11/21 & 22: Whaling & Climate Change in Antarctica

After our final two landings on the continent of Antarctica, we spent the next two days crossing the notoriously stormy and rough Drake Passage to return to the port of Ushuaia in southernmost Argentina. We were lucky that because the waves were 'only' two meters high, it wasn’t very uncomfortable. There was a lecture in the lounge after breakfast on whaling activity in Antarctica which helped to while away the time as there was nothing remarkable to look at outside!

By the early 1890s whaling in the Atlantic Arctic was dominated by Norway and Scotland and was in decline due to over exploitation. As a result, attention turned to the possibility of a new whaling ground in the Southern Ocean and both countries sent out ships to explore Antarctica. The first boats arrived with no idea if there were whales in the southern hemisphere. 

The blue and finback whales they saw were too big for the ships as they were about twice the size of the whales in the northern hemisphere. In 1904, whales were first killed on the South Georgia Islands, then in the Shetland Islands. Humpback whales were easier to catch because they swam co close to the ships and whalers depleted all that type of whales. Later, they caught just blue and finback whales after developing new technologies to kill the whales. Whalers then realized they needed a new way to process the whole animals.

Around 1905 whaling involved catcher ships towing the whale carcasses back to onshore stations for processing on land. One of the main places was Deception Island which we'd visited and had seen the remains of the whaling station. There were so many carcasses on shorelines that it was decided to process the bones and their fat so nothing would be left behind on the island. Whale blubber was used to make cosmetics, and whale oil was used to light cities around Europe and the US. Meat was used to feed  soldiers during WW I. Buttons and tools made from the ribs were particularly strong. Starting in 1926, fully independent factory ships were developed to process the whales on board. 

The British government was the first nation to exert sovereignty in Antarctica, claiming possession of all the islands surrounding Antarctica and also the Antarctica Peninsula. That was why they charged a fee of about one percent of each whale caught anywhere by any other country. Most of the men in the whaling stations were farmers and laborers from Norway who had never set foot outside of their country prior to working in Antarctica. 

In 1920, the International Whaling Commission established rules that only adult males could be caught because of concerns that ten thousand whales had been caught each season for 20 years. The whaling industry ended in the early 1950s as so many of the whaling ships had to be used during WW II and most were destroyed. A hundred years later, whales are now only recovering the numbers there had been during those whaling seasons. There is a quota now for Japan & Norway to hunt whales but not in Antarctica.

Several of the whaling captains kept detailed log books, notes and charts so about 40 names in the South Shetland islands and Antarctic Peninsula came from the whalers and many more names associated with whalers in the South Orkney Islands.

I learned that the climate warming that has occurred on the Antarctica Peninsula in recent years has affected the flora, fauna and sea ice but the most visible and dramatic impacts have been to the glaciers and ice shelves. The changes have been so striking that that even the redrawing of continental-scale maps has been necessary. What happens in the future depends on whether climate warming continues and, if it does, whether it's stronger in the winter or summer. That's because glaciers and ice shelves are most sensitive to changes in the number of days when temperatures rise above zero.

The Antarctic Peninsula is experiencing the fastest rate of warming in the southern hemisphere, equaled only by two locations in the North American Arctic and the Tibetan Plateau, also in the north. The warming has resulted in more energy available for organisms in terrestrial ecosystems, which means they have been more active for longer seasons and to grow and reproduce faster. 

It was alarming to learn that even a small rise in summer temperatures could have a significant impact in the Antarctic Peninsula with more ice-shelf retreat expected as well as more glaciers migrating inland with the effect of ice-free ground separating them from the sea as is already the case in southwest Greenland in the far north. I couldn't help but think that future visitors to the Antarctica Peninsula would likely be faced with a different view than what we'd just been lucky enough to witness.

