the chef made Becky a special chocolate birthday cake which was delivered to the table at dessert time, and shared with the people at our table. Though Becky would have liked to keep the whole thing for herself

On our first evening aboard we were treated to an evening sailing up and down a short section of the Danube to admire Budpest lit up by night. The Hungarians kindly put on a firework display for Becky's birthday outside the parliament building - though our crew members kept insisting that it was actually for the Pentecost bank holiday that was happening the next day (Monday).

At the airport

So here I am at Ottawa airport.  Becky's plane was due to leave San Francisco before my plane takes off from here.  So I decided I would check the Virgin flight status page to make sure she took off alright.  The page finally showed her as "in flight" 5 minutes ago.  With that out of the way I thought now would be a good time for a cup of coffee, especially since there's over an hour until my flight starts boarding. 
What do I find.... Starbucks has already closed.  I should have bought my latte first!
Anyhow, looking forward to a very boring hour or so now.  There's only so many games of Candy Crush I can play before it gets old.   I'm also going to be without any refreshment while I sit around.  Tim Horton's is still open - but a Timmies coffee just doesn't do it for me like a chai latte.

Ho hum.  See you on the other side .....

Heading off again

Tomorrow I get on a plane to London to meet up with my sister, Becky.  For Becky's 60th birthday we are going on a cruise along the Danube, from Budapest to Passau.  Fingers crossed that we will find each other at Heathrow and then we'll take the next flight from London to Budapest together. 
Watch this space for more vacation exploits!

Back to Ushaia

Today has been another day at sea.  We seemed to have outrun the bad weather by this morning, and the Captain slowed the ship right down, so we had a very calm crossing for the day. 

There were huge number of birds following the ship throughout the day.  I spent a lot of time out on deck trying to get decent photos of some of them.  They are huge birds (a wandering albatross can have a wingspan of 13 feet).  I've attended some fascinating lectures while on board, and learned some unbelievable facts about these ocean birds.  A newly fledged albatross will spend around 6 years out of sight of land before it finally finds some remote island and mates.  They can switch off one side of their brain at a time in order to "sleep" while flying.  They drink sea water and have a special gland in the head that filters out the salt, the remaining very salty solution then runs out of their nose and drops off the end of their beak.  And I have been lucky enough to see several of these amazing birds on this trip.

A black-browed albatross alongside the ship

 

 

 

Today has been largely taken up with winding things up.  I had to return my rented boots, settle my ship board account, pack, etc.  Tonight we are anchored in the tBeagle channel, waiting for the Ushuaia harbor pilot to guide us in.  We should dock in Ushuaia at about 2am, and will disembark and head to the airport at about 9am tomorrow morning.

Naturally it's sad that the experience is drawing to a close.  So this is  a good time to reflect on this journey and how it's changed me.  Many people have tried and failed to describe Antarctica to someone who's never been there.  Of course it's vast, and the photographs you take cannot depict the scale of the mountains and ice bergs.  But actually what I found most striking was the absence of any evidence of people.  Every day when we go out in the street there is a constant background noise of humanity: traffic, machinery, other people talking.  But apart from my fellow passengers (and the odd seal belching) it was silent.  There was no background noise.  Nor was there any rubbish.  I've seen TV shows where people are taken out into the "wilds" of Northern Canada to survive on their own for a week.  The participants always seem to find plastic bottles or bits of rope, etc washed ashore on the beach even in these remote areas.  But there was no rubbish anywhere where we went.  I won't say it was clean, because there was plenty of seal and penguin poop around in most of the areas we landed, but that is natural - not man made.
One of the other amazing things was the quantity of wildlife that I encountered.  I imagined that we would be lucky to see a seal, or a whale.  Instead we saw seals everywhere, it was hard to keep from treading on them on some shore excursions.  We spotted whales in 3 or 4 locations, and sea birds (especially penguins) galore.  I'm not against zoos as I realise they have a role to play in preserving some species that are threatened in the wild,  but seeing the penguins and seals in their natural environment I had this deep feeling that this was how they were meant to be seen, not in a man-made environment in a zoo.   It was astounding how trusting these animals were too.  They were totally free and could swim away from us at any time, but they seemed to have no fear of us, in fact they seemed curious and were happy to swim right up to us when we were in the zodiac, or walk right up to us when we were ashore. Seeing them like this just felt "right".  This was their world not ours, and I'm left with a feeling of having been blessed that they were willing to accept my presence there. 
Antarctica was so different I'm left with the feeling that I've been to another planet rather than somewhere on this earth.   There will never be anywhere else I can go that will ever be like it.

