Cape Horn. We passed Cape Horn at about 10.00am. The last time Sally and I sailed past Cape Horn had been at night and all we saw was a silhouette and the light of the lighthouse. This time the complex of rugged islands was bathed in sunshine and even the unusual sculpture of two enormous metal triangles was clear to see. Just at the correct angle the space between become a soaring albatross, remarkably effective, even from 10 miles offshore.

Cape Horn – Monument 2 Nmiles off

Drake Passage

Now in open sea the ship took on a slow, gentle roll from a swell coming from the northwest, not too uncomfortable but it was definitely ‘one hand for yourself and one for the ship’. During the afternoon the lecturers hosted a science fair – Heike Fries displayed an explained the rock and fossil samples from her collection; Sylvia Stevens the mammal samples from her collection, at last I understood the Baleen from whales (whale bone as it was in corsets long before I was born, well not all that long to be honest) and Sean Todd talked us through an archive film of whalers at work in the inter war years, fortunately it was black and white footage.

The South Polar Circle. Rising early we found the Hanseatic deep in pack ice and “porridge”, as the crew described it (the slushy last seasons sea ice) filling the Matha Straight.

Matha Straight – Porridge getting thicker

Matha Straight -Crabeater Seals

We pressed on slowly to the surprise of the seals resting on the ice pans. But at a kilometre or so short of out target the way was blocked by an impenetrable wall of icebergs, the captain had no option but to altered course. We had come so far and he wasn’t going to give up just yet, behind a particularly large iceberg the crew found a lead of open water and at 8.15am with a whoops from the ship’s foghorn we crossed the Circle. The pink champagne, on ice of course, was broken out to celebrate reaching 66 degrees 33 minutes south.

Port Lockroy and Dorian Bay. Overnight the weather had improved enough for the captain to take another early morning look at the Errera Channel, this time with spectacular success. The sun came out and we were greeted by amazing views of the mountains crowding in on this narrow passage.

Errera Channel – Mountain Snow

Paradise Bay. Our attempt to sail through the Errera Channel was defeated by the ice conditions compounded by poor visibility, so we sailed into Paradise Bay by way of the Gerlache Straight. Sadly this meant we missed a close up view of Waterboat Point, more of this tomorrow. Paradise Bay is spectacular; there is no other word, glints of sun highlighted the crystal blues of the glacial ice against the black of the mountains. The seas had stilled to a mirror-calm, and the surrounding mountains and glaciers were perfectly reflected giving surreal symmetrical images, just punctuated by the sea ice, all very magical. But then Minke whales, Crabeater and Weddell seals and even an over inquisitive Leopard Seal shattered the mirror.

South Shetlands, Half Moon Island. A very quick look at a map confirms that its name is its shape! Quite a bite to the air this morning, good job we brought an array of cold weather gear. First time we had tried the “Roll up vacuum type bags” for packing our fleeces and down waistcoats and jackets, I have to say they worked extremely well reducing their volume many times over.

Sightings of Orcas (killer whales), humpback whales and leopard seals delighted us during the morning as we cruised through the Weddle Sea on this ‘bonus’ day east of Graham Land. We were granted permission to land at Mendel Station, a Czech Research Station on James Ross Island. Fascinating to talk to the researchers, who need to fit in their work in the brief summer months and leave their climate experiments to operate remotely during the winter.

James Clark Ross Island – Mendel Czech Base coldest landing

James Clark Ross Island – Snowing at Mendel Czech Base

By late afternoon we were off Paulet Island in the Weddell Sea and this was to be our first true Antarctic landing, the clouds had cleared, the sky blue and the sea smooth, what a wonderful introduction to this inhospitable continent. A steep climb up a stony slope brought us straight into the midst of a colony of Adelie penguins. Fascinating to watch the chicks chase and harass their parents until they regurgitate food. Equally fascinating to wonder how the adults identify their young when they return from their fishing expeditions. Less enthralling was the extraordinarily pungent pong – I’ll say no more!

South Orkneys a wonderfully remote and impressive series of islands but although we had been sheltered for the night the winds were such that the planned landing on Laurie Island at the Argentine Orkadas Research Station had to be cancelled. The sight, through binoculars, of the waves breaking on the shore was enough to convince the Expedition Leader that this landing wasn’t practical. Instead we moved slowly into the Normanna Channel between Coronation Island (named after the Coronation of King George IV) and Signey Island and the sun shone. Remarkable, as anecdotally, the sun hardly ever shines on the spectacular ice sheets and glaciers of these two islands. We sailed out through an iceberg graveyard, bizarre shaped bergs stranded in shallows to melt slowly away. In deeper water we met the first of the tabular icebergs, standing 30+ meters out of the water and kilometres long and wide. My mind raced, if it was only a kilometre square and, for simplicity, a hundred meters from top to bottom, then that floating chunk of ice must weigh about 100 million tonnes and we are a mere 8,400 tonnes – no wonder the captain keeps a very respectful distance!

Cruise on Tauck’s Swiss Sapphire, calling at: Bratislava, Vienna, Durnstein, Linz (for Salzburg), Passau and Regensburg

Our very first river cruise with a full crew doing all the work for us was on the River Nile aboard Swan Hellenic’s Nile Star in 1990. It had been a very different cruise for us from the viewpoints of atmosphere, heat, architecture and the fact that I was working as the Ship’s Surgeon. We’ve also done several self-drive cruises on the Norfolk Broads and in France on the River Saône, the Canal du Midi and the River Rhône /Canal du Rhône à Seté. In June 2010 we set off on our second fully crewed river cruise on the Swiss Sapphire along with 116 fellow passengers, mostly Americans.