Day 18: Damoy Point

Today was our third day of landings, and because we had had such early activities the day before we gave ourselves leeway to have a few bevvies yesterday. We were looking forward to a bit of a sleep in, but this was thwarted by an announcement by the delightful Tousten,

“Wonderful, good morning dear passengers!”

This morning at 9am we were to be going through the Lemaire Passage and despite the fog we should be on the deck to witness this - in some places it is very skinny and there is ice to navigate. 

We were slightly hungover, so we had to drag ourselves down to Aune for our breakfast buffet. The breakfast didn’t go so well - my hard boiled egg was soft boiled, and barely even that (seemed mostly raw, not fab in my condition!). 

We made our way out to deck 6 - parts of the side of deck 6 are uncovered but the whole front is glass windows with leaning stations. Lots of people were gathered here watching us deftly navigate through the giant icebergs, knocking the occasional smaller one (probably a bergybit or growler) out of the way. The bang as they hit the Nansen was a bit startling! But obviously no need to worry about doing a Titanic. 

Also at the front on deck 6, Helene was doing a science experiment - she was distilling water collected during the science boat expeditions to find invasive species molecules and the rate of phytoplankton in the water. 

We watched the iceberg dodging for quite some time, and then retired to our room to watch the passage from there. 

I almost instantly passed out on our little lounge, and awoke with a start as we were approaching Una’s Peaks, as mentioned yesterday, also called Una’s Tits. They were indeed mighty. 

Sitting bolt upright, the announcement was to let us know that if we had postcards to send, they could be delivered to reception to be taken to Port Lockroy today. Dan had asked earlier in the trip and had been told there wouldn’t be an opportunity on this trip so we could deliver to reception at any time, and we would use the last two days to write them. This new information sent us scrambling. Between us we scribbled 16 postcards, including one to ourselves. While we were hastily writing, another announcement came through the room. This time it was the captain. 

“In line with protocol, I must let everyone on the ship know that there are two positive COVID-19 cases on board. The people are isolating, and I encourage everyone to wear a mask when moving about the ship.”

Dan and I stopped writing and stared at each other. How? We were all tested? Perhaps someone picked it up in the airport or Ushuaia after testing. “Damn, I was enjoying not wearing a mask.”

Hands cramped, we finally finished writing and donning our masks we ran to reception to make sure the postcards were in the post. Butler James (we never found out his real name!) took our postcards and started to count. He feigned exhaustion when he got to the end and asked if we wanted to put any of the ink stamps on them. 

“No,” we said, “we have another postcard here that we’ll stamp. We are also sending a postcard to ourselves to we will get the port lockroy postage stamp that way!”

He shook his head in disbelief but also awe at how organised we were. Dan started ink stamping our spare postcard - one stamp for each destination we had been and where we were going (which was a sneak peek!), then said loudly, 

“And four Drake passage stamps as we crossed it four times!”

“I like your style,” Butler James laughed.  

Today our excursion was set for 3:20pm and we would be alighting at Damoy Point to view more penguin colonies and to visit the historic Argentinian and British supply and rescue huts. We had lunch on the dot of 12pm, and the scenery outside was magnificent. Entirely different to anything we had seen so far, the sky was indeed grey but there was little wind, and it was snowing gently. 

Just stunning. 

The excursions were running early for once, and many of the humpbacks were ready before the Orcas. We ended up on a boat with the Orcas and we’re some of the first of our group over. 

It continued to snow on us gently on the slow zodiac ride over, due to lots of submerged rocks. We came right up close to the ice sheet and I could see that it didn’t quite seem to meet the rocks at the edge, and could also see that it was melting fast. 

Disembarking the zodiac was legs up over the side and splashing into the water. First time testing out the shoes and pants properly! I did feel a little bit of cool near my toes, and in hindsight I think my boots did leak a little…

We waded through the water to collect our stocks (each time Dan and I considered not getting them, but ultimately the hilly areas are a lot easier with the stocks, and coming downhill, it’s just a pest when taking photos), heard the  briefing (we had an hour on land today) and started up the steps that had been carved into the snow/ice by an expedition leader - probably stair master extraordinaire Maarten, the Dutch expedition leader who described his role as deputy as “everything Tousten doesn’t want to do”. 

The smell here was intense. Penguin guano has quite the aroma, and in the bay it seemed extra pronounced. We started up the hill while skuas watched us warily, and penguins splashed on the shore. 

As the queue to the huts was small, we decided to do that first. The bright blue british hut was able to be entered by a handful of people at a time, and Miguel Mexico was manning the door. It was an interesting change of scenery - being inside a building - and after we carefully brushed our feet to enter we spent some time photographing the now historical artefacts inside. Many shovels, bunk beds (they looked cold, especially as the snow was window height outside!), tins and tins of non-perishables, quick dissolve sugar, custard powder and much more. Apparently after the Falkland war the Argentinian’s wanted to keep a watchful eye on the brits, so they built a tiny hut directly next door. We weren’t able to enter the Argentinian hut but it had a couple of broken windows and looked in a greater state of disrepair. 

Out we walked along the path made for us - it was a little steep (but nothing still compared to day one!) when we reached the top we were greeted by Owen who said:

“Welcome to the Colony of Thieves.”