During the vacation Denise asked one of our lecturers what proportion of the world's population had ever visited Antarctica and after much discussion the experts came up with a figure of probably about 0.01 %..    I  have had the good fortune to be within that 0.01%  and I will never forget it.

Running from the storm

Silver Explorer is heading back across the Drake passage to Ushuaia, so we have a full day at sea today.  The swells are slightly bigger than they were on the way out, and more people seem to be affected by it.  I'm feeling fine though, so I've been attending all the lectures and activities that have been put on for us. Apparently there is a large storm now battering the South Shetland Islands (where we were yesterday morning), but we have out run the worst of that weather by turning for Ushuaia at lunchtime yesterday.

Sadly tomorrow is the last day of this cruise and I will have to start packing.

Tomorrow I will probably post some reflections on what this vacation has meant to me, but today is an opportunity to talk about the people - both my fellow passengers and the crew.

I anticipated that the passengers on this cruise would be outgoing and interesting people, and I was not wrong. On Silver Explorer there are no set table assignments, so we sat with different sets of people at almost every meal.  As expected most of my fellow passengers were well traveled and had plenty of interesting experiences to relate.  I suppose it's not surprising, given that this is an expensive cruise, that most of the passengers were on the older side. However, there were several sets of  passengers where an older passenger was being accompanied by a younger relation.  I met 2 Father/Daughter pairs, a Mother/Son pair and even a Nephew/Aunt pair.  The vast majority of passengers are American of course, and I would say that the second largest group was the Brits. However there was a reasonable sized Australian contingent, some Canadians, French, Swiss and German. There was even a moderate sized group of Russians, although they tended to keep to themselves and required the services of one of our lecturers (Dimitri) for translation.  But apart from the Russians I was very impressed with the English skills of the others on board, especially the Germans.   By and large I liked everyone I met, although there was one American guy who went around with a sour expression the whole time and seemed to be in a permanently grumpy mood. Fortunately I never ended up at a table with him during the entire voyage.  Later on in the voyage Denise had to keep to the cabin for a while due to a bout of vertigo, but I found I had no qualms about roaming the ship by myself and sitting down and chatting with the other passengers that I'd previously met in the dining room.  We really were a little society of our own.  It was a completely different experience to that of a large cruise ship.

Let me also say a little about the staff. Generally the staff were divided up into 3 roles:  The sailors, the "service" personnel, and the expedition staff.   I honestly didn't see much of the Captain or his officers. The "service" personnel included our butler, Ashish, the various waiting staff in the dining room and bars, the cleaners, hair dresser, ladies at reception, etc.  They were all excellent at their jobs. When we first boarded Silver Explorer we had to have our photos taken. I didn't really understand why at first - since my photo did not turn up on my ship card, but later on I discovered that the staff take the trouble to view all the photos at the beginning of the trip and associate the passenger names with the faces so that they can greet you personally from day 1.  Some of the staff fill dual roles. The hair-dresser accompanied us on several shore excursions to help Denise get in and out of the zodiacs.  The group I had most interaction with were the expedition staff.  These are all experts in their fields of ornithology, marine biology, etc.  For example, one of our ornithologists (Dr Danae Sheehan) had worked for the RSPB for many years before joining Silversea, and one of the science "experts" Sherri  Bluestein had worked at the US Antarctic base McMurdo for 8 years before becoming joining the expedition staff. Being an expert in your field is not enough though. You have to be personable in order to deal one on one with passengers, you even have to be able to drive a zodiac.  Perhaps the most notable thing about the expedition staff was their near obsession with Antarctica.  Whilst I enjoyed my holiday here, I can't imagine living here on a more permanent basis (even with the facilities of a luxury ship).

Well that rounds out my entry for today.  I don't have any interesting photos because the only thing we can see is sea.  When I reach land I will probably post a few albums of photos on Facebook.

