How to Plan Your Polar Cruise – Wild Junket Adventure Travel Blog

Very last Current on February 1, 2023 by Nellie Huang

“And I explain to you, if you have the motivation for understanding and the ability to give it bodily expression, go out and check out.” So stated Apsley Cherry-Garrard, who accompanied Captain Scott on his doomed expedition to Antarctica and famously documented their activities in his memoir The Worst Journey in the World.

Luckily, finding the polar areas no for a longer period has to entail this kind of a feat of stamina. These days, they can be explored in secure, little-scale expedition vessels with specialist guiding.

Even if expedition circumstances currently are noticeably more snug than all those experienced by the 1st hardy polar explorers, visiting the poles continue to warrants the title of ‘trip of a lifetime’.

To expertise the Arctic or Antarctic is to working experience utter remoteness. It is about witnessing some of the very last undisturbed places of normal splendor on earth – just before they vanish. It’s about currently being awed by a perception of scale, drawing along with good icy mountainous peaks and glaciers and staying dwarfed by their shadow. It’s about seeing diverse species, these types of as whales and walruses, in their natural habitats and marvelling that these apparently stark sites are these biodiverse environments. 

Wherever Do You Go on a Polar Cruise?

Start to strategy your polar cruise by selecting which itinerary you’d like. There are generally a handful of options to choose from in phrases of itinerary.

Most Arctic cruises depart from Spitsbergen in the Norwegian archipelago of Svalbard. The typical route is to circumnavigate the archipelago, cruising into its fjords and sailing throughout ice fields. You are going to also get to go on land and hike on its tundra fields and even climb up glaciers.

Antarctica cruises normally depart from the southern part of Argentina. Most cruises visit the northern idea of the Antarctic Peninsula, cruising earlier icebergs that are bigger than buildings, zipping by pods of whales and seals, traveling to whaling stations and viewing thousands of penguins on land. Some cruises also visit the sub-Antarctic Falkland Islands and South Georgia, property to some of the greatest Emperor Penguin populations in the entire world.

What to Assume: Every day Life on a Polar Cruise

Regardless of whether you are on an expedition cruise in the Arctic or Antarctica, working day-to-working day everyday living can take a equivalent pattern.

Climate and ice disorders permitting, the crew will aim to get you off the ship and out on zodiacs (motorised dinghies) at least two times a day. This could include wildlife-spotting, traveling to a placing viewpoint or ice development, exploring a historic site (these kinds of as study stations or aged whaling huts), or even venturing ashore.

There are selections for additional adventurous routines, such as kayaking, and in Antarctica, diving or tenting on the ice. (The polar bear populace in the Arctic tends to make it unsafe to camp on land.)

But the polar regions are also about stillness, and time used thinking about these otherworldly landscapes. Ice, you will arrive to realise, is almost never white: it can occasionally be many hues of blue – turquoise, cerulean – or even greenish.

During sea times and some evenings there are lectures by expedition guides, who are all specialists in their area – irrespective of whether it be glaciology, geology, marine biology or polar historical past: polar cruising is a actual discovering practical experience.

On some expeditions, there’s even the option to just take part in serious-existence science experiments, such as accumulating h2o samples for checking degrees of plankton, or photographically documenting various whale flukes.

When to Check out the Polar Locations

Antarctic cruises depart in the northern hemisphere’s winter to discover the Antarctic Peninsula in the course of the southern hemisphere’s summertime. Chilly-weather clothing with heaps of layers is definitely essential for both environments, while it’s not quite as chilly as you may perhaps be expecting – unless you acquire aspect in a polar plunge, of course…

Wildlife in the Polar Regions

Wildlife viewing is a spotlight of all polar cruises. A single of our preferred Antarctic moments was stumbling throughout a lazing Weddell seal just as the clouds parted. The seal seemed to respect the unexpected break in the clouds as a great deal as we did, and he basked in the solar as we crept previous, whispering our shock at viewing him so unfazed by our proximity.

As perfectly as spotting a variety of seals at possibly pole, there is a good likelihood of observing whales as they feed or occur to examine the moored ships, supplying you a chance to notice behavior these as breaching and spyhopping (when whales raise up vertically and pop their heads out of the drinking water). 

The species of whales you are going to see range dependent on destination. The Arctic is residence to the shy beluga whale with its exclusive white colouration, while humpback and minke whales can be viewed at either pole. It is wondrous to see whales surfacing in the vicinity of your zodiac, but this is also mother nature pink in tooth and claw: you could glimpse huge petrels or glaucous gulls swooping down to select off unguarded penguin or guillemot chicks.

