Up and on deck at 5.20am before sunrise as the captain was going to attempt to pass through the Lemaire channel. This season the channel has only been passed through 3 times due to rough seas and/or ice build up. We were in luck, it was a beautiful day, there was only minimal ice in the passage and we got to pass through the snowy white cliffs. Sunrise occurring all around us, it was beuatiful. We had a fleeting glance of a Fin whale (the 2nd largest whale and fastest) and Gareth and Dan (another Welsh passenger) saw a huge chuck of ice break off a glacier to our left as we passed through the passage. Scenery and skies infront and behind us were amazing.
On the otherside of the Lemaire channel there were a lot more icebergs, mainly small but with the rising sun reflecting off them created a very pretty scene. Our captain navigated his was around them and we had our 1st landing of the day after breakfast at Yalour Island. The island is a mixture of snow and rock it has a colony of Adelie penguins (a species of penguin only found in Antarctica, not further north on the south shetland islands like some of the other species). We had time to spend watching these, all their chicks were fledged now as their breeding season is more advanced than other more northerly species of penguin. There were also plenty of Skuas (another type of sea bird) flying around. We also spent time just sitting on the rocks watching the surrounding scenery and the movement of 3 large iceburgs, moving closer together and finally colliding with a series of bangs and squirting of water.
Back on the ship we retraced our passage through the Lemair channel. Equally beautiful in full daylight and with much more ice now, proabably blown in. The Antarctic Dream being a former icebreaker didn't have any trouble getting through. Gareth saw a Leopard seal leave the iceburg it was sitting on catch and then toss a penguin around. Apparently the Leopard seal method of skinning it. We then had our second landing of the day at Dorian bay, back just around the coastland from Port Lockroy, where we had been yesterday. Most of us walked up the hill to a level plateau where there were good views of the sheltered Dorian Bay below us on one side with the Antarctic dream and a couple of sailboats moored up in it and across the otherside we could see Port Lockroy. Walking back down to the bay we had a quick look around 'Damoy Hut' a former British hut, now unmanned but set out how it would have been when previously in use. Planes used to land on the level plateau above the hut, which we had just walked up to, when boats couldn't get into the bay.
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| The welsh contingent, Alison, Gareth and Dan |
Back on the Antarctic dream whilst we were having dinner the captain set course for the Melchior Islands in Dallam bay. Just as I go to the front of the queue for pudding, plate in hand there was a tannoy announcement of a whale sighting off the boat. A brief moment of hesitaion, pudding or whale? before the plate was hastily set down and I made my way with most of the others to the front of the boat to watch 3 humpback whales. Lovely to watch, especially to the backdrop of a beautiful sunset. The whales were pretty active, probably feeding and reasonably close to the boat for some good viewing. We got to see their tails as they dived, backs and fins. Typically as I'd been at dinner I didn't have any warm clothes with me, but didn't want to loose whale watching time getting an extra jumper so I put up with it and finished the day as I'd begun, on deck and very very cold, but it was definitely worth it.
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