Penguins and polar plunge
4th January 2025, Antarctic Sound
We started bright and early. At 6 am, the first volunteers enthusiastically braced the cold morning breeze. The conditions were very windy but the sun shone, visibility was good, and while we didn’t spot any marine mammals, the seabirds seemingly enjoyed the wind. Due to the early start, most of us opted for a later breakfast. From our table, we watched porpoising Adelie penguins; these were only the first individuals of the many tens of thousands of penguins we would see that day. We went up to deck 10, where we watched the Argentinian Base Esperanza pass by on port and several large rafts of Adelie penguins racing the Amundsen. We were astonished at how long these small animals could keep up with our large ship!
Around midday, we reached our excursion destination: Hope Bay, a large Adelie penguin colony with more than 120,000 individuals. From a distance, the brownish penguin patches looked like writing on a wall – “Was it only a matter of time before penguins would take over the world?” we joked.
Once the vessel stopped in front of spectacular glaciers and volcanic scenery, it was time for our next activity: a Zodiac cruise. While it was still a beautiful sunny day, the wind had picked up even more, and the water was very, very choppy. Wearing full waterproofs, hoods, hats, scarves, gloves, sunblock, and sunglasses, we were ready for this adventure, which came with complimentary sea water shower! Initially, we had a tailwind, allowing us to take pictures of penguins and scenery even though holding the camera steady was challenging. There were penguins everywhere around us: On land, in the water and even in the air; the Adelie penguins were jumping through the waves as if flying! However, when the boat turned around to head back to the Amundsen, we got soaking wet; not one centimetre of our clothing remained dry. Our boat driver laughed that we were in safe hands, as the best boat drivers were those who could not swim. It made us all burst out in laughter – and getting wet was part of the experience after all!
After the cruise and a hot shower, we met to discuss data. We added the previous day’s penguin data to the spreadsheet and started organising the seabird data until it was time for our biggest adventure yet: THE POLAR PLUNGE!! We were excited and couldn’t wait to jump in the water! We had found shelter from the swells in the Antarctic Sound. The bay was peaceful and calm. The polar plunge involved jumping from the Zodiac into the water, which was only one degree C ‘warm’—basically, just a big swimming pool with icebergs in the background!
Every jumper wore a harness attached to a safety rope and a buoyancy vest. Standing on the side of the zodiac, looking out over the icebergs and only the clear water underneath felt unreal. All students joined in – we must have been a tiny bit crazy: Jumping into the near-freezing water without any hesitation! – The Southern Ocean is very cold; our team can now confirm this from experience. There is photographic evidence of all brave jumpers, and we even received a certificate. Everyone was thrilled; diving into the clean, clear water – simply an unforgettable experience! Following the plunge, we met in the outside hot tub at deck 10 and shared our cold-water experiences. Everyone loved it, and we would have certainly gone again! We didn’t see any whales from the hot tub, but we enjoyed the soft tingling when our bodies slowly returned to a normal temperature.
After dinner, we came together on deck 7 for the last shift of the day and were surprised by the most beautiful sunset. The sky was full of colours: pink, green, orange, purple, and yellow, and the sun set slowly behind the icebergs—the perfect Antarctic scenery. The sun disappeared at 11 p.m., a lovely end to a special day that all of us will remember for a long time.
Polar greetings,
Lilli
Adelie penguins must have one of the most interesting and equally messed up mating practises I've heard about in nature. Early researchers of the species documented the exchange of rocks for sex, penguin gang rape and even necrophilia among the species. The reports were originally not released to the public due to their troubling content and they only surfaced year later. Though how can we judge a species that could never understand our senses of morality? Fun fact though is that these penguins are the same species as the penguins from the Madagascar movies. The polar plunge sounds amazing... and very cold. The water being 1 degrees celsius means you actually experience some fairly warm water given that the mean temperature of the water surrounding Antarctica in summer is freezing at zero degrees celsius. Interestingly the water does not freeze despite the temperature due to the salinity of the sea water instead freezing as frazil ice at about -1.8 degrees celsius. The ice then clumps together into larger 'pancakes of ice' before forming an ice sheet. In Antarctica this sea ice covers a maximum area of ~14.2 million square kilometres. Did you see any sea ice sheets on your expedition? Given your geographical area you might expect to encounter some sea ice in the nook between the Antarctic peninsula and the Ronne ice shelf.