It was amazing watching the little penguins (and one in particular!) keep stealing rocks from one nest and then presenting them back to their lady at their own nest. It was a constant shuffle of stones. My favourite was one thief who was chased away from a nest it was trying to steal from, when he returned to his own nest and pretended to lay a stone down anyway so his lady wouldn’t know he didn’t succeed! (I got it on film, it’s so cute.)

They were so funny. I assume because it’s a long way to get new stones from the shore so it’s easier to steal from your neighbours who have done the hard work!

The penguins were on little rocky crops sticking out of the slow - I assume their body heat stops the areas from settling snow and ice. The next outcrop had amazing view of the Nansen in the background, and the scene was just magical with the snow still gently falling. 

Further on the next rookery had little penguins running down their penguin-made highways - some were so deep we could only see the top of their heads bobbing along!

We stopped to take photos on the way back, and ended up getting back a little late to the launch site. The ice stairs were beginning to disintegrate so I had to take it carefully. To get into the zodiac was the same as getting out, and I realised I might have some trouble. 

We waded into the water up to our knees, and then had to jump our bums up onto the side of the zodiac, swing our legs around and in. I didn’t see Dan do it but he apparently pretty much stepped in, which resulted in a chorus of other boat occupants chastising him for making it look so easy. My turn. I could not get enough height the first time, and Dan captured me flailing like a bug on the GoPro while the expedition crew tried to lift me in. No luck. I threw my bag at Dan and tried again, this time he helped hoist me from the inside and, Ungracefully, I slid down into the boat. 

“Short people problems!” A lady uttered sympathetically, while I laughed and tried to hide my embarrassment. 

Once back to the ship, we thought - jacuzzi! The weather was colder today so this would be a perfect opportunity to sit in the warmth while the snow fell around us. Because the air temperature was colder and there was no sun, the spa temperature was perfect! We were able to stay in for much longer this time. After a while a young German guy joined and we had a good chat about the snowshoeing that had also taken place at Damoy Point - they walked about 2km around the base of a hill, saw many seals and back again. It hadn’t interested Dan and I, and we think we made the right choice Altho it would have been nice to see some seals!

We got out of the spa and took some silly photos sunbathing and parading around in a skimpy bathers with the big arctic mountains behind us. What a wally!

Back in our room, I tried a Norwegian cola (“tastes like the jagermeister of cola” I said because it was really herby) and Dan had a beer. We lost track of time looking at our videos and pictures that we realised just in time that tomorrows briefing was about to start! We couldn’t get it to load in a room so we jumped out of our wet bathers and back into some civilian clothes and raced to deck 6. 

Tomorrow our group excursion would be at 12:10pm - it would be another continental landing! Apparently we were very lucky to have this landing and it was entirely thanks to the passenger who we had to turn back for - in changing the itinerary a vacancy had come available to visit Neko Harbour. We learnt much later that many sites work on a booking system devised by IAATO, but not every ship is part of IAATO so it can still be a bit hit and miss when arriving at a landing point whether we could go aground. So strange, and I hope this is something that is tightened when the treaty is revisited in a few years (although the fear is of course that the treaty will become more lax, which would be an issue). Only 100 people can be on land at any time, so if another ship is there we must wait our turn. 

We also learnt that ther is a possibility to try the polar plunge again here, but the site is dominated by a large and active glacier that regularly carves, causing tsunami waves to cover the beach landing area. We will find out in the morning. 

While we were in the spa we wanted to have a drink outside but the bar there wasn’t open. Instead we went to the explorer lounge on deck 10 so Dan could have a Mack beer - the most northern brewery in the world that we had visited in Tromso. They didn’t have it, so he got. Svalbaard beer and I got myself an aquavit sour which was very strong. Once we were on the cuddle couch Dan googled the Svalbaard beer and turns out it has topped Mack in being the northernmost brewery in the world, so it all righted itself in the end!

We had dinner tonight in Aune because Lindstrom’s menu didn’t appeal, and we liked what we saw on Aunes (btw the menus for the next day are posted the night before in the app). We were seated near a window and I set up my phone with a Timelapse as we sailed out from Damoy Point, leaving the overnight campers behind. 

At dinner Aune is alacarte, so we both chose the duck breast starter, pork knuckle and potato for main and the chocolate mousse for desert. The service here wasn’t quite as polished as Lindsteom but the food was delicious!

While we were eating an announcement was made that whales had been spotted breaching on our side of the ship. We kept our eyes peeled but saw nothing. 

Shortly after a cheer cane from behind us at the back of the ship, we raced over and saw 3 orcas! You could clearly see their tall diesel fin and white colouring. That takes our whale watching to minke whales, humpback whales and orcas - and later on we learnt that almost every expedition leader missed out on the orcas and they were bitterly disappointed. If we weren’t in the Aune restaurant and hadn’t been placed at the back of the ship, we wouldn’t have seen them either. It’s not usual to see orcas at this time of year. 

After dinner we Finished went to the tiny talk about Antarctica used to be green. It was fascinating, and explained how Antarctica broke off from Gondwana so South America and Australia and Antarctica all used to share land, flora and fauna. At some point in history an ice sheet covered Australia and Antarctica, then Antarctica started drifting south, getting colder and also *making* the atmosphere colder at the same time. Dinosaur fossils and many plant fossils have been found, altho much of the continent remains unexplored.