Tuesday 18 November 2014

Reflections from Jakob

This is Jakob, one of our trainees on board the Fram. As usual we ask our trainees to write an edition of the blog and as mentioned the other day, your faithful bloggers are thrilled when they accept (do they REALLY have a choice?!!!).


We are now in the notorious Drake Passage after 17 days on board. All the way from Buenos Aires to Antarctica, via Falkland Islands and South Georgia. It’s been an amazing voyage with tons of wildlife, all types of weather and breathtaking scenery. I’m very happy be in a place with 20 hours of sunlight compared with 4 months of darkness, and be close to harmless penguins instead of giant polar bears.

From my home in Svalbard to Antarctica is about as far away as I can get. This is my second time as a trainee in the expedition team, but my first time in Antarctica, actually my first time in the southern hemisphere. I had a lot of fun learning and thinking about the fundamental differences in the south of the planet. Just the fact that the sun moves in the opposite direction when it’s going down, the stars are different and my compass doesn’t work.

This is truly the realm of the great explorers. I have walked in the footsteps of Shackleton in South Georgia, spent a night tenting in Antarctica, just like Amundsen. Kayaking in Neko Harbour was the best, with penguins and icebergs all around. I'm looking forward to one more voyage down south.

(Eds. note- we are now heading for Ushuaia and the end of this fantastic cruise). It all starts again tomorrow with another trip so keep following the blog!)