Elephant Island and The Scotia Sea

We had lots of time when sailing through the Bransfield Strait off of the South Shetlands. But never a dull moment from Polar Latitudes. They filled the time with interesting lectures on krill, Ernest Shackleton, and even the detailed history of an iceberg.

I had no idea that large icebergs are named and tracked. Antarctica is split into quadrants: A, B, C, and D. When one calves off, the first letter of the name shows where it came from. The following numbers are the year it happened, and the last letters are given in order and if there are more than 26 in a year, they add a second column. The largest iceberg we saw was called B15AB which means it came from the SW corner of Antarctica in 2015. It was the 28th one that calved that year.

So much for the background. Suffice it to say this guy was HUGE! Some are as big as Jamaica. They are miles and miles long and hundreds of meters high. We sailed past this guy and the expedition leader talked about it as if it was an old friend. And given the ocean currents and temperature, she wouldn't see it again.

The lecture on the Antarctic explorer Shackleton by the ship historian was even more interesting. Long story, but a failed expedition in 1914 left them stranded on their ship, on ice, and islands for 2 years! And everyone survived. Great story.

Elephant Island is where one group stayed behind for a year while Shackleton and a few others sailed on, looking for rescue. What a cold, lonely, desolate late place. But, they have penguins and seals!

More photos and videos are here.
https://photos.app.goo.gl/piSadFD3YmmLmgf48

And here.
https://photos.app.goo.gl/FyjD6iouwjCuUUNC9

And this is the highlight of the trip: a Southern Right Whale sighting on January 10th. It's so rare for one of them to hang out next to a Zodiac, I'm posting it in every footprint.

https://findpenguins.com/0x7ax2pvwii8d/footprin…Read more