HEADING SOUTH

BY JONATHAN RUSSO

For hazardous journey, small wages, bitter cold, long months of complete darkness, constant danger, safe return doubtful, honor and recognition in case of success. Ernest Shackleton 4 Burlington St. (Shackleton ad seeking crew for the Antarctic expedition in 1900)

It was 6:00 am on our third day after leaving the port of Ushuaia, Argentina, bound for Antarctica, when Captain Etienne Garcia strode into the ship’s bridge in a bathrobe and sunglasses. We had arrived at Antarctica’s Crystal Sound and “the ice.” He was excited to be there, as was I. As he’s in charge of Le Commandant Charcot (LCC), Ponant cruise line’s ice-breaking flagship, he had seen this ice a hundred times. This was my first, but I saw his excitement was real. He commented in French-accented English, “We are here and what a smooth journey, no? The Drake [Passage] was like a lake.” I have 11 more days of adventure ahead. We will see how smooth those are.

For over forty years, the exploration of the Earth’s southernmost continent has fascinated me. The endurance of unimaginable hardships: bitter cold, total darkness, sensory deprivation, nutritional privation, and the real possibility of crippling illness and/or death, has jarred me out of my urban comfort zone. The organization, provisioning, ship handling, and navigation required for each journey south stimulated me to think about humanity’s relentless quest for progress in the most extreme climate on earth.

As I sail aboard LCC, I swim in her pool, enjoy the sauna and snow room, and get a massage. I eat in her Alain Ducasse restaurant, followed by an espresso in the observation lounge while watching ice floes, whales, penguins, and seals. I attend the daily naturalists’ lectures and excursion updates before retreating to my comfortable Scandinavian-style cabin outfitted with every amenity. With all these luxuries at my fingertips, contrasted by my knowledge of the historical hardships of this journey, I can’t help but be overwhelmed by the technical, social, and economic progress humankind has made.

It was established early on that Antarctic exploration, aside from harvesting whale oil and seal skins, would result in no economic value. The continent is an ice desert. Larger than the United States, the dominant feature is ice, ice, and more ice. There are scores of different types of ice. Frazil, Nilas, and Pancake are just three. There is ice on mountains, ice on flatlands, rivers, valleys, volcanoes, and floating on the seas. Ice covers 99.6% of the surface, rising to the height of three miles in places. 70% of the world’s freshwater is locked up in that ice. Unlike the Arctic North Pole, which is a floating ice cap—a remnant of the glacial ice that once covered “snowball earth”— Antarctica has land underneath the ice. As one of the shipboard naturalists explained, “Antarctica was, 550 million years ago, part of the Earth’s one unified continent called Gondwana. Over eons, it migrated south to the coldest part of the planet. The climate is always evolving. It’s hard to believe dinosaurs once walked here before it went south.”

The first to discover the rumored continent was British explorer James Cook in his 1772-75 voyage. He observed and sailed around the ice shelves, believed the land itself was impenetrable, and wrote, “The risk one runs in exploring a coast in these unknown and Icy Seas, is so very great, that I can be bold to say no man will ever venture farther than I have done…” Not a very promising call to later explorers. However, since his journals revealed wildlife in abundance, within a few decades, a century-long mad rush of whalers and sealers came to relentlessly kill everything that breathed.

Cook’s discovery set in motion an era of scientific exploration, as large expeditions, led by adventurers and scientists sailed in uncharted and perilous waters, mapping the continent’s shores and islands.

The next big wave of interest came in 1874 when astronomers studying the transit of Venus ventured south. This became the catalyst for inter-European rivalry, as countries sent scientists and explorers to Antarctica. Belgium, France, England, and Germany all competed to go the furthest south and winter over the longest. These were huge expeditions requiring years of plan- ning, funding, and provisioning. Both national treasuries and private sponsorships were used. Temporary land bases were established and dashes to the pole were set in motion. Public buy-in was essential, so when the adventurers returned, they toured lecture halls and wrote countless newspaper accounts, emphasizing the hardships of life on the ice, their frozen bodies, the relentless darkness of winter, and the perils of migrating ice shelves. They enthralled audiences living in a world that was becoming urban and sedentary.

Sir Ernest Shackleton, however, stands in the English-speaking public’s mind as the most notable adventurist of all, probably because, by this time (1914), mass communication was possible. As many know, Shackleton’s voyage on the Endurance (recently found almost intact after 106 years at the bottom of the Weddell Sea) ended in disaster. His ship was caught in the ice during the long winter and had to be abandoned. Using lifeboats, Shackleton led his 27 men to safety on Elephant Island. Then he and a few others underwent a harrowing voyage to South Georgia Island and eventual rescue. No other Antarctic explorer ever captured the public’s attention like he did, not even Robert Scott, who died on his Terra Nova expedition, or Roald Amundsen, who was the first to reach the pole and return alive.

