Back on board from Neko Harbour, the Captain had decided that benevolent forecasts for the Drake Passage allowed us enough time for some more landscape cruising so we headed out of Andvord Bay and turned southwest past Lemaire Island and entered the Neumayer Channel between Anvers and Wiencke Islands. On the way we were hugely fortunate to see a large pod of Orcas that crossed right in front of the ship and down the port side, not twenty metres from where Lisa happened to be at the time – on our port-side balcony from which she had her own private show. As we ate dinner, we gained Port Lockroy at the southern end of the channel and launched a Zodiac to drop off mail at the British Antarctic Survey base there for franking and onward delivery around the world.

We then turned Minerva around and for two or three hours after dinner we cruised back up Neumayer in the phenomenal late evening light. On the bridge, the Captain’s musical pick was Amy MacDonald’s “This Is The Life” album – the first track, “Mr Rock & Roll” blew my mind when it started up, it just seemed to be the right music for the place and time… The landscapes were breathtaking – everywhere you looked you were presented with a combination of water, ice, snow, rock, mountains and plateaus, with dramatic cloud patterns ever changing across a constant blue sky. On Anvers Island, Mount Français – the Peninsula’s highest peak at 2,825 metres – provided a particularly striking backdrop for the first part of the 25km-long passage. We were heading downwind, the water flat and calm, and although the sun set around midnight, it was still light when I called it a day at one o’clock – still bright enough to take one or two last photos before retiring.

Overnight we entered the Drake Passage where we had had one fairly calm day and one where we had to pay our dues with near-gale winds and four to five metre seas. Lisa held up well, however – remarkably so – with the help of her Stugeron and her IPod! Forty-eight hours later we were back on the dock in Ushuaia having completed a 3,500 nautical mile round trip. An amazing, life-changing experience in many ways. And one that I still have to articulate for myself let alone a broader audience. When I put this up on my travel blog, perhaps I will have done so…