Thank you to everyone who took such amazing photos of the kayaking group. It was a little difficult for us to take photos when we were trying to avoid icebergs, wind gusts and whales!
I love this photo! The water is so glassy and perfect. The kayaking group wore yellow suits that made us stand out. Kayaking on the trip was an add-on that had to be pre-purchased before boarding and it was limited to 16 participants. We had 12 in our group on this trip and if you're considering going to Antarctica, I would say kayaking is a must!
I love this photo because it captures the size proportions and makes me think we were insane for kayaking near these animals!
The infamous Leopard Seal spectacular.
Vicky holding up her bergy bit!
I think I spotted something.
Sully & Jordan in Wilhelmina Bay after we had an incredible late afternoon paddling with whales.
This is one of the beach launches- I think we only did two beach launches on the trip.
Me holding up my bergy bit!
Look at my game face.
Someone caught me taking a selfie with the bergy bit!
I love this photo because we hit rough patch of water around the shore and had to learn how to back paddle into waves with the kayaks perpendicular to the waves to avoid rolling. We thought it was a blast but our guides were clearly concerned!
Oh hey there seal!
A rather large marine mammal rolling up...
Towing the kayaks to launch after our visit to Neko Harbor.
Pinnepeds, or seals, were unexpectedly a large part of the trip. Actually, everything on this trip was unexpected. If I remember correctly there are over 20 species of seals in the world. We spotted several types of seals throughout the trip:
Admittedly I had a tough time identifying the differences between some of the seals we saw while kayaking or while on land, but I will certainly always be able to identify the Southern Elephant Seal and the Leopard Seal as we had particularly memorable experiences with both! Clearly I was not paying close enough attention during our seal class but hopefully I'll correctly identify the seals in the photos we took during the trip. I plan to do a couple more posts on seals to get into more detail about some of our experiences. For now here is some GoPro footage and some photos taken by me and others.
Some GoPro footage of our encounters with seals:
A short clip of a seal sneaking under my kayak. This took place on our first excursion- I was so thankful to have had the GoPro strapped to my head so I could capture this!
I think this is a Fur Seal that was particularly sassy at Deceptions Island. I have several clips of this particular seal chasing after passengers. The worst thing you can do when a seal is chasing you is to run and we all seemed to forget this outside of the classroom.
The Leopard Seal poking our kayaks. We had no idea this happened until the last day of the trip when the staff put together their own GoPro footage.
We witnessed a Leopard Seal catch and kill a penguin on a morning excursion. It took place within a few feet of our kayaks and zodiacs. It was difficult to watch the penguin go, but it was one of those things that makes you realize how amazing nature is.
This is a male Southern Elephant Seal that seriously seemed to stare into my soul. I don't think I took this closeup shot, but I'll be posting more on the day we encountered a pile of about 50 male Elephant Seals in a mud bath pile-up that typically takes place during molting.
A seal resting on a small iceberg. I can't remember if I took this from my kayak or from the ship.
Another seal perched on an iceberg. I think this is a Fur Seal and I'm sure it's fairly obvious to someone else- hopefully someone from the trip will help me out here : )
A Leopard Seal captured by another passenger.
Another great photo captured by someone else on the trip. This is, I believe, a Crabeater Seal who appears to have just finished a meal.
A Weddell Seal appears to be posing as we cruised by on the zodiacs and kayaks. Another passenger captured this photo.
This is a sassy Fur Seal we encountered at Deception Island. Photo also captured by another passenger.
I think this is an Elephant Seal calf we spotted on the beach at Hannah Point.
I didn't expect to fall in love with ice on my trip to Antarctica, but I did. I am completely obsessed with ice, icebergs and bergy bits now. One of the most beautiful surprises of the trip was seeing blue ice. Blue ice is hidden deep within glacier crevasses or is just floating around on and under smaller icebergs.
Why does ice turn blue? When snow falls on a glacier it eventually gets compressed as it moves towards water. While the snow is compressing and moving with the glacier, any air bubbles trapped in the ice are slowly squeezed out of the ice eventually making it clear. The ice looks blue for the same reason that the water looks blue- the result of oxygen and hydrogen bonds that absorb certain light colors and reflect only blue. If you'd like to read more check out wikipedia for a quick lesson.
Here are some of the photos I took of blue (and blue-green) ice!
This is an unedited photo I took when we were cruising through the Lemaire Channel. This smaller iceberg is almost completely blue and really stood out against the glassy water.
A seal resting on some glacier ice extending out from land. The blue green water below it shows the outline of how far the ice extends below the surface.
Close up of the blue crevasses in an iceberg like the one below.
This shows the deep blue crevasses in the glacier wall as well as some blueish icebergs floating in the water.
The color of the water above the iceberg below the surface reminded me of tropical waters.
Those tiny dots are penguins hanging out on the iceberg.
And here are some photos taken by other passengers:
I'm getting used to the questions people ask but am not getting better at my answers. I should just respond with pictures. Once people realize I'm not making some clever joke about the cold weather in NYC and realize yes, I went to Antarctica, they are curious to know why and what I was doing there. Did you get close to the animals? The answer is that the animals got close to us and sometimes without our knowledge. On day one I was lucky enough to capture some footage of a seal gliding under my kayak via the GoPro. Below is a screen shot from that footage.
In some of the videos I posted you can see underwater footage. The underwater footage is from the trip and was filmed by both passengers and staff using the GoPro attached to a 4-6 foot pole submerged under water. We were shocked to see these next photos capturing a curious seal poking our kayaks without our knowledge.
The seal investigated and poked a few of our kayaks from below.
The seal was not quite sure what to make of these yellow objects!
The seal poking a kayak; in the video you can see slight movement which I'm guessing we thought was from the water or wind at the time.
The seal continued to examine and poke the kayaks from below!
GoPro is also how we captured the underwater scenes of the seal killing the penguin. Check out the video if you're not sensitive to blood.
The leopard seal playing with his recently killed penguin. We learned in seal class that this is typical behavior. I'll post more on seals at a later date; we were fortunate to have both a whale and seal expert on board to give lectures and comment on what we witnessed during our excursions.
