Antarctica!!

- January 19, 2019

So after the medical evacuation in Stanley, we turned around towards Antarctica. It took 2 full days at sea from there to finally reach it, crossing the Drake passage and passing the Antarctic convergence, where the water temperature dropped a couple of degrees. Days were pretty relax while at sea. Lots of movies, fooling around and chilling in the lounge. And a little bit of home schooling! Lots of desserts, too. 😵 Sugar rush.

All landings in Antarctica were unique and amazing! We first landed at Baily Head, part of the outer wall of Deception Island, an active volcano which is part of the South Shetland Islands. There, we saw a large colony of chinstrap penguins with multiple chicks in their nests made out of pebbles. So many of them were walking around, making little highways for penguins.

After the afternoon landing, we went inside the crater with the ship to have a look at the scenery. There is an old whaling station, and it's pretty neat just to think that you are inside an active volcano aboard a ship!!

After cruising Deception Island, the ship navigated all night so that we could wake up at Danco Island, where we saw gentoo penguins and played in the snow. The kids were stoked to finally be able to have a snow fight!!

In the afternoon of January 4th, we went to Paradise Bay for a zodiac cruise and a landing at the Argentinian station. The kids just played in the snow all day, for everyone's entertainment!! I still can't believe how many pictures of the kids were taken during this trip. I would say over a thousand!!

On our way back to the ship, Romain held in his hands a piece of ice old of about 10000 years! Pure ice, perfect for vodka. 😜

Once everybody was back onboard, it was time for the famous polar plunge! I had been hesitating all day about doing it or not, especially after seeing a leopard seal before heading back to the ship. 😬 But once they made the announcement on the radio that the time had come, I put my bikini on and went to the mudroom! We live only once as I like to remind myself!!! It felt like 2 minutes before I emerged from the icy water, and went straight back to the ship!! I did it!!! In and out.

The day after, we navigated towards the polar circle. It was quite a ride to get there, but the celebration was fun and we saw some spectacular icebergs all around us. We also saw some groups of humpback whales, which is always cool.

One of our last landings was at Useful Islands, and the zodiac cruise that day was one of the best. Icebergs everywhere, with all different shapes and colors! Unfortunately we were too cold after the cruise to do the hike on top of the hill, but hey, we’ve seen a lot already. Traveling with kids made it a bit harder to do everything, but I can say that Romain and Julianne did an awesome job at being two of the few kids around the globe to ever visit Antarctica!!!

On our way back North, we spotted our first and only pod of orcas. This was definitively part of my personal highlights! They came really close to the ship, and we were lucky enough to be on the bridge for the best view of it all. Yeah!

We have been so lucky on this trip!! The sun has been with us on many days, which was apparently an exception, and the passage of the Drake was as good as it gets. Thank you life!! This is an experience that we are not about to forget... 🤩