Drake Passage
Daybreak finds us halfway across the Drake Passage, a notorious piece of ocean separating Tierra del Fuego from the Antarctic Peninsula. Sir Francis Drake led the first expedition to definitively prove an oceanic connection between the Atlantic and Pacific by sailing south of Cape Horn and around South America in 1578, during only the second circumnavigation of the world. Eleven thousand feet deep in places, this 600 mile wide passage can be tempestuous at times, but thus far we have had only a glimpse of its potential. More than 20 million years ago this waterway opened, as South America and Antarctica spread apart. The Drake has very much defined Antarctica ever since. As cold currents began to circle around the continent and cut it off from more northerly warm waters, the land that had once been relatively lush with fauna and flora started to freeze. A green continent ceased to exist, and a white one took its stead. The existence of the Drake makes Antarctica what it is, and only by sailing through this portal can we explore the frozen mysteries of the south.
We have crossed 60 degrees south latitude, entering the significant portion of the globe that is administered by the Antarctic Treaty. Pictured here is the sea chart detailing the entire Drake Passage, Scotia Sea and all our destinations on this voyage. This chart will become a familiar tool, guiding us across thousands of miles from one remote landfall to the next. Tomorrow morning we will have our first glimpse of a land unlike any other.
Daybreak finds us halfway across the Drake Passage, a notorious piece of ocean separating Tierra del Fuego from the Antarctic Peninsula. Sir Francis Drake led the first expedition to definitively prove an oceanic connection between the Atlantic and Pacific by sailing south of Cape Horn and around South America in 1578, during only the second circumnavigation of the world. Eleven thousand feet deep in places, this 600 mile wide passage can be tempestuous at times, but thus far we have had only a glimpse of its potential. More than 20 million years ago this waterway opened, as South America and Antarctica spread apart. The Drake has very much defined Antarctica ever since. As cold currents began to circle around the continent and cut it off from more northerly warm waters, the land that had once been relatively lush with fauna and flora started to freeze. A green continent ceased to exist, and a white one took its stead. The existence of the Drake makes Antarctica what it is, and only by sailing through this portal can we explore the frozen mysteries of the south.
We have crossed 60 degrees south latitude, entering the significant portion of the globe that is administered by the Antarctic Treaty. Pictured here is the sea chart detailing the entire Drake Passage, Scotia Sea and all our destinations on this voyage. This chart will become a familiar tool, guiding us across thousands of miles from one remote landfall to the next. Tomorrow morning we will have our first glimpse of a land unlike any other.
