best whale day ever

April 2
In the morning the weather was too windy and snowing too hard so all morning excursions were cancelled and the Captain moved the ship to find a better spot in a bay. At 3pm we got the announcement to get ready to go in the zodiacs. The water was very calm but had a lot of small pieces of ice. One of the people in my zodia had a waterproof camera duct taped to a ski pole so he could take underwater photographs. In the video link I will send later you can see someone in another zodiac with the same setup for underwater pictures. In this video I am in the zodiac from which the photos and video are being filmed, so what you see is what I saw and it was amazing.

Our zodiac guide was so excited by everything the whales did and told us it was possibly a once in a lifetime experience to have 2 huge humpbacks playing around, under, and so close to our boat for over 30 minutes. At one point a whale rolled over on its back and laid with his fins stretched out, kind of like a "scratch my tummy" pose, Our guide said he could die now, since he had the ultimate whale experience!

I am infamous for saying over and over," I was so close to whales I got whale blow on me THREE TIMES!" but it's true- of course I needed a good shampoo after that, and it didn't smell that good, but it was totally worth it.

 It is hard to put into words the thrill of being that close to the whales. I get the question frequently about if we were afraid or in danger and the answer is that we never were afraid and never felt in danger. The whales would pop their heads up and look to see where we were, then dive under our boat. They were playing and having fun - if you can imagine something 50 feet long and 50,000 pounds "playing"...

i will send the video link and more whale pictures later!

amazing whale video

Here is a link to a video of our whale encounter in Antarctica. This was put together by our zodiac guide, Derek, so what you see is exactly what I saw- it was incredible.  I think there is a bit of the noises of the "blow"on the video but they also made deep sounds that were cool to hear. I will spare you the whale blow smell and liquid that coated my hair and camera!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_i-MUsd2U_Q

more penguins and a dangerous seal

After we warmed up from our amazing kayaking experience we dressed in our big red suits again and took zodiacs to Cuverville Island. When we first heard it everyone thought it was "Cougarville Island" and many jokes among our group of "women of a certain age"! When we got to the island we were not sure we would be able to leave the beach and go up on the main part because a seal was blocking our way to the path, and the naturalist said we couldn't go any farther unless the seal moved on its own. I did not hear what kind of seal it was but whatever it was it was fast if it decided to attack and too dangerous to deal with. We all waited, stacked up on the small shore. I guess he finally got tired of seeing so many big red suits staring at him and eventually he begrudgingly, slowly, with many backward looks, edged toward the water and swam away.

We all breathed a sigh of relief and climbed up to the main part of the island. There were penguins everywhere, many more than the first time we saw penguins. They are so funny and cuteand I have way too many penguin photos!

April 1, 2013-kayak day!

Fortunately I was not in the 6:45am kayak group, so I was able to have breakfast and then attend the 30 minute lecture about how to get into our kayak suit - seriously, 30 minutes! The suits cost $1,000 each we were told, and have gaskets at the wrists, ankles, and neck so if you fall in the water the gaskets keep water from getting inside your suit and you float. You won't be particularly warm but you won't sink, either. We also wore life vests over the suits, and neoprene boots. Everyone needed help getting into the suits and making sure the gaskets were sealed, the zippers were locked, etc. It was a long process but finally we were ready.

The kayaks were towed behind our zodiac and we went to a calm bay with beautiful icebergs and humpback whales. One by one we got into our kayaks, which wasn't as hard as I expected - going from the round rubber side of the zodiac you just kind of drop into the kayak. We all paddled around randomly until everyone was in a boat, which took a while but it was a great chance to paddle close to the sheer cliffs and towering ice and snow of Antarctica. We saw whales immediately and it was an amazing viewpoint to be on the water with them, almost eye-level. They are curious and very playful and don't make much of a wake or ripple when they go under water so we never felt in danger. It was incredible! 3 humpbacks played around us for a long time-so cool to hear their noises and see them next to our boats!