As timelines go, Shackleton’s historic voyage 110 years ago is both distant and near. Distant in the sense that we have gone to the moon several times since then and have GPS on our cell phones. Technology has progressed so rapidly that the “modern” Antarctic explorers—Shackleton, Scott, and Amundsen—seem closer to James Cook’s discovery of Antarctica in the late 18th century than to our routine visits to this ice-covered land today.

While the derring-do of the above remains in the imagination of those interested in polar adventure, it is a quieter man, a man primarily interested in science, that the Antarctic adventure ship I was on was named after—French doctor and explorer Jean-Baptiste Charcot. His twentieth-century expeditions discovered and mapped over 600 miles of coastline which he explained in 18 volumes of scientific reports. Robert Scott called him “the polar gentleman.” Our voyage on LCC visited several islands and harbors named by or for him.

The South Pole explorers of yore were envelope pushers; they lived and died mapping and naming the vast continent’s features.

Ponant’s Antarctic adventurers will have a different experience than past ones. Here are some of the contrasts.

Scope of Exploration: Very few people going to Antarctica understand that they only see the Antarctic Peninsula. One of the LCC naturalists explained, “They’re seeing less than 1% of the land mass.” Fortunately, this peninsula is closest to the ports of embarkation (in Argentina and Chile), has most of the wildlife, and is the most accessible place to land. The other 99% is hard to access and far more monolithic in terms of visuals—often just a massive ice shelf. One, the Ross, is larger than France, a scale difficult to comprehend.

A Norwegian expedition cruise line offering eco-friendly trips to Antarctica with educational lectures and polar exploration activities.

A pioneer of eco-tourism, Lindblad Expeditions provides expedition-style trips to Antarctica with a team of naturalists, historians, and photographers.

SILVERSEA

A luxury cruise line that offers all-inclusive trips to Antarctica with butler service, fine dining, and personal suites with private balconies.

A partnership between Lindblad Expeditions and National Geographic, offering expedition-style trips to Antarctica with a team of experts and scientists.

AURORA EXPEDITIONS:

A small-ship expedition cruise line that offers trips to Antarctica with kayaking, camping, and mountaineering options for adventure enthusiasts.

A Dutch adventure cruise line that offers trips to Antarctica with a focus on wildlife encounters, hiking, and kayaking opportunities.

SEABOURN

A luxury cruise line that offers all-inclusive trips to Antarctica on its ultra-luxury ship Seabourn Quest, with gourmet dining and personalized service.

Weather: Another misconception is the weather. My friends asked me how cold it was. They imagined freezing, life-threatening, sub-zero readings with accompanying whiteouts. Unlike the real explorers, no cruise ships go to Antarctica in the polar winter. We sailed in the polar summer. Some days it was hot, in the 50s, with brilliant sunshine, 24 hours’ worth by the way. Most days it was in the 30s. Yes, there can be storms and high winds, but they are the exception, and modern forecasting prevents anyone from being caught out in life-threatening conditions.

Navigation: GPS is so accurate that a ship’s officer can pinpoint their location within a few feet on a chart. Depth, ocean bottom contour, water temperature, and even ice floes appear on computer screens. The LCC’s bridge never had less than three officers tracking and plotting our course. Thus, we could sail in the icy waters called The Gullet, a very narrow 11-mile channel. Just to be sure, our helicopter scouted the route before. It deemed it passable, a feat unimaginable to those in wooden ships taking occasional sun sights and using sounding lines to (hopefully) tell them where they were.

Propulsion: The LCC uses the most advanced propulsion systems. The famed Norwegian shipyard, Vard, built her with engines that can run on diesel, liquefied natural gas, or self-charged batteries. Two Azipod rotating propellers allow the ship to not only enter the icepack but back out of it. Using these Azipods, LCC can secure itself into the ice for passenger disembarkment. The days of relying on winds or coal-fired engines for propulsion are over. In an impressive feat of technology, LCC schedules its return hour to Ushuaia based on winds, tides, and ice with complete accuracy.

Communication: I have always been amazed that even though Shackleton set out in the 20th century, he could reach no one when he got caught in the ice. The world didn’t know the Endurance sank or that he left 22 men on Elephant Island when