Neko Harbour, Cuverville and Lemaire Channel
Today has been a day of extraordinary light effects, culminating in the most stunning finale.
Early birds at 0400 were treated to pastel shades of pink, lilac and lavender as the sun hit the peaks of the Antarctic peninsula, the same peaks we could see from Neptune’s Window on Deception Island yesterday. We had crossed the Bransfield Strait in the night and are now exploring the sawtooth mountain chain of the peninsula. A stiff breeze whipped up the water as we dropped anchor in Neko Harbour, once a favourite haven for nineteenth century whaling ships. At our first Zodiac landing among the pink granite boulders, we had to scamper up the beach like startled penguins, for part of the glacier across the bay collapsed, sending a mini tsunami across the bay. In the spirit of the great explorers, we toiled uphill past the raucous kindergarten of a gentoo penguin colony and onto the smooth flanks of the glacier. Snow crystals sparkled in the sun, boots crunched on the crisp surface of the icefield. From a rock turret 400’ above the bay, we surveyed the panorama: a toy ship on the deep blue pond of the bay; the white comet of a tiny black Zodiac like a pond skater, and below us red ants in single file inching across the white counterpane of the lower slopes. From our rock eyrie, midgets in an immensity of ice and snow, we sat ringed by gleaming white mountains, and far beyond, pale gold against the china blue sky, stood Mt. Francais, at 9,400’ the highest peak in this part of the peninsula. Small avalanches had plucked away the snow blanket to reveal scraps of colourful plaid, pale green rocks zigzagged with red granite dykes.
As we moved south from Neko the wind dropped and soon every scene was duplicated by mirror-perfect reflections. Off the moss-green dome of Cuverville island, Endeavour halted for the afternoon, dwarfed by grounded icebergs, and we put kayaks down: it was the perfect afternoon to paddle among the domes and turrets of blue ice and listen to the silence. Others sat onshore in glorious sunshine to watch the Gentoo penguins while one heroic group toiled 800’ up the snow slope for the view from the summit of Cuverville. As the afternoon ended we continued through Paradise Bay, past the Chilean base at Waterboat Point and the abandoned Argentine base Almirante Brown. But the day had saved the best till last. For as we steamed down the Lemaire Channel, dazzled by the setting sun, there was a brief, incomparable moment of epiphany. We jinked to starboard to avoid some ice, and in that moment the sun, masked by the jagged peaks of Booth Island, sent a golden beam down the channel, a blinding light on the road to Petermann, which in one sublime instant seemed to all on deck like a glow from the dawn of the world.
Today has been a day of extraordinary light effects, culminating in the most stunning finale.
Early birds at 0400 were treated to pastel shades of pink, lilac and lavender as the sun hit the peaks of the Antarctic peninsula, the same peaks we could see from Neptune’s Window on Deception Island yesterday. We had crossed the Bransfield Strait in the night and are now exploring the sawtooth mountain chain of the peninsula. A stiff breeze whipped up the water as we dropped anchor in Neko Harbour, once a favourite haven for nineteenth century whaling ships. At our first Zodiac landing among the pink granite boulders, we had to scamper up the beach like startled penguins, for part of the glacier across the bay collapsed, sending a mini tsunami across the bay. In the spirit of the great explorers, we toiled uphill past the raucous kindergarten of a gentoo penguin colony and onto the smooth flanks of the glacier. Snow crystals sparkled in the sun, boots crunched on the crisp surface of the icefield. From a rock turret 400’ above the bay, we surveyed the panorama: a toy ship on the deep blue pond of the bay; the white comet of a tiny black Zodiac like a pond skater, and below us red ants in single file inching across the white counterpane of the lower slopes. From our rock eyrie, midgets in an immensity of ice and snow, we sat ringed by gleaming white mountains, and far beyond, pale gold against the china blue sky, stood Mt. Francais, at 9,400’ the highest peak in this part of the peninsula. Small avalanches had plucked away the snow blanket to reveal scraps of colourful plaid, pale green rocks zigzagged with red granite dykes.
As we moved south from Neko the wind dropped and soon every scene was duplicated by mirror-perfect reflections. Off the moss-green dome of Cuverville island, Endeavour halted for the afternoon, dwarfed by grounded icebergs, and we put kayaks down: it was the perfect afternoon to paddle among the domes and turrets of blue ice and listen to the silence. Others sat onshore in glorious sunshine to watch the Gentoo penguins while one heroic group toiled 800’ up the snow slope for the view from the summit of Cuverville. As the afternoon ended we continued through Paradise Bay, past the Chilean base at Waterboat Point and the abandoned Argentine base Almirante Brown. But the day had saved the best till last. For as we steamed down the Lemaire Channel, dazzled by the setting sun, there was a brief, incomparable moment of epiphany. We jinked to starboard to avoid some ice, and in that moment the sun, masked by the jagged peaks of Booth Island, sent a golden beam down the channel, a blinding light on the road to Petermann, which in one sublime instant seemed to all on deck like a glow from the dawn of the world.