Since direct human contact with Antarctica has only occurred over the last two centuries, much of the region has fortunately remained  relatively pristine and unscathed, especially relative to other continents. However, as you can readily appreciate, human presence has inevitably resulted in the transfer of non-native organisms into the Antarctic. It has been estimated that at least 200 non-native species have established on the sub-Antarctic islands, with half being flowering plants and a third insects. 

I imagine you have also read that since glaciers have been retreating in most mountain ranges around the world, these losses account for much of the measured global sea-level rise. Though the loss from the Antarctic Peninsula is small and similar in magnitude to what's been happening in Alaska and the Canadian Arctic Archipelago, the area has been described as "an icon of global change."

The ship's chef had gone all out for our final dinner which we really appreciated. The Ushuaia could in no way be described as a luxury ship but we enjoyed our experiences with the crew and fellow passengers. Sorry for the fuzzy photos!

What Steven and I both especially liked about eating on board our ship the Ushuaia - 'dining' would be an exaggeration! - was that we had the freedom to sit at different tables at each meal so we had more interaction withe of the passengers. Naturally, we gravitated often to the same mix of about 20 people to learn more about them.

We were so fortunate to have two exceeding friendly and helpful waiters, Fabian and Ivo, who made every meal so pleasant and also knew most of the 90 passengers by name! 

The officers were all decked out for the Certificate Ceremony after dinner. How spiff most looked compared to their usual casual t-shirts when few wore anything with the company's name.

Jo, a friend and extreme adventurer also from Colorado, was one of the first to receive her certificate indicating she'd traveled to Antarctica and landed on the continent.

Our Australian friends, Carol and Keith:

Fellow Australians Margaret and Mike accepting their certificates:

Carolyn had been a dear lending me her hiking poles when she decided not to go ashore on one excursion.

I 'dressed up' as best I could given the clothes I had brought with me for our final night at sea and the Certificate Ceremony with the captain. What had to pass for a dress was my nightie  - shh, don't tell anyone! No mention had been made in the information we'd received ahead of time about the ceremony and the need for any 'fancy' clothes.

 This was my Australian friend, Carol, and me vamping for the camera!

The Antarctic Treaty of 1959 and its related agreements manage all activities on the continent. I read that the system of international governance is unique and of global importance because it established Antarctica as an area of peace and science, setting aside territorial claims. However, of the many countries that have explored Antarctica, seven have staked claims in the region. As the claims of the United Kingdom, Argentina and Chile to the Antarctic Peninsula all overlap, there was considerable international tension in the 1940s and 1950s as well as disagreement between the Cold War superpowers of the USA and the USSR about their future use of Antarctica. 67 nations participated in the Antarctic Treaty but part of the ocean is still unprotected. For example, the Weddell Sea on the east side of the continent is unprotected by the Scientific Committee of Antarctic Research.

There are 14 articles in the Treaty which cover maritime, aerial and land operations. There are military operations but no guns are allowed in Antarctica. Geology, biology, physics and meteorology are the research projects undertaken in Antarctica. Most stations are located close to the shoreline and about seven countries have stations at King George Island. One of the crew members who had recently returned from spending 15 months at a research station talked about visiting with staff from different country’s stations, holding a mini Olympics, sharing research with other researchers, and celebrating national holidays together. Some stations are year-round but most are seasonal research stations because the weather in the winter doesn’t allow for outside research. Because of the compressed summer season allowing research, there are no days off for any of the researchers or staff.

Argentina has six seasonal stations but 30 all told because they were concerned about the prevalence of so many British stations. Our Chilean expedition crew leader, Pablo, indicated that some of his country’s stations may be empty, however. Russia & China each have five seasonal stations and Australia & US each have three. There are 30 countries with facilities in Antarctica; 83 stations combined including year-round and seasonal stations and 19 camps. Britain used to be a major power in Antarctica but it only has two stations remaining.

The oldest base in Antarctica is Orcadas Base on the South Orkney Islands and has been operational since 1904. It first belonged to Scotland but was subsequently given to Argentina. The highest year-round station is Base Vostok located at 3500 meters above the sea level. They found a lake and also the lowest temperature on earth recorded at 89 degrees below 0!

