Emotional goodbye

We all said an emotional goodbye to the Antarctic yesterday in glorious sunshine. Like most days we still had a wind chill of minus 30, but the more time we spend here we somehow seem to get used to it. The crew who have been travelling here every Summer season for years kept saying that we had been so lucky experiencing the best of everything that the Antarctic has to offer – smooth crossing over the Drake Passage, perfect weather, sightings of every wildlife we could wish for…..so I guess it was inevitable that we had to experience a true Drakes Passage crossing on our way home, and that is exactly what happened last night. I have now had no sleep for nearly 48 hours so a quick note from me to everybody who´s still checking out what we´re up to.

We tried to have some dinner and all linked hands at the table but still couldn´t stop ourselves falling over. We had spend most of the day hanging onto the most secure parts of the ship but had now resorted to crawling everywhere to prevent more accidents. When a 10m high wave hit the boat side on in the middle of the night I was well prepared as I´d been hanging on to the metal post supporting our bunk beds since 10pm. The winds were gusting at 90mph, this was extraordinary, even for the Drake Passage and George our Captain who would normally be tucked up in bed stayed awake all night to keep us on course. The crew have not been able to serve any food in these rough conditions, but we´re still hopeful for dinner tonight before the Pirates of the Antarctic farewell party. Everything on the boat that is not tied down was thrown across the boat when the huge wave hit us, so now only 40 miles to go before arrive at Cape Horn and have some protection from land. Now I can´t wait to step onto dry land!