Tomorrow we should dock in Ushuaia.

Deception Island

A fur seal lies in front of whale bones on the beach

 

Last night we headed north from the Antarctic peninsula toward the South Shetland Islands. 

This morning we arrived at Deception Island. This is a volcanic island, where an explosion blew a hole in the wall and sea water came through the hole and filled the caldera.  The result is an island that looks like a letter O with a tiny chunk taken out of it. The passage into the middle is called Neptune's Bellows and is very narrow indeed.  When I awoke this morning the ship was rolling a bit, so I went up on deck both to get some fresh air and to watch the ship navigate the narrow channel.

Within the caldera the water is quite calm, and some of it is even heated by the volcanic activity, so steam rises off it. Deception Island has seen plenty of whaling activity and the beach is littered with whale bones and old whaling buildings (many of which have been partially destroyed by ash from subsequent volcanic eruptions). I took a walk with our expedition guide to the gap at the top of a ridge, which is called Neptune's Window. There were fur seals everywhere and it was difficult to thread our way across the beach without disturbing them too much.

The polar plunge

This location was also chosen as the venue for the "polar plunge".  Once during every voyage the crew organize this activity where passengers have the opportunity to change into their swim suits and jump into the polar waters. If you submerge your entire body, including your head, you get a certificate.  I can't swim, so there was no way I was going to attempt this, but 48 passengers did. Despite the volanic activity heating the water to some extent (hence the steam rising off it) this only
 occurs with about the top 2 inches of water, and water below that is just as cold as you'd expect.

Uli models his lederhosen

Deception Island was our last shore excursion of this voyage.  The weather forecast shows bad weather approaching in the Drake passage, so the ship has turned back towards Ushuaia hoping to make it back before the weather gets too bad. The Captain's farewell dinner has been rescheduled to happen tonight, as the staff think that the conditions will be too turbulent to hold it after that time.

Another Day in Paradise

Today we went to Paradise Bay. The weather was beautiful, the scenery was unbelievable. It's no surprise that they called this place paradise. We took a zodiac cruise around the bay and got up close to a colony of blue eyed shags. The weather was so calm and clear that the surface of the water was like a mirror and reflected the mountains around it.

Half way through the zodiac cruise our guide Shelley noticed another craft on the other side of the bay that was apparently in trouble. As we got close we could see it was full of crew members. They said they had taken a zodiac out for a little sight seeing of their own and had run out of petrol.  However, when we drew up along side we discovered that it was all a brilliant surprise. The crew members in the "stranded" zodiac were all the restaurant staff - and they had brought us champagne and snacks. I had a mimosa.

We left Paradise Bay at lunchtime. The weather was so beautiful that Denise and I decided this was the day to try out the hot tubs.

The afternoon was a bit of a departure from our usual shore excursions that focus on wildlife and scenery.  We visited Port Lockroy, on Goudier Island. Port Lockroy is a historic site and operates as a museum, post office and gift shop.  The original UK base here was opened during WWII. It was abandoned in the 60s. At the time there were no penguins on Goudier Island, but apparently at some point some penguins came along and thought "look at all these nice abandoned buildings" and moved in.  In 1994 a decision was made to clean up abandoned UK bases in the Antarctic, and Port Lockroy was restored and re-opened in its current form. The base is "manned" (currently by 4 women) in the Summer months only.  It has no fresh water supply and the staff rely on the visiting cruise ships for their water.  Apparently the staff really like Silver Explorer as it is the only Antarctic cruise ship that has baths as well as showers.  The women come on-board to take baths/showers.  The cruise ships also deliver supplies to the gift shop and take away the mail (dropping it off at Stanley in the Falklands).  From the Falklands the mail is all sent to the UK, and from there to the rest of the world, so delivery can take some time.  That said, this is the only place in the Antarctic that we could possibly send a post card from, so Denise and I sent 28 between us.  I also did all my present buying for the trip in the gift shop. The proceeds from the gift shop go to the UK Antarctic Heritage Trust, which maintains the Port Lockroy museum and other UK heritage sites in the Antarctic.

