Antarctica, Antarctica - Polarsteps

No sunrise this morning☁️. We were hopeful, but the weather doesn't allow us to make the planned landing. Still rocking and rolling, the waves might be even bigger than we had during the Drake Passage! 🌊 Now we're traveling Northwards again🧭, leaving the inner Polarcircle and crossing our fingers for an afternoon excursion! 🤞 The morning excursion was replaced by interesting lectures on European explorers at the Peninsula ⚓ and a geological lesson on the drifting Continents: the forces that built Antarctica. 🗻 After lunch the water calmed down. The expedition team found a sheltered spot to unload the Zodiac's!🚣 The excursion was situated in the sheltered water of Planeau Bay. Half of the excursion time we set foot on land, our first (is)land of Antarctica: Petermanns island! The island is deserted (by men at least) leaving a research cabin behind which now functions as an emergency shelter. We could walk around a bit and up on the mountain there was our 'rots in de branding' it was our geologist Norm! And he totally rocks talking about rocks :) 🪨 Also lots of Gentoo pinguïns (the ones with a with spot like headphones on their head)🐧 and some Adélies (perfectly black and white with a white circle around their eyes)🐧 were spotted. 🧑‍🏫Some notes to take: Nothing prepares you to be actually in a penguin colony. First of all, it is smelly👃, no cleaners around and they poop and pee on the same places where they lay their eggs. Due to this, it isn't perfectly white, like some of the documentaries are showing us. Not only the birds guano is colouring the ice, also red and green algae make the colonies a colourful place. And when you expect it to be all peaceful, you don't know about the evil -still incredible- skuas🦅, robbing the parents from their eggs or chicks. Also the relation between parents and chicks isn't always developing in a peaceful way. The chicks are very demanding, causing hilarious scenes of chicks almost the size of their parents chasing their parents for more food -just like teenagers-.🐣 (Oh and look at that sneaky pinguïn stealing rocks :o later more on that) On our way back to the Zodiac's we crossed paths with a seal🦭. The rest of the time we spend on the water spotting icebergs and searching for whales -sadly, we did not succeed in the latter🐋❌-. Full of curiosity, after diner, we went to the bar talk titled 'Sex on the beach' given by Miko. No cocktails were offered🍹❌, but instead we learned about the sex life of the elephant seal. We all hope that in our next life we won't turn into one. Male elephant seals can weight up to 4 ton, while the weight of females doesn't rise much further than a meager 1 ton. And now think of the name of that cocktail again.... After the talk we formed the Miko-fanclub and stalked him with questions. We learned that the Wombat's butt is the most epic butt in the world (for example it's fire resistant) and he informed us of a human that has been raped by an elephant seal (new nightmare🙈). -again credits to Claudia💞 for the most beautiful pictures-

Country Guides:

Antarctica