Antarctica - Small Ship Expedition

[2552phxcrzr]

I posted a lengthy (very lengthy) report of our January 2007 small ship expedition on the South America board.

 

If you're interested, you can reach it from here:

 

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=531528

[2552phxcrzr]

Photos from our voyage have been posted at:

 

The albums are available under the “2007 Travels” category.

 

Oh no! Did she say “albums?”

 

Well, yes. I did. I organized the pictures that I decided to keep as daily photo journals. So, if you want to relive the trip, you’ll want to browse albums 01-15. There are a lot of pictures in these albums, including the good and the not-so-good ones since I was trying to tell the story of the trip.

 

If you just want to get a sense of the voyage, you’ll want to browse Favorites – Quest for Antarctica. This album has a small selection of “my” favorite photos from throughout the trip.

 

The "Endurance & Shackleton" album consists of a PowerPoint presentation converted to jpegs to provide a synopsis of the saga.

 

How to View the Photos if you are not familiar with SmugMug: once you open the album, you can click a thumbnail to see a larger picture. If you put the cursor on the larger picture, you can change the size of the picture and view the pictures in the “lightbox” mode.

 

I don’t recommend using the “slideshow” button at the top of the page since it automatically loads the pictures sized to your monitor (probably OK if you have a really fast internet connection, but keep in mind that the photos have been resized for the web).

 

If you do want to look at the photos as a slideshow, you can change the default view from the “style” pulldown list at the top of the screen (default will read SmugMug – and you change back to this or another view when you’re finished with the slideshow). You can experiment with the other styles as well to find the one that really suits your personal viewing style.

 

Feel free to leave comments on the website if you’d like – you do not need to be a member to do so.

 

Happy travels!

[TonV]

Dear Mr Pyne,

 

I am really very glad with your long report as it is hard to find such information.

I have some questions about the ship you were on, the Professor Molchanov as I want to travel on their exactly equal sister ship, the Multanovskiy.

I understand Deck 5 is best.

How was the hut in terms of silence and thickness of walls? Did you hear the neighbours in the next hut?

Does one get a feeling of privacy when being inside the cabins, or can one hear neighbours talking in the next cabin?

 

Thanks for any reply.

 

Ton from Holland

[2552phxcrzr]

No problems hearing any neighbors - at least not in our cabin. Being that this is a small, research ship however, do not expect it to be quiet - you will hear the engines and such much more so than you would on a big cruise ship. I don't recall being bothered by the noise however. Enjoy your visit; I would go back in a heartbeat.

[TonV]

Thanks for replying and again for the very lengthy trip report. I spoke yesterday at a bird fair with the Dutch owner of the travel company who made such trip himself and wrote a book about it, but your report has so much valuable information that others forget to write about.

This man told me the Professor Molchanov (and other such size ships) will stop these tours in 2010, as it is no longer profiting to do such tours in such small 50-passenger ships, so 80 and 100 passengers will be the minimum from then (apart from sailing ships that do them also, like the www.barkeuropa.com , also from Holland. The Molchanov is indeed now again from Oceanwide Expeditions (in Holland), not Quark. Every year in March they go from Antarctica via South Georgia and inhabited Atlantic islands to Holland for maintenance

and then to the Arctic and I will be on such yoyage (but just till Cape Town). This is relatively much cheaper.

see www.oceanwide-expeditions.com

 

Thanks again!! You've done a really fantastic job with the lengthy report and many hundreds of pictures..

[TonV]

On the www.barkeuropa.com website one can find a link to a book about a voyage of this ship, if anyone is interested. see www.cold-the-book.com

[2552phxcrzr]

Thanks for the information and the link.

[AidenWin]

what are the best cruises to take to antarctica?

[2552phxcrzr]

AidenWin ...

 

My two cents -- as small a ship as you're comfortable with that offers landings and an itinerary that includes South Georgia as well as Antarctica. If the Falklands are included as well, that's a bonus.