The first stop in the morning was Port Lockroy, a historic British station that is now basically a tourist attraction. The passenger's broke up into 2 groups. One would do a little scenic hiking while the other went to Port Lockroy as not to overwhelm the station. Our group went first to do some hiking along the rocky seashore. It was fairly windy so we kept moving to keep warm. Then we headed to the station. Some of the rooms were setup as they would have when the British were doing work here in the 1940's. They had a gift store and We bought a couple of things. We also sent a postcard to ourselves to get the Port Lockroy postal stamp.
Port Lockroy
Whale Bone Arrangement
During mid-day we took a cruise through a narrow channel called the Lamiere Channel. The scenery was absolutely spectacular. There were large mountains on both sides of the ship as we proceeded. In the channel there were many icebergs and we had to cut through a thin layer of loose ice to get through it. After passing through the channel we ended up in Pleneau Bay also known as an iceberg graveyard. In this bay many icebergs that had been drifting in the sea end up trapped here and slowly melt away. The ship set anchor near all these icebergs. The weather was improving, the winds were gone and there were fewer clouds.
Along the Lamiere Channel
Iceberg in the Iceberg Graveyard
On our afternoon outing we went to Booth Island and scrambled up a granite hill to a lookout spot. The landing spot for the zodiacs was at a narrow strip of the land. From there you had great views of the sea from both sides. Again dramatic scenery. This turned out to be one of my favorite hikes on the trip. This part of Antarctica is very mountainous, lots of icebergs And you can see the mountains stretch a great distance down the peninsula. I was glad we did not choose to do any kayaking. We would not have had the time to take in these tremendous viewpoints we encountered.
View from Booth Island
Booth Island Viewpoint
On our way back to the ship we made a detour and cruised through a portion of the iceberg graveyard. This allowed us an up close view of the icebergs. You had to be careful through here because the icebergs do roll over periodically. You don't want to be near them when that occurs. We took a lot of pictures of these oddly sculpted icebergs.
Zodiac Cruising
In the evening we went camping. We were about as far south as we were going to get on this trip, 65° 15' S. We camped out on a small snow coveredisland. As we were pitching our tents we saw ice break off of an iceberg and then it took a roll. It was an interesting sight. I brought my sleeping mask so that the 24 hour light would not be a problem. The camping setup was not to my comfort level. The tent was not well ventilated, the sleeping bag was a bit confining. I was warm enough (it was probably a 35-40 degree bag, even though the guide said it was a 12 degree celcius bag). They had the fold-up Thermarest waffle pads with a foam pad for sleeping. I have considered buying such a foam pad for backpacking, now I know not to waste my time. My old Thermarest self inflating matress is still the best. We also used a cotton liner, it wasn't that comfortable in the bag. Even though it wasn't the most comfortable setup I still slept fairly well. At least once I got to sleep.
Our Tent
The Campsite
View from the Campsite
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