20221219 Monday December 19, 2022- Fournier Bay, Anvers Island Zodiac cruise

 20221219 Monday December 19- Fournier Bay, Anvers Island

Everyone seems to need extra sleep to catch up on sleep deficiency from the travels to get to the Viking Polaris, but John and Price were up early and got a workout in before breakfast.  

The ship had an open house for the Hanger/Garage where we could get a close up look at all the vessels and equipment.  We even got a chance to get up close and personal to the two yellow submarines, George and Ringo.  It is interesting that all the motorized vessels burn diesel, not gasoline.  Diesel outboard motors are pretty rare and much more expensive than gas powered outboards.  There was a room in the hanger that housed spare outboards.  

We watched some of the morning’s lecture on birds, given by an expert professional ornithologists.  It is nice that they record the lectures so that passengers can watch them at their own convenience, and if it gets too boring, it’s easy enough to just fall asleep on your own bed.  

During lunch, the ship made landfall as Anvers Island appeared out of the fog.  It was 36˚F with light winds, and there were snow flurries going on intermittently. As we approached Anvers Island, we saw a humpback whale break the surface about half a mile from the ship.  

As the afternoon approached, the Viking Polaris was put on virtual anchor- its propulsion systems holding a static position.  It is preferable to avoid disturbing the bottom in sensitive areas.  Before long, we saw the Special Ops Boat (SOB) cruise by with staff on board.  Then the Zodiacs made their appearance, and then the dive support/rescue boat and the submarine appeared.  It is notable that the submarine can be operated on the surface with the pilot sticking her head out of the top of the submarine, not unlike a tank commander.  Last came the kayaks, towed behind one of the Zodiacs.  

It was time to put on all our cold weather gear.  While it was a relatively balmy 36˚F outside, the speed of the zodiacs in the water could make a significant wind chill factor.  It is quite the process donning 2 layers of socks, thin and medium weight base bottoms, fleece lined synthetic pants and waterproof outer pants, waterproof insulated boots, thin and medium weight top base layers, fleece shirt, insulating jacket and then the outer parka and inflatable life vest.  Ben had an additional layer for mounting a GoPro and attachment points for the mirrorless multi lens camera.  

Our heads and necks were covered by neck gaiters/balaclavas and wool caps.  Ben also had a GoPro mount for his cap.  We also had our heated gloves and sunglasses.  

There are two outer lower pockets in the parka, and an inside left breast pocket, but when the life preserver is worn, there is no access to anything inside the parka. It was easy to overheat while within the Viking Polaris, so we didn’t don our hats or gloves until we could feel the cold air in the Zodiac boarding area.  

The Zodiac cruise was more like a technical rehearsal for all passengers.  It takes some ingenuity to work out how to access cameras and manage accessories in the Zodiacs.  We motored deeper into Fournier Bay, which had views of multiple glaciers and bits of dark rock exposed on some of the peaks.  The Zodiacs picked their way through floating bits of sea ice and got with a quarter mile of a few very large ice bergs.  They say we can’t get much closer than that because some of these ice bergs can spontaneously flip over, causing a tsunami or direct strike hazard.  We could see very clearly two layers on the face of the glaciers.  The superficial layer is white while the underlying layer is blue.  

We also saw some floating ice that was much darker in color than the white appearance of most of the floating ice.  These were formed deep within glaciers and looked like sculpted glass. 

We didn’t see wildlife during our Zodiac cruise, but a pair of humpback whales came close to the Viking Polaris just as we had placed our order in Manfredi’s Italian restaurant. The Captain made an announcement over the intercom, so everyone scampered to windows to see the whales.  When we returned to the table, they brought our food out as if nothing had interrupted our meal. 

Our Zodiac cruise was the second session to launch.  As we returned, the winds picked up from 5-10 knots to 20 knots.  This forced cancellations of any subsequent submarine dives or kayak trips.  The weather can change very abruptly.  We were lucky to have gotten out while it was still pretty calm.  

We did manage to make reservations for our whole group at Manfredi’s for tonight.  We had failed to recognize that we could have booked Christmas dinner earlier, and when we realized our mistake, there were no more reservations at the specialty restaurants for Christmas Day, but we did manage to get a table for Christmas Eve.  

There isn’t much entertainment in the evenings aside from the in-room video streaming and 2 pairs of musicians (cellist and pianist, guitar and vocalist) playing in the Living Room and Explorer’s lounge.  No trivia, game shows or contests, but with the wine at dinner and residual sleep deprivation, about all we can manage is to brush our teeth and hit the sack.  Even at 10PM, it is still daylight outside, so it is necessary to use the black out shade to sleep.  

We have learned that tomorrow’s excursions will all be pushed back a couple of hours due to excessive wind in the forecast for the morning.  Our Zodiac landing at Breakwater Islands has been postponed to 1PM. We had previously signed up for a submarine dive, but so far, there has been no confirmation that we will make that dive.  We’ll find out tomorrow.

At 9:45PM it was still light, and although the Viking Polaris had left Fournier Bay, it cruised only several miles before coming to a complete stop.  The crew started serving complimentary Irish coffees in the Shelter at the bow and people were congregating.  Then at 10pm, the reason for the gathering approached from around an island and then came to a complete stop just 500ft from our bow.  It was the Viking Octantis.  The two ships were perfectly aligned nose to nose.  Passengers on the bow of both ships then began a back and forth spontaneous cheering to the other boat as if in a contest.  The Octantis sent a drone aloft, apparently to take photos of the two Viking expedition sister ships in such a tight and unusual formation.  I suspect it had something to do with Torstein Hagen being onboard our ship. That was a bit of unscheduled excitement.