The most populated station with around 1,200 people working there in the summer is McMurdo owned by the US. It is so big it even has bookstores, traffic lights, ATM's, bars, etc! The American Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station is located at the geographic south pole. The first building was built by the US government in 1956 and is supplied from the McMurdo station via a highway located 1,600 kms away at the Ross Ice Shelf.

During the trip's final recap, Pablo mentioned that Argentina almost had a war with Chile over the official entrance to the 420-meter-deep Beagle Channel as there were three islands in dispute between the two countries. Britain was able to negotiate peace between the nations when they agreed the dividing line between the two countries would be where the glacier came down into the channel.

Pablo said our ship would have to wait until nighttime at the entrance to the channel for a ship transporting a pilot to come aboard our ship and bring us into Ushuaia port as our ship’s crew was not allowed to bring us into port. Pablo said he understood passengers’ desires to stay longer on the continent rather than allowing so much time on the return through the Drake Passage but that the crew never knows what the waves might be like on the return and therefore couldn’t take chances on not allowing sufficient time on the passage for all kinds of situations. 

Our ten-day Antarctica trip had covered an amazing 1,811 nautical miles which was the equivalent of 3,354 kms! It had been a dream come true and one of the top five trips of all the trips we've taken since we began exploring the world back in 2013 in what we thought then would be our solo "Big Adventure." Little did we know that our first long trip to Iceland and Cambodia and everywhere in between would spark such a desire to see so much more of the world! What thrilled us about our relatively brief time in Antarctica were the opportunities to see so many penguins and many other animals in their native habitats once we'd traversed the Drake Passage, the exceedingly beautiful glaciers and icebergs bathed in blue, and learning from the crackerjack staff on board our ship so, so much about our last continent. It was the combination of all of those factors, plus meeting some special people aboard the ship, that made me dream about even returning to another area of Antarctica someday!

Next post: Back on land for just 24 hours discovering Tierra del Fuego National Park outside of Ushuaia in southernmost Argentina before embarking on a short cruise through part of Patagonia!

Posted on Boxing Day aka December 26th, 2019, at home in Colorado happily surrounded by all of our children and their spouses.

11/20: Whaling Station at Deception Island & Adios Penguins

We had been told the night before at the Evening Recap to be up and on the deck at 6:30 to watch from the bow as the ship entered the narrow entrance to Deception Island. I watched for a while as the ship entered the notorious Neptune’s Bellows close to the eastern rock walls of the island's collapsed caldera. 

We’d been lucky that we’d hardly felt any motion on the ship for the last several days unlike when we’d gone through the Drake Passage the first two days out from Ushuaia. It was so easy to get blase about being on the ship after going through the passage and not be as careful certainly as we'd been instructed at the beginning by keeping both hands free all the time when we moved about the ship.

This narrow opening was also shallow in the middle, so the captain had to hug the starboard side. 

It was bitterly cold where we stood hugging the ship, I can't believe how much colder it had to have been for these brave souls encountering the winds head on. I didn't stay out for long because of the piercing cold and numbing winds. 

Do you get the sense how ... cold it was on board the zodiac for Carol and Keith from Australia?! Steven had bought something called a buff that could either be worn as a hat or to cover his face to ward off the cold as he hates that above all else. I wish I had done the same.

Our landing on Deception Island was at Whalers Bay where we were able to walk between the historical remains from the whaling era as well as the abandoned British Antarctic Survey Station. Whalers Bay had been the location of so many conflicts because it was a political hotspot in Antarctica among Britain, Chile and Argentina that the need for the Antarctica Treaty became necessary, according to Pablo, the Expedition Leader.

The fuel tanks belonged to the British during their battle with Argentina in the Falklands War or as the Argentines call the islands, the Malvinas.

What an adventure to actually enter the ancient volcanic crater of this ring-shaped island that measured over nine miles in diameter.

