Fred's Logbook

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Date / Time: 2015-01-04 07:48:57Voyage from: to ETA:
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Vesselname:National Geographic Explorer
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04th of January 2015
Booth Island / Antarctica
65°04,2’S; 064°01,8’W

This morning we anchored off Booth Island, one of the biggest islands of the Wilhelm Archipelago.



The Archipelago was discovered and named by the German Expedition under Captain Eduard Dallmann in 1873 / 74. He named it after the Emperor Wilhelm the 1st, the king of Prussia.

I went ashore and enjoyed the stroll up to a viewpoint, overlooking Port Charcot to one side and the so-called ice-berg alley on the other.



The interesting thing about Booth Island is that one can find all three brush-tail penguins here. The main population consists of Gentoo penguins, but here and there we saw some Chinstraps or Adelies sitting on a nest or strolling around.























Back on board I learned that a polar plunge would be offered before we start sailing away again. So I quickly went to my cabin, stripped off the scarf and met up with John Gerrit, who took me along for the plunge.





We stepped into a Zodiac, which was tied up at the side and then hopped into the ice-cold ocean. Oh my gosh!!! That was cold!!!









I hopped straight into the fresh water tank of our divers to get rid of the salt.









Then made my way all the way up to the Wellness area, where I enjoyed a nice, hot sauna… .











Photos

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