We kayaked for 90 minutes and it sleeted on and off, and we could hear rumblings of glaciers, which sounds like thunder. I wasn't cold but with the sleet and then some wind I started getting chilly.

Getting into the zodiac from the kayaks was harder, and I was able to boost myself up enough to get onto the side of the zodiac, but my roommate just dove headfirst into the zodiac and ended up on the floor of the boat! It was funny and then other people decided that was a good way to get out of their kayaks so more people slid into the zodiac!

Easter Sunday, Antarctic Peninsula

A couple of the teens on the ship hid Easter eggs so all day we were finding them in boots, pockets, etc., it was fun.

The first kayak group went out in the morning, and the rest of us took zodiacs to an island to see penguins and seals. The photos will do a better job of relaying how cute the penguins were and how un-interested and bored the seals were by our visit! Penguins have no predators on land, so they are very casual about all of us in our big red suits gathering around. People cannot approach the animals but they can approach us. Since it is the end of the summer in Antarctica the penguins were not very active because they were storing up energy and fat, but we still saw some walking around and being just exactly like you would expect them to be- cute and randomly wandering off one way and then another.

In the afternoon we took another excursion in a bay and rode around in the zodiacs looking at all the amazing iceberg formations. The color is just incredibly blue, and some had holes in them, and all had odd shapes. It was a beautiful day with some sun, temperatures were around 25 - 30 degrees most of the time on the trip, and sometimes there would be snow or sleet but it never lasted long.

Race day, last part

After I got back to the ship the full impact of what I had done, and not done, hit me. I had a hard time dealing with the fact that I didn't do the full marathon. I have never gone into a race thinking I wouldn't finish so even though I knew it was the right decision I struggled with "only" doing the half.

I had a pity party that evening but then knew I had to get over it to enjoy the rest of the trip. The next day I found out that a record number of runners changed to the half from the full, and several people were not allowed to finish due to time constraints.

One of my shipboard buddies was there to complete his seventh continent marathon and he was pulled off the course so he was really disappointed. My roommate got back a long time after I did and she had finished the full but only with the help and encouragement of another runner. It took them 7 1/2 hours and they were not the last ones!

Many people fell frequently including my roommate who fell 4 times, sprained her ankle, had a limp on her knee, and road rash all down one side. Many others had similar stories so I felt lucky to only be sore!

Race day, part 3

When I got back to the center point of the course and started toward the actual research bases the path was smoother but had longer hills, and those were covered with fist-sized frozen rocks which really hurt the neuroma in my foot. The course was poorly marked on this loop, with flags on sticks but the researchers also use flags on sticks to mark their paths, and  there were no arrows at any of the turns.

There was nobody in front or behind me that I could see, so at one point I realized I was at the airport and was not supposed to be there!  I backtracked and found the turn I had missed. Then about a mile later I missed another turn, ran about half a mile and found another woman who couldn't figure out where the race course was, so we backtracked together and found the next turn. We were able to warn some people behind us, and they really appreciated it. I figured I ran an extra 2 miles due to missing the turns.

Back at the center point I used the "bathroom" and got some water and headed out to the first section again. It was as bad as I remembered! My ankle started hurting from all the twisting and almost falling. When I was at the top of a hill the view was wonderful, but I could only look around when I stopped, otherwise I had to keep my eyes on the ground to watch for ice.

When I got near the turnaround I didn't know where it was and had to ask some Russian scientists who happened to be working near the course- they knew what I meant and they pointed around the corner and finally there it was. Slipping and sliding back to the finish I was feeling very disappointed to not do the whole marathon but relieved to be done with tripping and slipping. There were a few support crew at the finish so I got a couple of cheers but otherwise the finish was not too exciting. A friend was working as part of the supporters so I got my camera and she took a photo of me with the big library card. I walked around a bit and saw some penguins and suddenly started getting very cold. I put on my big red overalls and boots and waited until one of the zodiac boats was ready to go back to the boat, then hopped in.