Back on the Drake

With the festivities of the night before the first day of our Drake passage was a quiet affair. Most of our crew were nursing hangovers and the weather was rough and foggy so a lot of time was spent just chilling out in the lounge area with people organising their photos or reading. We have heard that there will be another party tomorrow night so looking forward to that.

Apparently last night there was a 6.7 earthquake about 150 miles from where we were sailing. While we didn't feel it the whole crew were most excited - especially Dani (our geologists crew lecturer/guide). That said today the waves were pretty impressive. Standing on the lower deck the sea would rise up and obliterate all the sky so that the impression was of looking into a frothing wall of water. Then the ship would heave and the water would subside and we were left with a view only a few meters from the ship into the mists. Quite surreal and while it could have felt scary somehow it just wasn't.

Compared to our first crossing the waves were much higher but my fellow passengers seemed to have either gotten a handle on the principles of seasickness prevention or I think most of us had just developed our sea-legs enough that the waves weren't that much of a bother.

I figure that as nothing super-interesting happened today that I would pass on a few little tit-bits that I have learnt about travelling to Antarctica and travelling with a camera for the first time (as in the full gear not just the trusty point and shoot) so...

• Take a lot more warm clothes than you think you'll need - it was really cold. I realise that this sounds obvious but warm socks were at a premium and gloves that kept out both wind, water and cold would have been nice.
• Take some really comfortable clothes for lounging around in the bar - I would have loved a warm pair of track suit pants or something similar for the downtime.
• You cannot under-estimate the value of good moisturisers and lip balms - Antarctica is the driest continent on earth and it really starts to take a toll on the skin.
• Start the anti-seasickness medications before  you feel sick. I am very prone to seasickness but never once even felt queasy whereas many of my fellow passengers didn't emerge from their cabins for the first 2 days. The method I was told is halve the dose of antihistamine and take it twice as often, this stops the fatigue that comes with the drugs.
• If you own warm waterproof pants bring them - the hire stuff, while it was sufficient, was not comfortable or particularly well fitting.
• If you have a beanie or warm hat with earflaps use it - the wind makes ears get really cold. A thermal scarf is a must as well. I was wishing for a balaclava a lot of the time, my nose was suffering from cold.
• A rainproof jacket is a must but make sure that the hood will fit over a beanie comfortably and that the top zips up to your face, not just under your chin.
• Re camera gear.. bring a really sturdy tripod. The wind can push the camera around a fair bit and a light tripod with a big lens is a nightmare.
• Take plenty of storage - and I mean plenty. I took an average of 400+ photos a day (ok a bit snap happy but there is so much to take photos of)
• Take a computer. Never, never, never again will I travel without a computer. Not only for ease of sorting and cataloguing photos but if you are doing a blog it is much easier to blog while you are doing it than to have to hunt for internet cafes.
• If the ship has internet capabilities (ours had email that you paid to send through the ships computer via satellite) take a list of email addresses. I sat at the console and suddenly realised I knew almost no email addresses off by heart. Frustrating to know that we have become so used to just pressing our address book and having all the details pop up for us.

While this list is not exhaustive it does sort of get a few of the things that I learnt down and who knows - those little tips may prove useful to someone.

The photos I have included were taken throughout the journey and I figured were worth posting up here. The photo of Dave and I, while obviously not a glamour shot, does show a little of the wind that we met along the way.