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WEEK 3: JANUARY 13, 2008 - JANUARY 18, 2008
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WHY DO THESE PENGUINS SEEM SO WARM?
 Have you ever seen footage of penguins walking around in the cold wind and wondered why they seem so comfortable in temperatures that would quickly freeze human skin? Would you believe penguins are so well adapted to life in cold places they have a more difficult time dealing with warm temperatures than they do with cold?
How do penguins stay warm? Other birds grow feathers only in narrow tracts and then fluff them out to cover the rest of their bodies. Penguins, in contrast, have dense, scale-like feathers with downy tufted bases tightly covering their entire body. Underneath the many feathers, penguins also have a thick layer of fat that insulates them from the cold. Even though they live outside in extreme cold, the 101¡F (38¡C) internal body temperature of a penguin is higher than the average human body temperature. 
Imagine yourself wearing several thick sweaters, a couple pairs of sweatpants, a wool hat, mittens, and a big puffy coat with the hood cinched down tightly. Now think about walking into a heated room and you might start to have some idea what it must be like to be a penguin in warm temperatures. What would you do if you started to overheat? Penguins can't take off their coats, but they can try to lose heat through their feet, the only part of their bodies not covered in feathers. Penguins have many blood vessels in their feet and can send warm blood out into their feet to cool it down before it is pumped back into their body core. Before penguins dive into the cold water they can squeeze the blood out of their feet to keep from losing too much heat to the water. This explains why the feet of penguins that just jumped out of the water are white, but the feet of penguins nesting on land can be rosy.
Not only do penguins rely on cold temperatures to stay comfortable; they also rely on cold to maintain the sea ice they use for hunting, resting and, for the Emperor Penguin, making colonies for raising young.
- Elizabeth K. Andre
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January 14, 2008
EVERYWHERE YOU LOOK THERE'S ICE
66,00.98S x 65,25.13W - A snowy day on the peninsula; we've passed this big ice flow with seven crab-eater seals luxuriating...
VIDEO: Kayaking in the pack ice |
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Katabatic Winds
Can you imagine relaxing on a ship in coastal waters with calm weather or only light winds and then being hit unexpectedly by hurricane force winds? It would be quite a surprise! Certain coastal areas in Antarctica can be calm for much of the time until hit by a katabatic wind. Before slamming into your ship, the air in that katabatic wind was at a higher elevation on the slope of a tall mountain or a high glacial valley. As that air cooled, it became denser than the air below it and began to "flow" down the mountain towards your unsuspecting vessel. For that reason katabatic winds are sometimes called down slope wind or fall winds. How strong can these winds be? Douglas Mawson, a famous Australian explorer, recorded frequent gusts of more than 150 miles per hour (240 kph) at his Cape Denison base in 1912.
If you're thinking about exploring Antarctica, however, the occasional katabatic winds aren't the only winds that should concern you. Antarctica is the windiest of the continents and some coastal areas endure almost constant strong winds. Over the two years Mawson spent recording wind speeds at Cape Denison, the average wind speed was 45 mph (72 kph).
Why is Antarctica so windy? In addition to global wind currents, Antarctica creates its own wind systems. Cold air slides down the ice plateau, gaining speed as it leaves the high interior ice fields and descends to the lower areas near the coasts. These winds can form impressive clouds of blowing snow that reach high into the air. Winds this strong, combined with cold temperatures, would quickly freeze any human's exposed skin.
- Elizabeth A. Andre
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January 15, 2008
DETAILLE ISLAND We are now south of the Antarctic circle, which means the sun never sets...
 PLAY AUDIO
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JANUARY 16, 2008 CRYSTAL SOUND
What a difference a day makes. This morning we woke up to a howling wind off Detaille Island. During the night - though the concept of 'night' is tricky now that we are south of the Antarctic Circle where the sun never really sets - the boat at anchor heaved back and forth due to various combinations of winds, tide and swell. Katabatic winds blowing 40 miles per hour off the onshore glaciers ripped the Lallemand Fjord, turning the scene very ominous despite the still-bright sunlight.
We camp just next to an abandoned British refuge - known simply as Camp W, on Detaille Island - and this morning snuck in through an open door to explore. The place was as if people had just left, which they had, but 50 years ago. Everywhere was evidence of men intending to return: Full cans of rolled oats, bags of Grape Nuts, jars of Heinz mayonnaise, wooden skis, dogsleds and canvas harnesses, blank weather observation forms, telegraphs from home ("It is sunny and 70 degrees in the garden and Jock has a boil on his neck, which I am cleaning every day, which makes him wag his tail at me... "), cheap detective novels, shoes, jackets, photographic film and much, much more. The depot served as a resupply hut for British Antarctic Survey teams, as well as a refuge for anyone passing by who might need a warm place stocked with coal, paraffin and fuel oil. It's been officially abandoned since the late 1950s and may very well be torn down in coming years.
By noon the wind had disappeared and we kayaked under hot - 45 degrees Fahrenheit! - sun, through thick pass ice. We were headed for the Gullet, a pair of channels that would lead us to Margarite Bay, but the pack ice made it difficult. No one cared though, because the typical Antarctic winds and gray skies were gone, at least for the day. I've traveled several times along the Peninsula and have never seen a full day this glorious; Graham has been here seven consecutive austral summers and confesses this is the most beautiful day he's ever seen here. Somehow, for some reason, the weather gods stay on our side.
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JANUARY 17, 2008 CRYSTAL SOUND
OUR SOUTHERNMOST POINT: ICE WILL ALLOW US TO GO NO FURTHER
On an incredibly beautiful day, incredibly beautiful by any standard but particularly in Antarctica, we reached our southernmost point. The sun blazing over a perfectly calm sea, temperatures in the mid-40s (F), we bumped into enough pack ice to stop an icebreaker. Our kayaks could only penetrate through narrower and narrower channels between thick ice before running into dead ends. Sean's last GPS measurement had us at 66 degrees, 58 minutes South by 67 degrees, 20 minutes West.
 We'd hoped to be able to sneak through a pair of channels known as The Gullet, which would have taken us to Marguerite Bay. But even climbing to the top of the "Pelagic's" mast all we could see southward was a long sheet of sea ice leading to an even longer sheet of fast ice attached to the Peninsula. Even dragging the kayaks up and over the ice would only result in an extreme workout; open water is more than 40 miles away as the crow flies. Sailing to Marguerite Bay would be tedious and roundabout, and cost us perhaps three days at sea. Not wanting to do that, we decide instead to sail north and return to the Fish Islands where we know we can maneuver both the "Pelagic" and our kayaks. We also have it in mind to climb Sharp's Peak and have a look at the Peninsula from that vantage point.
It's been a funny year in Antarctica, weather-wise. It was an unusually cold winter and late spring, which meant lots of snow and pack ice lingered far longer than usual. But we've now seen several straight days of 40+ temperatures with virtually no wind. Among us we have 50 years of Antarctic experience and none of us have ever seen conditions this ... bucolic. I'm a little concerned the pictures of us kayaking on these blue waters among sculpted icebergs may create the wrong impression; while it's been blue and sunny for several days we all know somewhere in the back of our minds, even while applying sun cream to any exposed piece of flesh, that we are about to get slammed by the real Antarctica.
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