Once-in-a-Lifetime Adventure at Once-in-a-Lifetime Savings NOTE: This post has been updated to reflect new discounts still available on our Pacific cruises Book one of our 2012 Pacific cruises by January 31, 2012 and save up to 40% off the posted price! The Orion and Orion II represent small-ship adventure cruising at its best. Both hold [...]
Category: Antarctica
Marie
Dec 15
|14:03
Wildlife and adventure travel often forces us to examine practices going on in the world that are controversial. We came across this story recently about whales in Antarctica that are still being hunted by the Japanese, despite an almost universal ban on whaling by most nations on earth. At the Institute of Cetacean Research in [...]
Marie
Feb 3
|10:35
How would you like to take an Antarctica tour in 2011 to see both penguins and polar bears in their natural habitat? You’ll have to settle for a picnic at your local zoo, whether this year or next. Or the year after that. Polar bears and penguins literally live at opposite ends of the earth. [...]
susanadie
Dec 1
|10:56
29 NOVEMBER Half Moon Island, Moon Bay in the great Southern Ocean Today, snow is falling on snow. Mountains of snow turned to ice creating mountains of ice with more snow falling on it. This of course has been going on for hundreds of centuries. It is just that today, we are spectators of this [...]
susanadie
Dec 1
|10:48
29 NOVEMBER In the presence of whales. The time – midday. The place – Bransfield Strait. The event – Humpback whales. Be there…. And we all were. Some dressed for the occasion others not. Winds were light out of the south to 10 knots, sea state mild. We slowed the ship because [...]
susanadie
Dec 1
|10:35
SUNDAY 28 NOVEMBER Big Silence Visibility in the Neumeyer Channel was terrible today, less than one mile horizontal and perhaps 1,000 feet vertical. And it was snowing. But still there was so much to see. The islands which define this channel are all cloaked with tidewater glaciers. Within the face of each I can see [...]
susanadie
Dec 1
|10:24
27 NOVEMBER Penguin Trails Punching through deep snow, a slight icy crust prevents you from dropping down 5 feet! The reality is, the snow is deeper this year than other years. But we have been saying that almost every year since the first time I visited Antarctica. As a matter of fact, the Ukrainian research [...]
susanadie
Nov 26
|11:43
24 NOVEMBER 2010 – Ezcarra Bay King George Island, South Shetland Islands, Antarctica The Drake had been rather kind to us, a circumstance that those of us who live on board really appreciated. However, by the time we got to the South Shetlands, the weather had changed! We reached Nelson Strait in a blizzard. It [...]
susanadie
Nov 23
|19:33
SUNDAY 21 NOVEMBER 2010 – Drake Passage approach to Cape Mountains. Mountains of ice. Mountains of rocks. Mountains of waves. 10! A perfect 10! OK – there is never perfection – but it is still a 10. On the Beaufort scale that means a storm. The wind is steady to 50 knots from the NW [...]
susanadie
Nov 23
|19:26
18 NOVEMBER THURSDAY Port Lockroy / Neko Harbour There is too much ice to get the ship and Zodiacs close to shore to make a landing today. So we are Zodiac cruising in the ice. On a day like today – I wish I was a landscape painter. I would choose Paine’s Gray to paint [...]