Port Lockroy was totally overrun with penguins. The usual rule of staying 15 ft away from them was a non-starter, as they were literally everywhere, including all over the path up to the museum/gift shop building. It was quite warm today (maybe 2-3 degrees) and the penguins were all too hot. When this happens they lie down on the stone to try and lose some of their body heat.

They are not dead. Their just "resting"

This evening we had a special asado dinner, followed by the crew talent show up in the Panorama lounge. The first performer was good, the second was reasonably good, but after that I could tell that the quality was going downhill and decided to give the rest a miss and go to bed, since we have another early landing tomorrow.

The ice berg grave yard

This morning's shore excursion was at Petermann Island.  Denise opted to stay on the ship as the landing site was quite difficult and it was a reasonably long hike to get to where the brds were. I managed to spot my third penguin species (Adelie) and some blue eyed shags.

After this I hiked up a small mountain to get a view of the bay from the top.  Going up wasn't so bad, but coming down was a bit slippery, I was very glad I had my walking poles with me.

After lunch we made our way to Pleneau, otherwise known as the ice berg graveyard. Apparently prevailing winds tend to drive icebergs into this area where they become trapped.  We had a 90 minute zodiac cruise around the area to admire the ice bergs. It was actually snowing this afternoon and colder than it has been, so although the ice bergs were fascinating, we were glad to be back on the ship.

At 5.30pm the ship began making its way down the Lemaire channel. There was a lot of ice in the channel and we all went up on deck to watch as the Captain threaded the ship through.

This evening Denise and I stayed in our room and ordered room service rather than going to the restaurant as we had a number of post cards to write.  Tomorrow afternoon we will be docking at Port Lockroy, which has the only post office in the Antarctic, so we need to have our post cards ready.

On the mainland - 20th Feb

My apologies that this post is a day late. We were in Neko Harbour yesterday evening and the mountains there are quite high, so the internet signal got cut off.

One of the interesting things about taking an expedition cruise to Antarctica is that there is no fixed itinerary. Every evening we go to the theatre for the resident experts to answer questions about what we saw that day, and for Kara (the expedition leader) to give us a run down about what is planned for the next day.  But as Kara is fond of telling us - that is just plan A.  By the time we get up in the morning we might already be on plan D.  The cruise ships within the area have to co-ordinate with each other as only one ship is allowed to be at a particular location on a particular day. Also weather conditions may make landing impossible.

The plan for the morning was to go ashore at Orne Harbour. However, when the scout zodiacs went out they discovered that there was a lot of ice and landing conditions were treacherous. Instead the ship sailed on for 30 minutes to another landing spot at Cuverville Island. Here there was an option of going on shore for a hike, or just taking a zodiac cruise around the bay itself. The hike sounded quite strenuous and Denise would not have been able to manage it, so we opted for the zodiac cruise.

It may sound strange, but I find the zodiac cruises are much better in terms of getting a good range of sights and animal encounters, than being stuck in the one place if you go ashore.

Yesterday I saw fur seals at Mikkelsen Harbour and then later in the day several leopard seals at Cierva Cove.  This morning I added crab eater seals to the list. Crab eater seals are the most common seals on the planet. They certainly seemed to be everywhere  around Cuverville Island. Several were playing in the water and swam right up to the zodiac.

During lunch time the ship sailed on  to Neko Harbour, giving us some truly spectacular views out of the dining room windows as we were eating lunch.

We dropped anchor in Neko Harbour around 1.30pm and Denise and I took a zodiac to shore where there was another Gentoo penguin colony.  The parents were busy feeding the chicks and a brown skua was taking a bath in a small pond of snow melt. This was actually our first landing on mainland Antarctica (yesterday morning's landing at Mikkelsen Harbour was on an island).

This evening we attended another cocktail party for first time Silversea cruisers.

Cierva Cove

So this morning we got up close and personal with the penguins at Mikkelsen Harbour.
This afternoon we were at Cierva Cove, but rather than landing anywhere we were taken on a 90 minute cruise around the cove in a zodiac, which allowed us to get a really good view of some of the ice bergs, and we also encountered lots of animals.

First we pulled up near a couple of humpback whales. As we were waiting for the whales to re-surface a number of penguins porpoised past. They are too fast to take a decent photo of, but I did get a short video, which I will probably edit and post on Facebook when I get home.

