We come back aboard from Almirante Brown station at about 7:30. Wet, in gear, a little tired from our climb. Ashley (our main bartender!) wants us to sit and have a drink! We’ll be back! So – up to the room we go, quick shower (I mean quick), change of clothes (OK, so I’m not going so far as sneakers, but I am doing my totally casual pants and tops with my little dress sandals) and back down to visit Ashley for beverages. Then it’s on to a late dinner, very good – all the food has been great – absolutely no complaints on the variety, selection or quality.
But, remember back at our first briefing? Words #2 ? “You will not sleep” – or maybe a better translation is: “sleeping is not allowed”. Our expedition staff is making good on its promise, that’s for certain. We are just barely finishing dinner, it’s about 9:00 and an announcement is made that we have a surprise visit to Neko Harbor….tonight! Everyone should be ready to go in 30 minutes. Geez – we are like kids. We look at each other – ready? Heck yes! We are up out of our chairs like a rocket – fortunately the Mountain boys (Dad and a group of 6 fairly rugged guys who are sons and sons-in-law from what we’ve heard – including very outdoorsy looking) are just as excited as we are – and out the door on our heels.
We are getting good at the gear thing – so it doesn’t take us anytime to shuck our indoor wear for outdoor gear and head down to the marina deck. We all queue up outside and chat away (met one of the family’s with kids – yeah – there are 2 families with kids onboard – and they were great – son is the ham of all time – he’s great – taking videos and posting on YouTube for his school). We finally hit the zodiac, and head out to Neko Harbor.
It’s 10:00 at night, it’s still just like daylight, and most of us are a little tipsy from our pre- and during-dinner beverages. What better way to experience a surprise landing? We have a wet landing (really wet – almost inside my boots – really, really close) and then up we go – again! This time a HUGE hill – mountain – is in front of us in very deep snow. There are a ton of gentoo penguins which I snap away at – as Ed leaves me behind trudging up the mountain.
It’s really sort of grueling – since it’s on a full stomach, the 3rd excursion for the day, by now 10:30 at night and we’re climbing up a freaking mountain! But we’re here – we’re climbing! Again – it’s worth it – the trail is a little better – a teeny bit wider – but still with those evil soft spots where suddenly you are just sunk down to your knee in the snow. Oh, btw, the nurse is always with us on shore…yeah..gives you a certain sense of comfort and foreboding…..but…anyway…..up we go – and it’s a view!
The glacier is magnificent, all blinding white and blue ice, with crevasses and calved out pieces. The view of the harbor is spectacular, with our little ship down there in the distance. Its really, really, really neat up there. Pictures, pictures and more pictures, we then begin our long walk down. There are little trails in the snow where it looks like people have slid down, but one of the trail “guides”, read “ship excursion police” up there says “some people have tried to slide down, but it was not good” then she waggles her pointer finger, basically saying “no, no, no”. Ok – we’ll go with that – it’s really, really steep – so – we’ll just walk thank you.
Back down at the bottom, I am of course enthralled with the penguins. Ed is humoring me and letting me bask in their cute silliness. There is even one little ham who just stands on the shoreline preening for all of us snapping shots. Finally we turn back and head for the zodiacs.
On the way back to the ship, suddenly, we make a detour around a little iceberg. Surprise! We are greeted with Ashley and champagne in a zodiac – and of course a great photo opp! What a better way to end our first full day of excursions – it’s close to midnight, we’re in a zodiac drinking champagne and toasting the Antarctic and the 100th Anniversary in the middle of Neko Harbor!
Needless to say – we’re done for the day! Looking forward to tomorrow and more surprises!
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