The continent

So to pick up where I left off…dealing with the bad weather, we did actually make it to the Ukrainian scientific base. It was fun to see, but man, I could never live there. This base operates all year, whereas the British one only operates in the summer. We all got the feeling that the Ukrainian base was a bit more serious. There is also a bar, and some people got shots of vodka. We looked around their gift shop, appropriately named “The Southernmost Souvenir Shop on the Earth”. However, it was rather expensive, so we didn’t buy anything. It was a bit hazardous getting back to the ship. For every landing site the ship lowers its anchor as close as it can get safely, and then the passengers are sent out in tiny little zodiacs, which only hold 8 people. Everyone on the ship is in a group of 30 or so people, and you are supposed to go get on the zodiacs when your group is called. There have been some issues about waiting your turn, but all the kinks were worked out by the last day, as there was someone who appointed himself bodyguard of the line to get on the zodiac.
However, about the hazard about getting back on that day was that we had to sail through a very small channel to get to the site on the zodiac. While at the southernmost gift shop of the world, I overheard our expedition leader, Karin, (who my mom and I refer to as Doppelganger Jan - All you Knox people, she looks exactly like Jan Koran, that trustee who always gives speeches at homecoming, and speaks at commencement about the ceremony 100 years ago) saying that the channel we sailed through was icing over quickly, and we may be stuck there. So, I grabbed my mom, and our little group of friends, and ushered them quickly to the boat, so we got out of there before it froze. The leaders who always leave the site last had to find another way out.
That evening, we drove through the Lemaire channel when it was nice out (we had gone through it in the morning when it was too foggy to see) and so we all took lots and lots of pictures. The next day it was snowing, but not too heavily, so we were able to make it to our two sites that were actually on the Antarctic peninsula. We have been landing on small islands that from a map look like they are connected, but aren’t. There are very few places you can actually land on the peninsula because it is so icy and rocky, and has so many glaciers that calve frequently (calving is when there is so much snow that it can’t take the weight so large chunks of snow fall off and become icebergs.)
Our first stop was in Paradise Harbor, a little bay that’s tall sides protect whatever is in there from most weather conditions. We stopped at an Argentinean base that had been abandoned after the base doctor went insane and burnt it to the ground. We got to see more penguin rookeries, and then climb to the top of a mountain. I even saw some moss on the mountain, which is the first green thing I think I have seen in nature here. The best part about the climb, however, was that we got to slide all the way down a different path- using our waterproof coats as sleds. I did it twice it was so much fun.
After we left the base, the zodiac drove us around the bay some more to see blue-eyed shags (a type of bird) and their nests. Oddly enough we saw what we think was a photo shoot going on in the bay…some man was holding skis and the others were taking pictures. Since skiing is pretty much impossible here, especially where we had landed, it did not make much sense. The coolest thing we saw in the ride was an incredible iceberg, it had three sides so our zodiac drove right into it and let us sit in it for a while. I even touched it ☺.
When we returned to the ship, we ate lunch and then sat up on the observation deck looking for whales until the next landing in the afternoon at Neko Harbor, another site on the actual peninsula. We got to see more penguin rookeries and a fantastic view from the top of the hill. There was also a seal lying on the beach, so that was fun to see and take pictures of. This was our last landing, and we started to head north. Today we are in the Drake Passage, having just as much fun as the first crossing. ☹. We will make it to Ushuaia in a few days, and then fly back to Buenos Aires, and then home!!