Beyond the Sea Ice

A few days out from the ice edge is the start of the 'safari zone'. I saw my first whales: minkes, humpbacks and so many others that were too far off to ID. We were lucky enough to cruise right next to a couple of minkies bubble netting, which was awesome to see! You’ve seen it on documentaries and it’s just as cool in real life. A perfect circle of bubbles getting tighter and tighter and a huge whale rushes through the centre, munching up krill trapped by the bubble wall. We had humpbacks waving and fin slapping as they passed, a few diving under the ship. There were several days of just whales throughout the trip and they never got old.

Lazy Humpback afternoons

We had new birds. I really fell in love with the birds of the Southern Ocean, so you will hear a lot about them. The cape petrel is now my favourite bird.  They were always constant, always beautiful.

A Cape Petrel following the ship
Image by Amanda Dawson

The Giant Southern Petrel, big enough to be an albatross, has a fearsome looking beak, and strangely, a completely white morph that I was lucky enough to see a few times.

Giant Southern Petrel and the day moon
Image by Amanda Dawson

Black petrels, Southern fulmars, Wilson’s Storm Petrels, and Light Mantled Sooty Albatross make up the list of birds before the sea ice.

Southern Fulmar
Image by Amanda Dawson

 The birds would follow the ship, cruising around the back. Maybe there was increased wind behind the ship to ride, maybe we stirred up krill, or maybe they thought we were a trawler. Whatever the reason, birds would follow us for days, and I loved it.

Light Mantled Sooty Albatross  

I saw my first iceberg at 10am on the 14^th December. He was a beauty. It wasn’t the first iceberg of the trip but I had been sleeping late. After that, all day long: icebergs. Big ones small ones, flat ones, pointy sharp ones. And the whales! There were humpbacks and minkes intermixed. Whales and icebergs: it’s the dream. We saw our first penguins adrift on icebergs. They were just little black spots. No idea if they were Adelie’s or not.

My first Iceberg!!

“I can’t tear myself away from the bridge for that long because I can’t stand missing them. So beautiful and massive. Kind of awe inspiring"

Perfect glassed out ocean reflecting an iceberg

 Before the ice edge we stopped to pick up a whale mooring. It’s a hydrophone that records whale calls. Basically we pulled the ship up above it and sent a signal down to the mooring to detach. Then the buoy floated to the surface and we collect it using a grapple gun.

Whale Mooring

Collected

We hit the sea ice edge at 9pm. Sea ice is amazing! Penguins became a standard feature in the scenery. That first day in the sea ice I saw Adelie’s and a juvenile emperor penguin. Rhys, the cadet, took us all down into the bow of the ship (the focsle – as it is known to seafaring types like me arrr) to watch us crash through the ice. Two big fat blubbery crabeater seals were chilling on the sea ice nearby. Humpbacks cruised in around the ice. Snow petrels and Antarctic petrels followed us as soon as we made it to the sea ice edge, midnight sun, and the sound of ice being cracked and broken by the ship. That night was magical.

Some fellow expeditioners down on the focsle enjoying the sea ice 

Sea ice on a cloudy day

Breaking our way through an enormous ice floe

Snow Petrel
Image by Amanda Dawson

Antarctic Petrels

Krill fishing happened along the outer side of the sea ice edge. For some reason, that first night, we broke into the sea ice, cruised south for several hours then turned and left the sea ice for krill fishing. Antarctic krill (my krill) live outside the sea ice in the deeper water. Ice krill (inferior to Antarctic krill in every way) live in the shallower coastal water, regardless of whether or not there is ice. Krill fishing is pretty cool. As we cruise around, the krill team (not me sadly) monitor the depth sounder. A big school shows up and someone will ring the bridge to chuck a uey. We then scoot over the swarm and drop a trawl net to the right depth, as we pass through, the net opens and catches krill. Most times when we caught krill I got samples for myself, I'm hoping to look at microplastics in wild krill, and for Susan to look for POPs and to look at isotope values. Over the whole trip I collected 10 samples of krill. The krill team collected thousands of krill, including pregnant ladies (gravid), juveniles, adults, Ice krill, and Thysanoessa macrura (another lesser krill).  They also caught various zooplankton, like salps –lots of salps, fish larvae, copepods, an adorable translucent baby squid about the size of my thumb, and a pretty nifty siphonophore.

Krill fishing

Euphausia superba Antarctic Krill

After the first night of krill fishing we turned back into the sea ice. Seals became pretty common. There was a big fat crabeater seal sitting on the ice flow straight in front of the ship. He wouldn’t move, he was so territorial over his ice flow that he was nearly run over. He barely moved over enough as we passed, he was growling at the ship the whole way (you could hear it). I bet he went home and bitched to his wife about tourist drivers crowding up the ocean. I’m pretty sure we ruined his day. The further south, the thicker the ice became. It’s awesome. One of my favourite pastimes throughout the entire voyage was standing down on the focsle by myself, watching us crack through the sea ice. I loved the cracking, crunching sound of the ice being obliterated by the ship. But every now and then, the ship rocked as the ice held its ground and shunted the ship over.

Cranky old Crabeater
Image by Amanda Dawson

Ice breaking, though awesome to watch, was a shit to try and sleep through. The whole night you could hear the grinding of ice against the hull. Frequently ice would go through the prop and the whole ship would shudder. It was like trying to sleep on a vortex mixer.
After one night of icebreaking we arrived at the polynya (a polynya is an ice free area) and Newcomb bay - gateway to Casey Station.

Whales and sea ice

Juvenile Emperor Penguin (lacks the yellow around the neck) and poop smear

Adelie on an ice floe
Image by Amanda Dawson