A voyage to the Ross Sea Antarctica, part 12
A day at sea and a zodiac cruise around the Balleny Islands.
I wake up to an announcement from the Captain. It’ll be a day at sea as we head to Balleny Islands. We need to sail northeast to avoid the pack ice and then come back around again.
Once again we’re bypassing Cape Adare. Checking the map, I see we’re already north of it at, 69°02.16' S,171°14.29' E. We won’t reach the Balleny islands until morning.
Before lunch I look outside my window and spot two fin whales swimming by. I can never get enough of whales and I’m constantly in awe of them and by the fact that I can see them just outside my room.
After lunch and a visit to the gym I find the ship quiet. Most people seem to be resting in their cabins. I head to the deck six observation deck and find people reading or sitting quietly. I step outside and walk the decks of the ship, empty save for one Chinese tourist who always seems to be outside. I give her props for maximizing her cruise experience.
Natalie invites me to dinner with Zack and Tanya and Jim and Pattianne. I sit beside Pattianne and Jim, Natalie beside them, Zack and Tanya across. I fall into conversation with Pattianne and discover she has a small hobbyfarm of 500 heads of beef cattle. She has one bull and her cows calf once a year. She sells the calfs.
She’s not new to farming, having owned a sheep farm producing 500-600 tons of merino wool. She tells me that cows are much easier; sheep are susceptible to far more diseases and issues.
I find her fascinating and pepper her with questions. She’s somewhat surprised, checking to make sure I’m actually interested in hearing about her experiences. I assure her I am before diving into another round of questions. She tells me she usually encounters stone faces when she reveals what she does, followed by a rapid change in subject.
Tanya is a photographer, but we don’t have time to chat during dinner and we promise each other we’ll find time to talk shop before we disembark.
After dinner we’re called to the outdoor decks. We’ve come across a group of humpback whales feeding off the bow. The Captain stops the ship and we linger a respectful distance away, watching as they dine.
It’s casino night. I stop in to take a look, but decide to take the night off. It’s been an exhausting couple of weeks and I need a little time for myself.
— 8 February 2025
The next morning we wake up off the coast of the Balleny Islands. Our group is called at 07:20 for our cruise.
The morning starts a monochromatic blue, the colors shifting as the sun rises and attempts to burn through the cloud cover.
It’s a dramatic morning; the sun lights the clouds a rusty orange. From the outdoor deck of the main lounge Guiliana calls out bai ze, the Chinese group, and then our group. We board Lindsey’s zodiac and she speeds us towards the islands.
As we near we can see the snow-dusted hills. Penguin highways lead up the rocky slopes and penguins congregate atop ridges and along the shore. We watch as some stand by the water’s edge, seemingly reluctant to return to the sea.
As we bob along the waves a group of penguins swim past. One leaps out of the water as if to land in our zodiac, something Natalie and I have been hoping for since we heard tell of it happening on another cruise. The penguin smacks a passenger in the back and she leaps up in shock. The penguin bounces off of her back into the sea.
Lindsey navigates us around the island. Each time we turn a corner it’s as if the landscape changes. Now and again we see solitary penguins floating in the water, as if debating whether to return to shore or head into the open sea.
As we approach the shallows she times the swells to ease us around the far side of the island before coming around to complete our cirumnavigation.
There are chinstrap and Adélie colonies. From the clifftops we can see them silhouetted against the sky. Manuel tells us that he once saw one fall from a great height, bouncing off the rocks into the ocean. He watched as it surfaced and swam off.
Cape petrel breed in the ledges and Manuel points them out to us as we pass.
Coming back around to the beach where we started, Lindsey looks out towards the ship. There’s a line of zodiacs looking to discharge passengers and so she decides to let us hang out by the island, bobbing in the waves as we wait for the lines to abate.
As we wait a large group of penguins swim past. Natalie and I secretly (or not so secretly) hope they’ll change direction and head for the zodiac, hoping for another opportunity to see a penguin leap into our boat. Unfortunately, they continue on their trajectory, ignoring us completely.
It’s started snowing and the snow nips at our faces on the way back to the ship. The marina has its lights on to help the crew spot us. In response to a question about orca Lyndsey tells us that the different types don’t understand each other. In captivity, when they put two different types of orca together they lose their complex vocalizations and devolve into simple calls.
She tells us that animals also learn each other’s calls. She tells us that if dolphins hear fish eater calls, they’ll continue on unpreturbed. But if they hear the calls of a mammal-eating creature they’ll freak out. Scientists used to do playback sound experiments on dolphins but stopped because they would stress the dolphins out. They’ve been observed beaching themselves to run from orca.
Natalie and I lunch with Bernard and Marie, a French couple who were on the Charcot in the Weddel sea on 5 March 2022, the day the Endurance was found. A guide who’s a friend of Ondine’s had given a talk two days before about the ship and she ecstatically broke the news to the passengers when she heard.
In the afternoon Joel gives a lecture on the forgotten heroes of Antarctic exploration and I come away with an expanded reading list. We join George in the main lounge for trivia, sharing the top prize with another team after correctly identifying all of the celebrities shown to us. It’s a much better showing than our first attempt, when the trivia questions all centered around Ponant ships and the company. If only we had attended some of the cruise sales seminars.
Guiseppe is feeling generous and pours out bags of trinkets for everyone to select prizes. I elect a fish keychain that I now wear happily on my daily pack.
After dinner we head back to the main lounge. The night quickly escalates into a dance party. Most of the guides and the three dancers join us in partying and a bunch of us linger after the music has ended to hang out and chat. It feels like the celebration at the end of the cruise, but there’s still a week to go. 🇦🇶
— 9 February 2025
