Gunnel Channel, Hanusse Bay, 67°04.5’ South
We crossed the Antarctic Circle last night at 2245, to a rousing blast on the horn and cheers from an excited crowd on the bridge. It certainly looked Antarctic in the cold grey light, thickening flurries of wet snow about our heads and the sea awash with brash and bergy bits. Passing down Mudge Channel (which looked particularly mudgy at the time) and along Crystal Sound, it had been an anxious time on the bridge. The chart here says “Not properly surveyed” which kept our captain glued to the depth recorder, a stiff tailwind pushing us into uncharted waters. Today we skirted Adelaide Island, tempted by the lack of ice to try for the narrow gullet of Gunnel Channel. Before long we were punching through icefloes, intent on our target. Scattered among the shifting plates of flat, white, sea-ice were the glowing blue humpback fragments of melted icebergs. Clusters of crabeater seals sprawled on the floes, sleeping off their krill banquets. Patrolling the ice were watchful skuas, checking constantly for some scrap left from others’ tables. Loveliest of all, the darting, pure white snow petrels wheeled among the bergs, now lost against the ice, now reborn against the steely grey of the sea.
Then pandemonium: “Emperor on the starboard bow!” The helmsman crept the ship toward a glassy blue berg on which was perched an immaculate adult emperor penguin. It’s that Lindblad luck again, for this is the avian El Dorado: the Emperor, largest and most elusive of the penguins, is rarely seen on the Antarctic peninsula. Occasionally we have stumbled upon immature birds in heavy moult, but here was an adult bird in its regimental finery, steel-blue back, golden ear patch and silken, lemon-yellow breast. After a reverential, lingering look, we reversed quietly, leaving it to preen in peace.
Our next excitement was an expanse of fast ice, into which the captain neatly ploughed the ship’s bow until we were firmly parked. Spectacularly freed from the bosom of the mother ship, we all spilled out onto the ice, our red coats suddenly transforming the frozen waste into a lively Breughel painting. But when at last we reached Hanusse Bay, we found the Gunnel Channel choked with a multiple iceberg pile-up, bringing us up short at our furthest south this season: an impressive 67° 04.5’.
What more could you ask of a day: the full gallery of ice splendour, an audience with an Emperor, and a stroll on the ice. Just when we were about to collapse into our cabins to replay all these stunning images in our heads, a final excited call had us sprinting down corridors: “Killer Whales!” A last polar vignette to add to our treasure trove of memories: the tall stiletto fin of a big male orca breaking the surface, the blows of two smaller companions, then a female with a tiny calf tucked close by her flanks. We shadowed them for 15 minutes as they patrolled the sea ahead of us, an escort of black-browed albatrosses crossing their wake while they hunted the flotilla of flat bergs for a seal supper.
We crossed the Antarctic Circle last night at 2245, to a rousing blast on the horn and cheers from an excited crowd on the bridge. It certainly looked Antarctic in the cold grey light, thickening flurries of wet snow about our heads and the sea awash with brash and bergy bits. Passing down Mudge Channel (which looked particularly mudgy at the time) and along Crystal Sound, it had been an anxious time on the bridge. The chart here says “Not properly surveyed” which kept our captain glued to the depth recorder, a stiff tailwind pushing us into uncharted waters. Today we skirted Adelaide Island, tempted by the lack of ice to try for the narrow gullet of Gunnel Channel. Before long we were punching through icefloes, intent on our target. Scattered among the shifting plates of flat, white, sea-ice were the glowing blue humpback fragments of melted icebergs. Clusters of crabeater seals sprawled on the floes, sleeping off their krill banquets. Patrolling the ice were watchful skuas, checking constantly for some scrap left from others’ tables. Loveliest of all, the darting, pure white snow petrels wheeled among the bergs, now lost against the ice, now reborn against the steely grey of the sea.
Then pandemonium: “Emperor on the starboard bow!” The helmsman crept the ship toward a glassy blue berg on which was perched an immaculate adult emperor penguin. It’s that Lindblad luck again, for this is the avian El Dorado: the Emperor, largest and most elusive of the penguins, is rarely seen on the Antarctic peninsula. Occasionally we have stumbled upon immature birds in heavy moult, but here was an adult bird in its regimental finery, steel-blue back, golden ear patch and silken, lemon-yellow breast. After a reverential, lingering look, we reversed quietly, leaving it to preen in peace.
Our next excitement was an expanse of fast ice, into which the captain neatly ploughed the ship’s bow until we were firmly parked. Spectacularly freed from the bosom of the mother ship, we all spilled out onto the ice, our red coats suddenly transforming the frozen waste into a lively Breughel painting. But when at last we reached Hanusse Bay, we found the Gunnel Channel choked with a multiple iceberg pile-up, bringing us up short at our furthest south this season: an impressive 67° 04.5’.
What more could you ask of a day: the full gallery of ice splendour, an audience with an Emperor, and a stroll on the ice. Just when we were about to collapse into our cabins to replay all these stunning images in our heads, a final excited call had us sprinting down corridors: “Killer Whales!” A last polar vignette to add to our treasure trove of memories: the tall stiletto fin of a big male orca breaking the surface, the blows of two smaller companions, then a female with a tiny calf tucked close by her flanks. We shadowed them for 15 minutes as they patrolled the sea ahead of us, an escort of black-browed albatrosses crossing their wake while they hunted the flotilla of flat bergs for a seal supper.
