Antarctica

[Joel Eade]

Very nice collection of images, can you share which company you arranged the trip with? Did they do a good job for the group?

[Raid]

HI Joel

If you do a search on Antarctic adventures you will come back with hundreds of companies, most of these are just retailers. Finding the real company can be difficult but they are all registered with IAATO (International Association of Antarctica Tour Operators). Most of the companies are European based alternating their ships between Antarctica and the Arctic. There is the US based Lindblad I used them for the Galapagos and they were brilliant.

The company I used for my trip was Oceanwide Expeditions purely because of timing. My trip starts for Ushuaia with 3 days in Drake Passage (seasick passage), 4 days in the Antarctic Peninsula then 3 days back. I now realize I should have done the Falkland Islands and Weddell sea as well (an extra 3 or 4 days).

There are trips that have a Pro-photographer on board with photography workshops. I didn't go for any of these trips partly because this is a holiday and partly because I didn't want a boat full of photographers way better than me. While there were a number of people on the ship with good equipment, photography was rarely discussed.

The ship was well provisioned, there was no chance of running out of food or drink and the staff were excellent. The ship had 3 laptops for Internet and media work, they were always heavily used. The only complaint I have is that one passenger ran out of media. The media available on ship was small and very expensive. No DVD's were available only CD's, so bring your own media.

While the passengers (about 100) were from every part of the planet, English was the preferred language. As their were large groups from non-English speaking countries, they had a scientist who spoke their language as well.

The sea trips are where you can get bored so they have a number of scientists, who have the Antarctic bug, to give lectures. The Antarctic bug makes "L" disease look cheap, these guys will do whatever it takes, just to get another trip. When you see Neko Harbour in full sunshine you will understand why. As you would expect the standard of the lectures varied greatly. Some passengers (like me) preferred the science based, while others the anecdotal, its just a matter of personal taste.

There are a number of activities you can do, its not just going ashore to look at lots of penguins. There was Kayaking and camping on my trip although others offer skiing, mountaineering, trekking, scuba diving and as mentioned photography workshops.

The only problem with the trip was its length, it was way to short, was hoping the ship would get stuck in the ice at the Lemaire Channel. Unlike the Arctic their are only a few icebreakers down south so I would have had an extra month to look around. In reality the ships don't take any risks and you don't go vary far south, just into the Antarctic circle so that was never going to happen.

PS: If you need a Passepartout for you trip, just let me know... I will leave a light on.

[Andy Stringer]

...was hoping the ship would get stuck in the ice...in reality...that was never going to happen.

On the contrary, it does happen. On my trip in 2009 our icebreaker was ice bound for six days in the Weddell Sea.

5D Mark II, EF24-105mm f/4L IS USM @80mm, f/4, 1/3200s, ISO 100

Glad you enjoyed your trip, Raid. I enjoyed looking through your gallery to see some of the places that I was supposed to visit, but there wasn't enough time after being stuck in the Weddell Sea for nearly a week.

By the way Raid, in your gallery you have an image captioned "Skua?". You can delete the question mark - it is a Brown Skua.

[ZoeEnPhos]

Hello to Raid!
Absolutely stunning photos you shared!
Taking my breath away sir!
Thanks for sharing!
Wishing you all the BEST!
//Charl