06 Feb 2014

17 Jan Voyage: Leaving the Great White

Leaving Antarctica is always difficult.  Leaving the penguins, whales and seals, but most of all leaving the remarkable vistas and sense of scale that makes you realise your true size as a human on the face of the planet.

Cape Adare may have foiled our landing plans with its strong winds, push ice and steep beach making landing too difficult, but we were able to experience several Zodiac cruises along the shore. The Heritage Expeditions staff guided these nimble craft with great skill up to ice floes with Adelie Penguin chicks taking their first dip in the icy seas, penguins making their way home with dinner for the family, Orca circling further out, and even the incredible sight of a Leopard Seal taking several Adelie Penguins and playing with the bodies before devouring them.  Some expeditioners also came away with amusing stories of Adelie Penguins accidently porpoising onto the floor of their Zodiac before being gently returned back overboard by their Zodiac driver!  We sighted Borchgrevink’s 1898 hut and the 250,000 pairs of Adelie Penguins that make this area their home and could see far up onto the plateau above the beach to Hansen’s memorial.  It was then time to bid adieu to ‘our' Antarctica.  At 1500 we set off towards Campbell Island some 1,124 nautical miles away and many aboard held their breath in anticipation of the conditions we may encounter as we leave the relative calm of the Ross Sea.