So we returned back to Larsen Harbour, and after lunch an announcement rang out that hardy souls could take a Zodiac tour of Drygalski Fjord if they wanted to. I looked out of the windows, and seeing snow coming in fast and rapid, and nearly horizontal, immediately grasped the opportunity. My more sedate (and possibly more intelligent) family members deferred, preferring for some strange reason to stay aboard the Explorer with all the comforts of home (warmth, dryness, etc.).

I bundled up tight – underwear, two layers of long underwear, trail pants, and waterproof pant covers on the bottom, three layers plus a heavy two layered parka over my torso, a balaclava and my dorky but very warm winter hat and Oakley sunglasses on top, along with a neck warmer for extra insurance. My feet had nearly knee-length SmartWool socks, and the great Arctic Muckboots on them. And my hands had three layers of gloves. Toss in a life vest for good measure and I was ready to face whatever mother nature would whip at me.

First there was Nanuck of the North, and now there's Jake of the South

My first reaction to the snow falling (whipping) at me when I entered the Zodiac was “Ow!”. That’s because it was not snow – it was hard little ice pellets. But I was man enough to stand the pain, and off we went, zipping into the miniature hail storm, glad to finally be free of the confines of the ship after being cooped up in it for nearly two days.

The scenery, what little of it we could discern between fogged up glasses and falling icy snow, looked pretty impressive, and hardy little fur seal pups swam in the water between the large masses of kelp to check us out.

I wisely had not taken any of my nicer camera gear (none of which is remotely waterproof) and instead relied on my Olympus Stylus Tough 8000 everything-proof point and shoot, and Bas’ Sanyo Xacti waterproof video camera (which rapidly ran out of batteries). Better yet, I had thought to bring along a short plastic monopod which I attached to the bottom of the Olympus and then used to shoot underwater video of kelp. Worked surprisingly well (although my editing software had fits – more on that in another blog I write for, later).

Here's what my underwater video camera rig looked like

One special thing that did happen while we were out was that the hotel manager Henrick and chef Daniel, along with their Zodiac driver Oscar, were personally delivering Swedish Glog (similar to Glühwein – a spiced, mulled, hot wine which is wonder in cold weather) to all of us braving the fierce weather.

The restaurant staff came out to recharge our batteries with some Swedish Glog. Yum.

There is a bit of irony in the fact that the worst weather we’ve experienced on our Antarctic voyage has been at the northern most stop of the trip so far.

I returned back to the National Geographic Explorer about an hour later, feeling great, at least until I realized my waterproof pant shell was not so waterproof, and the reason my buttocks were cold was because I had been effectively sitting in a puddle of freezing water for some time.

The deckhands did not have a fun time getting folks in and out of Zodiacs

Lots more photos from the afternoon, including Glog photos, are on my Flickr page.

There’s a video below with highlights of the trip, including underwater kelp shots below:

Penguin water exits are rather dramatic, with penguins frequently leaping great heights onto land, and occasionally failing. They also have no idea what might be on land at the sites they are launching themselves onto, which produces some very entertaining results (at least for us humans – not sure about the penguins).

To help give you a sense of what penguins flying through the air look like in motion, I have assembled the video collage you can view below. Please note that the laugh track is based on what was recorded at the time of the various events you will be viewing, and not added later (only the music was added later). Enjoy!

This was shot with the video mode of my Nikon D300s camera.