Arrival in Antarctica

A trip to Antartica was a reason for our move to Chile, which provides the proximity, ports, and airports needed for accessing the white continent.

We opted for Antarctica21’s fly & sail expedition, opting to fly over the notoriously rough Drake Passage between South America and Antartica and then to board an expedition ship to cruise parts of the Antarctic peninsula.

We had been prepared and understood that travel to and from Antarctica is often disrupted by weather and other events. The unpredictable weather systems of the Southern Ocean swirling around Antarctica, the limited transportation infrastructure, and the number of logistical connections all pose a risk to disrupting Antarctic travel.

Our experiences lived up the the hype.

Our flight from Santiago to Punta Arenas, a town at the far south of Chile, was delayed by about five hours. We were already on a tight time window, as our originally scheduled plane would arrive in Punta Arenas about two hours before the expedition check in time.

Antarctica21 confirmed that our delay would not cause us to miss the flight to Antarctica, though we were already on edge as we had a disruption on our first leg.

When we finally touched down in Punta Arenas, we deboarded the plane. The Antarctica21 staff was waiting for us in the airport baggage claim, and they informed us we needed change immediately into our Antarctic gear, which included heavy winter clothes and special neoprene boots.

We would be leaving for Antarctica tonight, a day earlier than expected. The weather conditions were favorable but could turn sour, grounding the plane.

We unpacked all of our luggage, dressed in our gear in the airport, and then repacked our luggage.

The plane to Antarctica carried only the staff and clients who would be on our ship, and so went through an abbreviated check-in process, getting our bags and boarding passes for the flight to Antarctica.

We received a safety briefing in the terminal, and then off we flew.

We landed at Frei Station on King George Island on the Antarctic Peninsula about 9:30pm, and the sun still shined brightly in the sky. Frei Station is in Antarctica, though it’s an island, so we still haven’t made a continental landing. Frei Station is north of the red diamond below, just off the Antarctic Peninsula and west of the South Shetland Islands.

We boarded 4×4 busses to drive down to the beach, where zodiacs waited to carry us to the ship moored on her anchor in the harbor. We were fitted for life jackets and given brief safety instructions.

While we waited, we spotted our first penguins on the beach, bringing tears of joy to Wilson, who had been longing to see his first penguins in the wild.

Once buttoned up in our life jackets, we skimmed across the calm waters in the zodiac to our ship, the Magellan Explorer.

We completed the orientation onboard the ship, and so our Antarctic adventure had begun.