February 21 McMurdo Sound

That same day after visiting Discovery Hut, we sailed further south in McMurdo Sound to Scott Base, NZ's base. It was quite picturesque as it was snowing gentle flakes. A number of people went ashore to inspect the old huts. We then spent the rest of the afternoon and evening sailing close to the McMurdo Ice Shelf looking for wildlife. We saw Adelie and Emperor penguins and Weddell and Crab-eater seals and a few Minke whales plus other beautiful creatures. It was glorious.

The green structures are part of the NZ base.

We were intrigued to discover that there's a huge runway along the McMurdo ice shelf.

Sir Edmund Hillary was based at Scotts base in the mid 1950s when he led the New Zealand component of the Commonwealth Trans-Antarctic Expedition; he was the first person to arrive at the South Pole by vehicle. 

The sea was slowly starting to freeze forming tiny disks which coalesced to form pancakes.  This was no problem for our little ship but there was still some of last year’s ice which was much thicker - we munched through it. Aleksandr, our captain was having a wonderful time and didn’t stop smiling the entire time, nudged the ship right up the ice shelf so close we felt that we could reach out and touch a pair of Emperor penguins preening on the edge of the ice. 

Everyone crew included were hanging over the side of the ship

In spite of the freezing cold, the evening was glorious so we stayed around that patch of sea for hours photographing and videoing. 

It was fascinating crunching through the growing ice sheets 

We cut a crazy path through the ice as we tracked these glorious creatures

The Emperor penguins were wonderful and the Captain, careful not to spook them, took the ship in wide slow circles in order to get us a little closer. And while we were watching them a sleek Leopard seal was watching us. We were all reluctant to leave that glorious vistas so we dined pretty late again that night. Having spending hours out on deck in this little patch of heaven under pearly skies, it was not surprising that next morning I woke with a bit of a cold. But oh what a splendid evening it had been alone in the silence of ice and sea and pearly skies.