From the Bridge: Lemaire Channel
by Ben Lyons

Without a doubt, standing on the bridge as Chief Officer of the National Geographic Explorer gives me a great window onto the remarkable places we travel. In an effort to bring a bit of that “view from the bridge” to the blog, I’m going to send in occasional photos I’ve taken while on watch over the last year. Coupled with a brief description of where we are and what we’re doing, hopefully it will provide another perspective on a typical day — such as there ever is — on board National Geographic Explorer.

A living hero, an American patriot and space pioneer, when Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong landed the Eagle on the moon thirty years ago, the event marked not only the fulfillment of President Kennedy’s mission to send someone to the moon before the end of the 1960s, but also began a new era of space exploration for all humanity. Buzz Aldrin is a reminder of the adventurous spirit of our country and stands as one of the bravest explorers of all time. He will share his memories of his momentous walk on the moon, the travels he’s taken since and his vision for the future of exploration with guests aboard National Geographic Explorer in Antarctica on the Jan. 7, 2010 voyage.

Join our 15-day Antarctica expedition on the January 7, 2010 departure, and you’ll share one of the most exhilarating adventures left on Earth with a space hero — veteran of the historic Apollo 11 moonwalk mission — in the 40th anniversary year of that epic achievement! Travel to the ultimate explorer’s destination aboard National Geographic Explorer, the world’s ultimate expedition ship, under the command of the top Ice Masters in expedition travel — guided by experts from Lindblad and National Geographic.

To say the least, my job as Chief Officer on the 148 guest National Geographic Explorer is significantly different, in many ways, from my previous job as Chief Officer on a large megaship. In fact, driving the large ships- where the itinerary is often the same week after week, with no ability to deviate from the set schedule- my colleagues would often jokingly refer to themselves as “bus drivers” with very limited roles.

But on the National Geographic Explorer, I find a tremendous amount of job satisfaction from ‘driving’ the ship. Certainly, it never gets rote or boring. Even when sailing for an entire season in the same region- such as our four months in Antarctica- our itinerary is never the same. We adapt every expedition to take the maximum advantage of natural conditions like changing weather or ice conditions.

By Ben Lyons, Chief Mate, National Geographic Explorer

One of the delights of living in New York City (at least for the six months a year I’m not on board National Geographic Explorer) is that there are enough people around to support any interest that one might have. For me, that means there is not just one organization with people fanatically interested in ships, but several. One of these groups is the World Ship Society, and I found myself last week speaking to them about working for Lindblad Expeditions.

This was the third time I had spoken to the group in the last nine years; previous topics included a year at sea on cargo ships as a cadet and time spent working as a deck officer on board Cunard’s Queen Mary 2. Admittedly, many in the Society tend to be more interested on the larger passenger ships or the more obscure, older ships still in existence. Our new National Geographic Explorer didn’t fit into either category, and I wasn’t entirely sure just how much interest they would have in hearing about the comparatively small (albeit nimble) ships in Lindblad Expeditions' fleet. I wondered if there would be no, or very little, audience. 

Happily, that wasn’t the case...

By Ben Lyons

For most of the time I’m working as Chief Officer of the National Geographic Explorer, I stand watch on the bridge only with my lookout and helmsman. But when we’re sailing down the indented Norwegian coast, skirting close by skerries and lighthouses and finding our way deep into narrow fjords, we are also assisted by two Norwegian pilots. They work in shifts supplementing our bridge team, offering invaluable local knowledge on this very demanding itinerary.

In addition to being friendly colleagues to work with, they can offer us some invaluable bits of knowledge. For instance, on our northbound trip from Bergen to Svalbard this year, one evening we visited a small island community well offshore, and well off the beaten track. I asked our Expedition Leader Bud Lehnhausen how, many years ago, had we ever found such a destination in the first place?

Bud said he asked a pilot once, “You’ve been sailing this coast for 20 years—where is the one place you’ve always wanted to go to but never been able to reach?” And when the pilot mentioned this particular island, they simply took the ship there when they had a few extra hours in the schedule. Finding the community to be well worth visiting and completely unique, we started calling there every year…

By Ben Lyons

It's hard to get jaded on the National Geographic Explorer. For most people, a trip to Antarctica or the Arctic is an experience of a lifetime. Those of us who work on board have the privilege of returning there, year after year to our globetrotting expedition ship.

But one of the inherent benefits of expedition travel ― our core philosophy of keeping a flexible schedule ― is one of the many reasons it is difficult to get jaded working here. The ability to be spontaneous and take advantage of unplanned encounters often creates the most memorable moments of an expedition, and it certainly keeps each week fresh and exciting for me. Last week was just such an example. We were spending the morning cruising in beautiful Tysfjorden ― perhaps the most spectacular of all the Norwegian fjords we sail in ― and the plan was for an afternoon of kayaking, Zodiac cruising and hiking to a large waterfall.

