Web posted
Saturday, February 2, 2008
Summer in the South - way south
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Photo by Foss Farrar
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Antarctica as unreal as it gets
By FOSS FARRAR
Traveler Staff Writer
reporter@arkcity.net
(Editor's note: Traveler staff writer Foss Farrar recently returned from a two-week trip to Antarctica. This is a personal account of trip highlights. See related story Monday on global warming.)
University of Kansas Alumni Association representative David Ochoa speaks for many of his fellow travelers when he describes a recent voyage to Antarctica as "unreal."
Antarctica does seem other worldly. To me, it's about the closest thing to going to the Moon while remaining on this planet.
Our expedition leader, Ignatio Rojas, called Antarctica the "land of 'est.'" "It is the windiest, driest, loneliest."
Author David G. Campbell calls it "The Crystal Desert."
There were eight of us who made the trip through the KU Alumni Association. In total, 160 tourists sponsored by university alumni associations from throughout the country participated.
The continent at the bottom of the world has no native population and no governmental structure. Mainly scientists and researchers stay there in various stations.
Antarctica doesn't belong to any one country, although several countries claim certain regions. For instance, the U.S. has a station on the South Pole.
An Antarctic Treaty was negotiated by 12 countries active in the region during the International Geophysical Year, 1957-58. The treaty partners agree that Antarctica is a natural reserve dedicated to peace and science.
Those of us who made the voyage to Antarctica attended a mandatory session on rules aimed at keeping Antarctica pristine. We were to respect all wildlife on the islands and mainland, leave no garbage, secure our belongings and clean our boots before and after each expedition landing. (We especially tried to avoid stepping in guano -- penguin excrement.)
We boarded a French ship, Le Diamant, to make the voyage at Usuaia, Argentina, a city at the tip of South America. Many of us were tested making the stormy Drake Passage. That first night on the ship, the wind seemed strong to me and the ride was bumpy. I could hear the ship's timbers creak.
After a day or so, many of us got our "sea legs." My roommate was not so lucky. He was seasick during the two-day Drake Passage both on the way down from Usuaia and on the way back.
Life on the ship itself was a treat. The French cuisine was always tasty, and the staff, led by Captain Jean Philippe Lemaire, was friendly and helpful. We even had shows put on by dancers and musicians at night.
That first night, the movie "March of the Penguins" was shown in the Grand Salon.
By the way, we never saw Emperor Penguins, the kind shown in "March of the Penguins," during our trip. The Emperors march in the dead of the winter, but we were there in the summer; seasons in Antarctica are opposite of those in the Northern Hemisphere.
Our first landing occurred at Half Moon Bay in the South Shetland Islands. It was sunny that third day of the voyage -- unusually mild for Antarctica.
We boarded Zodiac boats in four groups, spaced apart so that no more than 50 to 100 were on the island at the same time.
Chinstrap penguins greeted us after we were helped out of the boats by our expedition leaders. The rocky island serves as a rookery for young penguins, some of which had been hatched just several weeks before.
The island also has a small Argentinean station -vacant at the time.
The penguins squawked and craned their heads as a predator bird, a skua, flew around the edges of the rookery and landed in their midst.
Later I learned that young males craning their heads and crowing in such a fashion are marking their territory and exhibiting mating behavior.
Down a hill next to an inlet, a Weddell seal was sunning itself while a penguin walked lazily nearby in the snow.
Our second landing came as a surprise to me. I had assumed the day's activities were at an end; we had already had a big dinner. But the call came from our cruise director that those were up for a "rougher" landing should get ready for one around 10 p.m.
The landing at Baily Head was well lit despite the late hour. Summer days are bright and long in Antarctica. (And winters are dark.)
The next day we made two more landings on Deception Island, of the South Shetlands. The morning landing was optional -- only for those who wanted to "swim" in the Antarctic.
I joined the swimmers at Pendulum Cove. We dressed in knee-high boots and parkas. Under the outer clothing we wore our swimming suits.
It wasn't as cold as it sounded. Deception Island is a volcanic island with eruptions occurring as recently as the late 1960s. The beach at Pendulum Cove is thermally heated; steam seeps up through the sand. I was dared to plunge into the colder water. I did so and was cheered by my KU alumni mates.
The second landing on Deception Island was at Telefon Bay, an active volcanic crater. The scene here is eerie -- ash, water, ice and snow all mixed together. A huge waterfall serves as a backdrop for the crater.
As we prepared for our first continental landing, it started to spit rain and snow. We made our way through the Gerlache Strait.
The sky had turned gray. We landed at Neko Harbor where we saw gentoo penguins and heard a crack as the edge of a glacier broke off. I trudged through wet snow three-quarters of the way up a steep hill.
Late that afternoon we stopped at the only post office we'd see during our Antarctica cruise. It was at a British station at Port Lockroy, on Wiencke Island. Gentoo penguins gather there.
The next day, a Sunday, we made another wet, snowy landing at Peterman Island. One of the guides, Jean-Pierre Sylvestre, told us the forecast was for a snow storm that afternoon.
The forecast proved true; it was snowing by the time we left the island. Later, I ventured out with some our of group to participate in a Zodiac ride around Pleneau Island.
I was glad I did. We saw beautiful white icebergs with a blue tint. We also saw seals resting on ice.
But the highlight of the day -- and perhaps for the trip -- occurred while some of us were still out in the Zodiacs: a pair of humpback whales, a mother and her 5-month old calf, swam near. The young whale started breaching -- flipping in and out of the water, over and over again.
Those who weren't in the Zodiac watched from the deck. It was quite a show.
Above: Tourists in red parkas hike up a snow-covered hill off Neko Harbor on the mainland of Antarctica while Gentoo penguins gather on rocky land in the background at left.
Below: A gentoo parent opens its beak in a show of affection for its chick.
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