Antarctica - Towards South Georgia 17 January

17 January

We turned our clocks forward an hour during the night.  I still have to adjust my watch.  The sea was pretty calm throughout the night and in the morning there had been some rain and the day settled to being overcast with a little low fog.  There was much discussion about when we might cross the Antarctic Convergence Zone where the cold waters of the pole create a currents travelling clockwise which meet up withtheirneighbours the warmer waters of the sub-Antarctic.  Around lunch time the waters became more choppy and there were suddenly more petrels scooping the ocean in busy flocks.  There was no announcement but I like to think that was the spot.

Today we had to go through bio-security procedures required by the South Georgian government, to ensure we take no exotic seeds to the island.  This necessitated a vacuuming of our bags and external clothing as well as washing our boots.  The process will take most of  the afternoon as t hey are doing just ten at a time.  We were responsible for taking all the clothes we intended to wear on the island and we were asked to sign off that we h ad done this.


A Sea Day enroute to South Georgia Tuesday, 17 January 2012

It appears this morning that we have traded the beautiful sunny skies and rocky seas of
yesterday for a more overcast sky, however, much calmer sea.

It wasnʼt long through breakfast that we were delighted to have a couple of whales spotted just off the starboard bow of the ship. At around 8:30 a.m. a couple of Fin whales made their presence known to those of us for a brief moment to those seated at breakfast near the bow, and shortly thereafter a couple of humpback whales added some more excitement. Later on in the morning, a couple of guests reported seeing some hourglass dolphins just off the starboard side of the ship.

At 9:30 John gave us an interesting talk on the seals that we may encounter on our adventure here at South Georgia and in Antarctica including The Weddell Seal, Crab Eater seal, the rarely seen Ross seal and finally, the Leopard seal.

At 11:00, Frank Todd talked to us about the Penguins of the South Atlantic. Frank, when asked what type of penguin was his favourite replied “the one I happen to be working on at the time”. We were introduced to the Rock Hopper, Macaroni, Adele, King and Emperor.

Later this afternoon we were all called to the mud room for our Bio-security operation where all of our outer weather gear and boots must be cleaned of any foreign material, such as seeds and mud, so that no non-native material is introduced to the sensitive South Georgia Islands.

The buzz on the ship is ever increasing as we all anticipate our first encounter with the
wonderful South Georgia Islands in the Spirit of Shackleton.

We all canʼt wait.

Submitted by: Jeff Wiseman / Musician