Spot the bird that isn't a penguin

In fact penguins were swimming all over the place, and we were able to pull up next to a cliff where there was a colony of chinstrap penguins (slightly smaller than the Gentoo penguins we met this morning), complete with one black and white bird that was having an identity crisis - because it definitely wasn't a penguin.





We saw a number of ice floes with leopard seals on them, and got up close to 2 of them.  Leopard seals sometimes like to bite the zodiacs, but these guys seemed too lazy to get up off their stomachs and enter the water, so we were safe enough.



Of course, whilst all these animals were lovely to see, they are the sort of animals that you anticipate encountering in Antarctica.  But our zodiac driver, Luke, popped his hand into the water and came out with this:

It's called a salp, and although it looks like a piece of red something caught in a chip of ice, that is actually not ice - it has a gelatinous body similar to a jelly fish.  Once Luke had pointed one out we could see them in the water all around us.

We also saw some amazing ice-bergs.  Take a good look at the tiny black blob at the bottom of the ice berg in the photo below - that's a bunch of people in a zodiac.  Hopefully that gives you an idea of just how big these ice-bergs were.

It's hard to imagine how what the expedition staff will come up with tomorrow can  possibly top today's experiences.  Tomorrow though we have 2 landings on the mainland (Today's landing at Mikkelsen was on an island off the coast of Antarctica).

Pick up a Penguin

This morning we arrived in Mikkelsen Harbour, and had our first expedition on shore.

Denise and I enjoyed an early breakfast at 7am with the most unbelievable views out of the dining room window.  Just how lucky are we to have that sort of view at breakfast.  

Getting into the zodiacs was an interesting experience. You're supposed to put everything in your backpack and keep your hands free, but I couldn't fit my Nordic walking poles into my back pack so I was trying to get in one-handed, while the other hand held both poles.  I made it in one piece at least.

On the zodiac ride towards the shore a leopard seal came up and circled the boat a few times. Tim, our expedition leader, stopped the craft so we got some good views.  Unfortunately, my camera was in my back pack, so I didn't get a photo.  I think the leopard seal thought we looked tasty, but eventually he left us alone.

Who are you and why are you on MY rock

After a bit of a wet landing (probably 12-18 inches of water) I waded onto land. The small island has a colony of Gentoo Penguins.  At this time of the year the baby penguins are very large - almost the same size as the adults, but still covered in a grey fuzz rather than the classic black and white feathers. Most of the adults are moulting. And when they're moulting they're pretty revolting. No - honestly, they are still cute, even when they are moulting..
We were told to stay at least 15 feet away from the penguins, but the penguins themselves don't obey the rule.  A young one came to inspect us and got up in Denise's face.

 There were also several fur seals on shore.

While we were on the island we heard a loud crash and we could see that part of the glacier across the bay had fallen away.  

The weather was bright and sunny (-1 degree) and I was able to manage well with no gloves in order to take photos.

Later this afternoon we will be going on a zodiac cruise around the ice bergs and glaciers in Cierva Cove

On board the zodiac, returning to Silver Explorer

Land Ho!

This morning it was quite fresh up on deck. We are being followed by a whole flock of what I think are cape petrels.

We had our Zodiac training in the theatre at 10am and went through our bio-check (they go through all the velcro fastenings and pockets on our outer clothing to ensure that we don't accidentally take any seeds or contaminants ashore with us).

This afternoon I attended a fascinating lecture about whales. Just as the lecturer was finishing up we were told there were some humpback whales out front of the ship. The captain "pulled over" so that we could get up on deck and watch.

As I came outside I had my first glimpse of land.

There were several groups of humpbacks around the ship, each with about 2-3 individuals in the group, then later on a larger group of about 12 appeared. The were very obliging with photo ops.  There were also fur seals and an elephant seal, but it's much harder to get a photo of seals in the water as they move too fast.

I also saw my first penguin. It was dead. Something (probably a leopard seal) had taken a bite out of it and then left the body floating around. Right now we're heading into Dallmann Bay, which is supposed to be a prime spot for whales.

Captain's Cocktail Party

So what else have I been up to today?

