Point Of View: Antarctic Cruises
He consulted the two charts on the ship's navigation table
. Both charts show the ship has now entered waters that have never been surveyed.
The concerned captain relies on depth soundings to chart a safe course. This is a new channel, one he's never sailed; although he's safely traveled the Antarctic innumerable times before.
First it turns to dusk, then a heavy snow starts to fall; it is difficult to see. The bridge windows start to accumulate the large flakes and we have difficulty seeing the icebergs ahead.
Each obstruction is clearly illuminated by the ship's radar. The large ice blocks show up orange on the screen.
The monitor shows the channel nearly blocked by one gigantic orange blob. It's only three kilometers away.
The captain issues a quiet command as we near the one kilometer mark. With a flick of the wheel, the helmsman steers the ship away from the danger. We glimpse a tabular iceberg through the shroud of fog and snow.
This is a unique form of iceberg that can only be seen in the southern ocean. These bergs resemble the American plains; they have very flat, wide tops and the sides are straight. They can be over one hundred feet tall.
Antarctica has amazed me again. We are heading to the Antarctic Circle in our polar class cruise vessel. We've passed many inaccessible and empty areas of the world to get here.
Seventy-nine years after being sighted in 1820, a person finally wintered over on Antarctica. Explorers searching for the southern pole struggled and scientists were the next to approach Antarctica.
It used to be that only very rich individuals could come to Antarctica, that's changed. Prices have fallen. You can cruise to Antarctica for about the same cost as visiting a Caribbean island.
The shape of Antarctica is similar to a manta ray with a curved tail. The very most northern tip of Antarctica is still 500 ocean miles from South America.
Rough seas fill this space, which is known as the Drake Passage. It has also been called the 'Slobbering Jaws of Hell' and extracts a high price for passage. One of the passengers told us all to stow everything and secure the latches on the cabin portholes before they went to bed.
Our ship left the Argentine port city of Ushuaia and passed through the Beagle Channel. Later we reached open ocean. Rough water bounced us to and fro for two days.
We didn't see any land during that time. Gusting winds blew the whole time, and reached near gale force.
Ocean spray shot over my fourth deck window as waves crashed over the bow of the ship. Seeing swells of fifteen to forty feet in size did nothing to quell our seasickness.
We got to the Southern Ocean after two days on the sea. A coastal archipelago was a welcome sight that first morning.
Though still not smooth, the waters seemed to be a bit sedated by the land mass. Mile-high mountain summits were draped in clouds. Looking like chocolate spikes through the glacier's frosting, angular ridges poked up.
The ice goes right into the water in huge frozen slabs. They are crackled and bumpy, not smooth like the glaciers. It looks like someone took the Alps and sunk them into the deep blue water.
Our Antarctic cruise reminded one passenger of the labor of childbirth. Like a naughty kid, Antarctica is the coldest, windiest, highest and driest of all the earth's continents.
It shares the same amount of moisture that Death Valley receives, though holds seventy percent of the world's fresh water reserves. Antarctica claims no original human populations, human owners, nor animals that make it a year-round home.
This difficult area requires that sailing routes and shore landings be made only when the weather allows. Even though we are warned to be flexible, our first landing comes right on schedule.
We've been assigned groups and told to meet on deck. My group of ten gets into an inflatable boat.
We travel across a mere quarter mile of water until we run aground. And then, with one simple step, I am in the small group of humans who has ever touched Antarctic ice.
by: John Chambers
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