Antarctica - wildlife and landscape

Christmas and New Years kept me from following up on the blog with the final part of our trip. Restless as I am I decided I couldn't even stay back home for New Years so me and two friends went to Luxembourg to welcome the new year. It was epic, but as with all my shorter trips - nothing that goes into the blog. There's a limit to how interesting my life is to others. :-)

I've had some time now coming into 2014 to go through most of my pictures and select a few to put online. This post is just to give a sample of the different wildlife we encountered down on the continent, as well as showing you a few shots of the quite spectacular landscape that is down there. Whenever I have more time I will make a final post telling more about the trip itself. Enjoy!

This is a map showing the route in more detail. The different points of interests are marked here, and I've tried describing under each picture below where it was taken. In total we sailed 1.700 nautical miles on the ten days we were away.

Light-mantled Sooty Albatross following the boat while crossing the Drake passage.

Antarctic (Blue-Eyed) Shag resting on an iceberg in Paradise Harbour near Base Brown (Argentina)

Floating ice and coming of night over Mt. Francais, looking out Neko Harbour.

The sun in our back crossing the Bransfield Strait from South Shetland Islands to Trinity Peninsula.

Sunsets in the Antarctic can indeed be quite spectacular. :-)

Floating ice and majestic mountains sailing through the Gerlache Strait off the Antarctic Peninsula.

Adelie penguin just out off the water near Arctowski research station (Poland).

Chinstrap penguin. Aitcho Islands. This was our first landing, and our first penguin encounter.

Gentoo penguin in Neko harbour. He's a bit upset I'm standing in his way.

Crabeater seal - Turret Point.

Elephant seal (these grow up to 6,5m long and can weigh 18-20tons!)

Antarctic furseal. This was the one species that was hunted to near extinction. Still rare in Antarctica.

Leopard seal. The only carnivore mammal living here besides the Orca (killer whale).

A small Weddell seal working on it's tan at Deception Island.

Did I mention the sunset is fantastic? Here's leaving the peninsula, heading for the Drake.

Southern Giant Petrel. The penguin egg's and baby's worst enemy..

Humpback Whale off Arctowski research Station.

Orca hunting the Gerlache Strait