I attended the 9.45am lecture on "Ocean Wanderers" given by our resident ornithologist, Will Wagstaff (from Wales!), learning all about the sea birds that often follow the ship. Later on in the morning I went up to the rear of the ship at deck 6 and had a look at the many giant petrels and occasional wandering albatrosses that were following the ship. Unfortunately most of them were too far back to get a decent photo.

After a buffet lunch in the restaurant we went to get our waterproof boots checked out and tagged. Then I attended an afternoon lecture about penguins given by Dr Danae Sheehan (from York). I did learn the fascinating fact that the word penguin comes from the Welsh words "pen" and "gwyn" meaning "white head".  It is mentioned in the logs from the Golden Hind (it's the Drake passage remember!)  that the Welsh sailors aboard the ship had caught several of these birds for eating and had called them Pen Gwyn.

This evening we went to the Captain's cocktail party and Welcome dinner. Another evening of having glasses of champagne thrust at me.  I have tried to be more circumspect about my alcohol intake today though.

The Captain says that this is the calmest crossing of the Drake they have had all season. Based on the map on channel 1 of the TV (which tracks where the ship is right now) we look to be making excellent progress.  Tomorrow morning we have to attend Zodiac training, so they can show us how to get in/out of the landing craft.

Drake Lake or the Drake Shake?

The Drake Passage (named after Sir Francis) is the stretch of ocean between the southern tip of South America and the northenmost point of Antarctica. There is no significant land  anywhere around the globe at this latitude, which makes for a huge volume of water, and the Drake Passage is the narrowest gap all that water must squeeze through. This results in one of the most turbulent areas of sea in the world. That said, at times it can be very calm and then it's called the Drake "Lake". 

There was a bit of a rolling motion overnight, but nothing too bad. I got up at 7am for the early risers breakfast in the Panorama lounge, only to find I was the only one there, so I bailed. I wasn't feeling 100%, but to be honest that may have had more to do with the number of glasses of champagne I drank yesterday rather than sea sickness. By 8am I was feeling well enough to go to the restaurant for a proper breakfast, while Denise opted to have a room service breakfast in the cabin. I sat with 3 Italian guys. One of them was really not doing to well on the sea-sickness front. I felt so sorry for the guy as it was his birthday.

Despite the fact that we will be spending the whole day at sea there's plenty to do on board. The first thing on the schedule for me was to spend some time exploring the ship and making sure I knew where everything was.

So let me give you a run down of the ship:  Silver Explorer is a purpose built expedition vessel with a 1A class ice rating (that's the strongest there is other than an ice breaker). Maximum guest capacity is 132, but many of the cabins only have a single occupant so there are only 123 passengers on this sailing. Crew is 120 - so it's virtually a 1:1 ratio of passengers to crew.
Despite the ship being compact, there are plenty of facilities on board. There are 5 passenger decks (decks 3 to 7). Our suite is midship on deck 3. Also on deck 3 is the reception area, the medical centre and the mud room (for getting in and out of those waterproof wellies and what not). On deck 4 is the boutique, where I already bought a stuffed penguin. Also on deck 4 is a small fitness centre with a sauna, the beauty salon, the launderette and the restaurant. I won't need to use the launderette directly though - as our butler comes to pick up our laundry bags every morning and delivers our cleaned stuff back to the room before 6pm. On deck 5 is the bridge. Denise and I will be trying to get a visit there sometime this week - the crew are very accommodating and visits to the bridge can be arranged at reception.  Also on deck 5 is the library and internet cafe (though there's no coffee on offer). There is wifi throughout the ship (free in our class of suite), so having brought my own laptop with me I'm probably not going to hang out in the library/internet cafe too much, unless I develop a sudden desire to read all the books about Shackleton. Deck 5 is rounded out with smokers' corner and the panorama lounge, where afternoon tea, evening cocktails and tapas is served. Deck 6 houses the theatre, where the various experts will be giving us presentations on the flora, fauna and history of Antarctica. The observation lounge is also on deck 6 - this is a good place to watch the view if you don't want to go out on deck and risk being blown away.  There is also a small outside deck area with the outdoor grill and 2 hot tubs. This area won't come into use until we reach calmer waters, but Denise and I definitely plan to check out those hot tubs!
Deck 7 is the view deck - all outside. Won't be going up there today though!