30Jan – 01Feb White Continent Antarctic Cruise

Antarctica is a land of extremes.
It is the coldest, windiest, driest, highest, quietest, most remote and least understood continent on Earth.
It holds 90% of the world’ ice and 70% of fresh water.
The inland temperature could go down as low as -70C in winter.
In 1983, it was recorded -89C (-128.6F) at Vostok station.

When we were passing through the same passages 2 years ago, we were also blessed as it has been absolutely fine for few days.
It was almost the same this time but only thing different was we were sailing to the eastern direction.
We started from Elephant Island the northern tip of Antarctic Peninsula.
Then, we passed by research stations, Argentinian Esperanza Station, Chilean and American Palmer Station.
There are over 40 permanent research stations in whole Antarctica belong to 30 nations which all are signatories to the Antarctic Treaty (1961).
7 Argentinians are Orcadas, Jubany, Esperanza, Marambio, Brown, San Martin, Belgrano II.
6 Russians are Bellingshausen, Novolazarevskaya, Molodenzhnaya, Progress, Vostok, Mirny
3 Americans are Palmer, Amundsen-Scott, McMurdo
3 Australians are Mawson, Davis, Casey
3 Chileans are Marsh/Frei, O’Higgins, Prat
2 British are Rothera, Halley
2 Chinese are Great Gall, Zhongshan
2 Japanese are Dome Fuji, Syowa
Korean King Sejong, Uruguayan Artigas, Ukrainian Vernadsky, South African Sanae IV, Indian Maitri, Italian Terra Nova Bay, New Zealander Scott Base, French & Italian is Dome Concordia, French is Dumont dÚrville, German Neumayer, Brazilian Ferraz, Polish Arctowski.
As there is no permanent residents, its population are involved in research or support activities.
Those number are varies from 1,000 to 4,000 by season.

A lot of passengers we bump into on the ship are so appreciative on the weather we enjoyed during Antarctic cruise for the last two and a half days.
Sun has been shining through scattered clouds on and off and we were lucky enough not to have snow storm.
In fact, there is no wind when we reached Paradise Bay; I was not even feeling cold with just t shirt on outside deck.
It was so pristine!
Surface of water around Paradise Bay was so calm and it was like mirror and the reflections of mountain were gorgeous!
Small and big ice bergs were scattered around the water surface.
They came in various shapes and sizes and some are so white it shines as icy blue.

Crow's Nest Bar the warmest place on the ship with hundreds of passengers snuggled in

Many are so excited on spotting Humpback whales and thousands of penguins on its colony along the way.
They are mainly Gentoo penguins and Adelie penguins and often seen swimming popping in and out of water.
Apart from these two penguins, Chinstrap penguin, Emperor penguin, King penguin, Magellanic penguin, Macaroni penguin and Rockhopper penguin are the penguin residents in this continent.
Lone seal was also spotted resting on a floating iceberg from time to time.
Glaciers and scenic mountains covered in thick ice were absolutely breathtaking view one will never forget!
How lucky I was to visit the Antarctica twice!