Palmer Station, Lemaire Channel and Booth Island
During the night the National Geographic Explorer slowly repositioned the relatively short distance from Paradise Harbor on the Antarctic Peninsula to Arthur Harbor at the south end of Anvers Island. Expedition leader Bud Lehnhausen woke us at 06.00 for an early breakfast so that we would be able to make the most of our morning visit to Palmer Station. Palmer is one of the three scientific research bases that the United States operates in Antarctica. We were divided into three groups for a tour of the facility so as not to overwhelm our informative hosts. While one group got an intimate view of the station’s varied research projects by Palmer personnel, the other two either waited their turn aboard ship or visited the Adelie penguin rookery on nearby Torgersen Island.
Back aboard during a special Swedish lunch, Captain Skog weighed anchor and took our ship farther south through the ice choked Lemaire Channel. Dramatic walls of snow capped granite rise vertically several thousand feet from both shores of this famous waterway. The east side is the continent, Booth Island forms the west. As we emerge from the Lemaire the dense pack ice gave way to open water and we were able to make a landing by a penguin colony on the south end of Booth Island. We also enjoyed Zodiac cruising among the many giant grounded icebergs around the bay to the south. We remained at anchor during dinner so that we could be back on deck to experience a second traverse of the fabled Lemaire Channel on our way to tomorrow’s adventure.