Having heard from many people how wonderful the hike was, I planned to take advantage of some free time in my schedule and go ashore upon arrival. I figured I’d be able to start hiking just around lunch time and easily be back for my 4pm watch on the bridge.

My timing was thrown off, however, when I noticed the ship quickly doing a 180 degree turn around 10am…

I admit that as Chief Officer aboard National Geographic Explorer, I probably look at things slightly different on the ship than many of our crew and guests do. For instance, following a summer in the ice in Arctic Svalbard, our return to Norway meant more to me than just beautiful fjords and wonderful hiking. Instead, my main thought was a bit more pedestrian: I could finally paint the ship’s hull again!

In Svalbard, opportunities to touch up the hull are basically non-existent. We only tie up at the pier in Longyearbyen for a few hours to embark and disembark guests, and those days are so busy it is impossible for the deck crew devote the entire day to painting. And the rest of the time in Svalbard, we’re either at anchor on a landing or underway.

Of course, the weather in Svalbard is not idea for painting, either. Paint has to be applied on dry days with moderate temperatures, and the polar regions are usually cooler than the manufacturer’s recommendation. And with the ship crunching through ice each week, painting the lower part of the hull can be a somewhat futile effort.

So by the end of the season, the Chief Officer in me is desperate to get a chance to spiff up the ship’s exterior a bit. And when we docked in Tromso the other day, I had the perfect opportunity. The sun was shining, the temperature pleasantly mild, and the forecast called for no rain. The hull was quickly rinsed with fresh water, and our longtime Lindblad Bos’n Villaruel Bunquin turned the entire deck gang loose on the port side of the ship...

By Ben Lyons

For some of our naturalists onboard the National Geographic Explorer, leaving remote and remarkable areas such as Svalbard can often be difficult. Take staff member John Fonseca, for instance. John has over-wintered at Scott Base on the South Pole, and works part of the year at Palmer Station in Antarctica. For the other half of the year, he works with Lindblad in Baja, Alaska, and Svalbard.

For the last several weeks, John has been working with us in Svalbard, and he has developed a very predictable routine. He is reliably one of the first people to visit me on the bridge every morning, arriving usually between 5 and 6AM. He soon grabs binoculars and spends hours scanning the horizon and the pack ice, always in search of possible encounters with Polar Bears.

But yesterday was our first day back in “civilization” since June. We’re currently on our “Beyond the North Cape” expedition from Longyearbyen, Svalbard to Bergen, Norway, and this was our first day back on mainland Norway. The contrast in scenery could not be more striking. Gone, almost overnight, was stark, barren tundra. Instead, we spend impossibly beautiful days winding along Norway’s green coast, far removed from cities.

So upon arriving in the morning, John asked in jest what the numerous “green, bushy things,” otherwise known as trees, were, and quickly settling into his normal routine, he picked up the binoculars and started scanning, asking out of habit, “Have you seen any Polar Bears yet?” ...

by Ben Lyons

But it was the polar bear spotted on the shore that was particularly noteworthy. This was the 100^th polar bear we’ve seen this season in Svalbard. And in case you wonder how we keep track of all our bear sightings, rest assured we’ve developed a highly technical, foolproof way of keeping tracks of bear sightings over the season: We make notches in the wood paneling on the bridge.

The tradition started several years ago aboard the National Geographic Endeavour. The first rule was very simple — a notch was only made when the polar bear was seen by at least one guest. More rules were quickly developed, though, and thankfully we've brought over all the same rules to the National Geographic Explorer… 

By Ben Lyons

As the National Geographic Explorer has been making her way along the Norwegian coast this week, I have been standing the 12x4 watch. This puts me on duty on the bridge from noon to 4pm and midnight to 4am. Sailing north, we’ve watched festive bonfires as the Norwegians celebrated mid-summer, and only a few days into the expedition, I experienced a very unusual event as we approached the Arctic Circle. Around 12:45am on June 24th, I saw the sun set for the last time until mid August.

Over the course of our previous British Isles expedition and our current track north along Norway, we’ve watched the sun set later and later in the evening. Instead of being surrounded by complete darkness in the middle of the night, my watches gradually became filled with a dark gray. As each day passed, I experienced more and more color, with twilights eventually bookending either end of my shift.

For a watch that is usually defined by stark contrasts of daylight (noon to 4:00pm) and night (midnight to 4:00pm), it has been like leaving behind a black and white world and suddenly discovering a rainbow of colors. The fjords and narrow channels we’ve been weaving through have been lit dramatically, making the already spectacular scenery of this indented coast almost impossibly beautiful.