Birds, penguins, seals, seals eating penguins, blood, humpbacks, minkes, albatross, glaciers, ice-bergs, mountains, calm seas, wild seas, calving glaciers, penguins mountaineering on ice bergs, seals sleeping on ice bergs, seals eating penguins, blood on ice bergs.
We visited three research stations. The Great Wall of China Base (home of the Antarctic winter Olympics), Vernadsky (seriously peaceful Ukrainians), and Arctowski (Poland) which has a tank with the top half removed as part of its amphibious conversion.
We had a total of eight half-day zodiac excursions, most with landings and some just cruising. A couple of times we were returning in wild seas. The most impressive zodiac dismount was by our octogenarian whilst the zodiac was in a two metre swell. She stood up to cross the zodiac, tripped over a rope, became airborne, her belly came down on the top of the rubber zodiac wall on the other side, she became airborne again, and with a mid-flight full twist came back down on her bum.
Staff were there to assist stepping off the heaving zodiac onto the narrow steel gangway. Balance was difficult and sometimes scary.
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