To the Arctic, part 6: Ice day

On this day the captain and expedition leader decided, since we were in the area, that they’d take the ship as far north as it would go before encountering the Arctic sea ice that would prevent further progress. (The Ultramarine is a polar ship, but it can’t plow through thick sea ice).  We made for point #5 below where the ice stopped us. (This map was provided by the ship.)

The view from my cabin window when I woke up.

We’re approaching our northern limit.

As we headed north, I had a hearty breakfast in the main dining room.  Look at all that food (it’s buffet style, of course). I often had a made-to-order omelet, as I almost never eat breakfast, much less eggs, when I’m at home. I avoided the “Healthy Corner” except from fruit juice.

As we got closer to the edge, passengers went out on deck to watch our approach:

Ice everywhere (click to enlarge the panorama). And yes, it was that blue:

About as far north as we can go:

Floating sea ice, broken off the shelf, was everywhere:

Meanwhile, the bridge was active as the ship needed to stop dead before it hit the ice. Second from right is the captain.

Sarah, the expedition leader, is facing me. She was always upbeat: a great leader:

As we headed north, the ship stopped because a polar bear (Ursus maritimus) was sighted off the starboard bow. And, sure enough, there was one, and it was eating the carcass of what we were told was a sperm whale (Physeter macrocephalus). Who knows how that whale got onto the ice floe, but it was surely a bonanza for the bear, which was feasting on the best part: the whale’s blubber.

I had my Panasonic Lumix point-and-shoot camera cranked out to the highest magnification (30X) and the boat was rocking, so this is the best I could do. Still, it was a fantastic sight: my first polar bear sighting and my first sperm whale sighting (if that’s what the whale was). This, to me, was the highlight of the trip. What you see is the world’s largest living land predator eating the world’s largest living marine predator!

I took a lot of photos. In reality, the photos are better than what I could see because they’re zoomed it. I was kneeling on the deck propping my camera on a rail:

Elsie Holzworth, a neighbor, touched up the photo above using computer magic:

 

There were plenty of birds around hoping for a nosh:

The bear walked away for a while, but then returned. I suspect he wasn’t going to go far lest another bear find the carcass. It was a fantastic sight.

We still weren’t as far north as we could go, so I went to look at our position in the lounge, and then had lunch in the informal spot. At this point we were at 81°53.89′ N, not quite as far as we’d get (red rectangle is mine):

After a big breakfast and no hikes onshore, I had a light lunch: a bagel on which I put the equivalent of lox. Some salad for the requisite greens. And, of course, several desserts, one of which—rice pudding with cherry sauce—was fantastic:

Too many to eat them all!

I had a large portion of rice pudding, as it wasn’t a normal dessert onboard:

And then we stopped, as far north as we could go. I was the first person on the bow, so I got to hold the sign and have my photo taken:

82 degrees north latitude!  This was the farthest north the ship had ever been, the crew and captain had ever been, and of course the passengers had ever been.  An AI question says that at this point we were about 332 miles (534 km) from the North Pole.

There were celebrations with champagne, and some of the naturalists dressed up as Arctic animals:

We then turned around and headed south (see map at top). Little did I know that the next day was going to be absolutely spectacular, seeing hundreds of thousands of seabirds nesting on a precipitous cliff, and watching from Zodiacs below. That will be in the next installment.