Your every day schedule may change quickly and unpredictability, despite the fact that this can include to the exhilaration. It’s not abnormal for dinner to be interrupted due to the fact a pod of whales have manufactured a unexpected appearance portside, or for planned routines to be disrupted by unpredictable weather.

In the Arctic, any sighting of a bear will be identified as out above the tannoy, so preserve your coat and digicam with you at all times. In Antarctica, you are permitted to roam independently for brief distances, but once again, you will require to head speedily again to the zodiac should really lousy climate occur in.

Penguins vs Polar Bears 

Selecting your polar cruise is a dilemma of priorities. Vacation time might be just one (see underneath). But that aside, it comes down to wildlife. Which creatures are you most keen to see?

Substantial colonies of penguins are found in Antarctica, with scientists seemingly becoming equipped to identify colonies from house, when the Arctic has greater mammals – you could see herds of reindeer, and tusked walruses lurching throughout the ice floes. And then there’s the polar bear. All are interesting in their individual strategies.

In Antarctica, you are most likely to see Gentoo, Adélie and Chinstrap penguins, and when they can feel ungainly and comical as they waddle overland (appear out for their strength-efficient slides downhill on their stomachs), they are modern in the h2o as they shoot as a result of shoals of krill, developing a waterproofing and friction-cutting down oil that spreads over their feathers. Their key predator is the fearsome leopard seal and you may place 1 snoozing on an ice floe in in between searching (but preserve your distance – their warning growls defend their personalized area).

The sheer remoteness of Antarctica usually means that penguins have no land predators, and so they feel unthreatened by human presence. Conversation with wildlife is forbidden beneath Antarctic treaty, but do not be astonished if a few penguins flout that rule and arrive and investigate you.

Polar bears are far more elusive, and facing extinction. As global warming brings about sea ice to melt earlier and reform afterwards, polar bears’ searching time is decreased. They are solitary animals, who hunt and are living alone as soon as they have been weaned from their moms, with the males being specially intense. Sightings are under no circumstances 100% certain and are fully unpredictable – but this only will make the prospect far more thrilling.

Svalbard is house to 3,000 polar bears and the sight of a white bear is unforgettable. You may possibly see 1 foraging on a shoreline, coming to sniff a moored boat, swimming amid ice floes or crashing by pack ice with its entrance legs.

Finding There

For Antarctica, obtaining there is all part of the exciting – a flight to Buenos Aires and then on to Ushuaia, the world’s most southerly city, and the departure issue for crossing Drake’s Passage to the tip of the Antarctic Peninsula. Crossings are notoriously tough, and you may well locate by yourself gaping at 15 to 20 metre-significant waves crashing around the ship, so it’s a check of your sea legs. On the other hand, there is the choice to fly to sign up for your cruise ship at the South Shetland Islands if you would like to stay clear of this certain rite of passage.

By contrast, journeying to the Arctic is substantially more rapidly and can generally be completed in the very same working day, traveling to Longyearbyen, one particular of the world’s most northerly settlements situated in the northern reaches of Norway. Scenery-wise, you can expect more cost-free drifting icebergs in Antarctica, although cruising in the Arctic normally entails progressing via pack ice to get to the day’s locations and far more breathtaking surroundings, these kinds of as the sculpted ice of the Sparreneset headland. 

Ships that direct expeditions to Antarctica in the course of the northern hemisphere’s winter season usually sail up to Spitsbergen for the Arctic summer. A single of our recent favorite vessels is the MS Expedition. Carrying 132 passengers, the ship has an open-air panoramic observation deck and comfortable interiors.

We recommend vessels that carry much less than 200 passengers, as they are able to supply a better selection of trips on the zodiacs. But cruising in the polar regions is genuinely about the quality of the guiding and we have been amazed by the expedition leaders on MS Expedition. All are polar travel veterans and reside and breathe their specialisms.

Polar Packing Strategies

Some cruises present expedition jackets, but you ought to also pack thermals, water-proof trousers, and at least two pairs of gloves (swap them in excess of though one particular pair is drying out). 

At last – and surprisingly – don’t undervalue the will need for polarised sunglasses and sun cream: the ozone layer is thinnest at the poles, and the sun’s glare across miles and miles of brilliant whiteness can be blinding. The slightest motion, whether or not a tickle of wind or the gradual rumble of the boat’s engine, blurs the picture, like the mild clean of a brush in excess of a sensitive watercolour portray.