Whalers Bay at Port Foster on the island had a history of human occupation dating from 1911 when a whaling station was established by the Norwegians. It operated until 1931 until there was a slump in whale oil prices.

In February of 1944, the British Royal Navy established a base on the island using three of the abandoned whaling station buildings. Base B operated for just one year before it was turned over to the forerunner of the British Antarctic Survey and became a scientific research station. It focused on meteorology and and the operation of an air facility to support survey work and the other British bases in the Antarctic Peninsula region.

 The base was occupied continuously until December of 1967 when it was evacuated because of a volcanic eruption. It reopened a year later but was closed again in February of 1969 following another eruption. That resulted in a mud flow that destroyed most of the buildings and also dramatically changed the topography and coastline of Whalers Bay and also engulfed the whalers' graveyard.

Luckily, much of the abandoned British research base and the Norwegian whaling station was still there to be seen.

During the 1990-91 and 1991-2 seasons, clean-up operations were undertaken at the base. All remaining fuel, batteries and hazardous wastes as well as a large amount of general debris were removed. Though further clean-up of the area is planned, the abandoned buildings won't be removed because the mud flow was regarded ass being of international geological importance and also because the building remains were a demonstration of the power of volcanic eruptions. The whaling station was listed as an Historic Site and Monument #71 under the Antarctic Treaty in 1995.

The island was a very harsh place for all who lived there because of the extreme climate, the lack of resources, etc. When the volcano last erupted in the 1970s, almost everything on the island was destroyed including the cemetery. It was recently uncovered so the history of the island could be revealed. 

What a godforsaken spot to be buried, so far from one's home and family.

Pablo mentioned that on the day of the eruption, all the animals on the island left as they sensed what was to happen. I remember hearing the same thing happened before the huge tsunami that hit Southeast Asia in 2004.

There were two stations here, one each belonging to the British and the Chileans, according to Pablo.

This was also one of the biggest whaling stations anywhere in the Antarctic. The whalers used the boilers to cook the whale blubber, mixed with hot water, to produce nitroglycerin, marrow and paraffin. That was later used for pet food and also in the production of makeup among other products. The whale bones were used for fertilizer.

The gap between the cliffs was Neptune’s Window, our destination in a bit!

These were the only penguins we caught sight of on Deception Island. I knew we had our last landing of the ten-day trip that afternoon and was sure hoping I would get in another penguin fix!

During the summer months, over 1,000 people lived and worked here. 

As we walked along the east side of the bay, there were various relics of the whaling station, including water boats, timber barrels and large quantities of whalebone. 

One of the larger pieces of whale bone we saw that had been bleached white with the passage of almost a century since the last whaling operations took place at the bay.

Gray skies, gray ash-covered beach and even the sea appeared to be gray that day!

You can tell we walked a good distance around the island as the oil tanks were on the opposite side when I looked back and took this photo.

The remains of a freshwater boat that was so critical to existence on the island:

Another piece of whale bone:

We trudged up the hill toward the gap known as Neptune's Window.

What a sense of accomplishment as we reached the top and took in the exhilarating sights of the water and the cliffs from the narrow ledge. Because it was so narrow, we couldn't stay long and had to leave so another group from the ship could also take in the great views.

If you look closely, you can just spot the Ushuaia in the distance and get a sense of the considerable expanse of water we traversed in the zodiacs to reach the shore of Whalers Bay.

In the distance in Neptune's Window were two more groups of passengers from their zodiacs.

Walking back along the beach, I lucked out capturing a bird just land in the water by another one.

When Pablo had announced the night before that  'crazy' passengers could go on the Polar Plunge today which meant basically jumping in and out of the 32 degree water, I thought that perhaps a dozen of the younger ones might take him up on the crazy idea. Never did I think that very close to half of the 90 passengers on board might actually do it!  About 20 or so people went in initially and then the lure of being in the Antarctic waters seemed to catch fire and the others followed suit. 

