For anyone interested in the natural history of Alaska or Antarctica, Kim Heacox is of “rock star” status. He was a Special Consultant for Ken Burns’ The National Parks: America’s Best Idea. And, with Shackleton: The Antarctic Challenge, Kim cemented his place as a Shackleton Scholar. Kim has written four books for National Geographic, but Deadly Beauty, which accompanies Paul Nicklen’s images, is the first essay he's contributed to National Geographic magazine. (We blogged about Paul's images Tuesday.) Kim often joins our Expedition Teams as Naturalist on select Arctic, Antarctic and Alaska expeditions.

Right now he is aboard National Geographic Explorer just about to welcome the first guests traveling to Antarctica this season. He wrote an entry for the blog.

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“With snow down to the waterline in the Beagle Passage, and the white peaks of Tierra del Fuego bold against a blue sky, the National Geographic Explorer sails for Antarctica, Terra Australis Incognita, to begin another exciting summer season in Antarctica, the land of penguins, petrels and the alpha predatory among them, the leopard seal.

I had the good fortune to write the leopard seal essay that accompanied Paul Nicklen's stunning, prize-winning photos in National Geographic magazine, September 2009 issue. Paul had the nerve to get in the water with the seals, but he got shots unlike any taken ever before or since. I find that just approaching the seals on the ship, or in a Zodiac, motoring up quietly as they sleep on an ice floe, is hugely rewarding. The seal awakens, opens his massive mouth for a big yawn, and goes back to sleep, or slips into the water to transform from a static ice-bound animal to a snake in the sea, fluid, graceful, powerful. What the lion is to Africa the leopard seal is to Antarctica. We see them on every trip.”

-Kim Heacox