This morning guests aboard National Geographic Explorer awoke parked in fast ice off Port Lockroy on Wiencke Island. Feeling a little bit more like Christmas in terms of weather, we dawned our layers and had fun walking on water on the ice that remains from last winter’s freeze. We all had the opportunity to visit Port Lockroy, a former British Base that was occupied almost continuously between 1944 and 1962. In World War II the British Government was concerned about what was happening around the Southern Ocean. German commerce raiders had sunk/captured allied shipping and other countries had been showing an interest in the British claimed territory-known as the Falkland Island Dependencies. In particular the territorial aspirations of Argentina and Chile were of concern because they had made formal claims that overlapped the territory of the British. The presence of the British thus established at Port Lockroy was further strengthened with an official post office that helped strengthen their political claim to this area. Reopened with the restoration of Bransfield House (now a museum) in 1996 we were able to share the incredible experiences of this voyage via post with our friends and family.
After leaving Port Lockroy we cruised North through Neumayer Channel back into Gerlache Strait to re-visit Dallmann Bay in hopes that we could find some of the amazing humpbacks we experienced on Christmas Eve. The deeper in we got to Fournier Bay the more whales came to surface. They were feeding on the krill that sustains all life around the Peninsula, and we were given a final finale to what has truly been an epic voyage! Leaving Anvers Island we head north across the Drake and pray for calm waters in what can be a rough and tumble sea.