Fortunately, the crew had been well prepared and brought lots of towels along to wrap the swimmers in as soon as they ran out of the water. None I heard complained about the cold water, thinking it was going to be even colder than it was. What a story they had to tell family and friends back home.

This skinny dipper was one of the 20 or so US students from many universities who were doing a semester abroad in the city of Ushuaia!

Two of these guys were the brothers who had served together in the Army and had been based in Afghanistan as had their father. If you read the previous post, you may recall a photo I took of them raising their unit's flag atop a hill.

Around 4, we had our last landing of the trip at Half Moon Bay, named simply because of its shape. We waited our turn and watched from the ship as other passengers left before us for the quick trip to the landing site.

Yeah, our turn at last to board the zodiac of the stern!

The zodiac ride took just five minutes to get to the rocky shore where there were lots of Chinstrap penguins which we hadn’t seen since our first trip ashore.

I bet you also had identified this as a Chinstrap penguin, right?!

I loved following the progress of some of the penguins making their way up the 'penguin highway' from the shore to the rocky outcrop!

Steven had paused to allow the penguins to pass in front of him as we knew to allow a minimum of five meters between us and them.

Their 'highway' was pinkish because of the color of their poo as you might have guessed!

Liesbet: Thanks for your suggestion from the previous post on how to load some of the videos I took of the cute penguins into the blog so many more people can also be amused by their antics. I don't have the time to follow your ideas but will get to it asap. Possibly, will just have one post devoted to short videos of the penguins. 

Steven and I remarked how we’d never thought that Antarctica had mountain ranges before coming here, so have been struck by the beauty of the mountains we’ve viewed. Perhaps other passengers had done some reading of what to expect in advance of this mind-blowing trip, but clearly we hadn't so it was all a wonderful surprise and revelation!

I was so going to miss these little cuties as they had found a way into my heart.

That lone black spot was a penguin, trudging along step by step on the thin layer of crusty ice covering the snow.

Our goal or destination was the small building in the distance on the right that was a Chilean research station.

How I wish I had known my Antarctic birds or had asked one of the crew members what this solitary soul was.

The mountains weren't the Rockies or the ones we'd soon see in Torres del Paine National Park in the Chilean section of Patagonia but they were majestic, nonetheless.

I loved how for the first time all trip we were able to escape from the madding crowd a bit and just go off on our own here on Half Moon Island.

What an absolute delight being the first people to walk in the snow in this part of Antarctica that day. We had specifically chosen this time of the year to travel to the continent knowing it was the beginning of the travel season and therefore the snow would be much whiter.

My attempt at a somewhat graceful recovery from falling through the snow!

We weren’t sure for quite a while whether it was a rock in the distance or a seal until we finally saw some very slow and seemingly tentative movement! I found out later it was a Weddell seal. I felt ignorant that, prior to this trip, I hadn’t known there were so many different types of seals. 

We finally reached Camara, the Argentine Summer Research Station but it had yet to open for the summer season. Pablo said he doubted it would open because his country’s president wasn’t a fan of the sciences and also because of the country’s poor economy. However, one of the other crew members who happened to be a scientist said it had opened last summer and would definitely open again soon. She added that the scientists would be working on many different topics.

We noticed a few crosses on the hill immediately behind the station and asked the crew about them. We were told that they were likely either graves from people who had perished here prior to the Antarctica Treaty or simply honored people who had once lived here because the treaty forbade burials now in Antarctica.

As we returned on the zodiacs to the ship, I think everybody was sad that we’d just had our last trip ashore here in Antarctica and, for me, hard saying Adios to the adorable penguins we'd likely never see again.

That night we started preparing our return 'home' to the ship's port of Ushuaia so it was time to secure our belongings and prepare for the Drake Passage again!

Next post: The slow trip back to port.

Posted on December 16th, 2019, from Buenos Aires, Argentina, on our last night on the road of this amazing six-week log trip to Antarctica, Patagonia and Paraguay.