(PINK PENGUIN) POOP SCOOP DU JOUR FROM LESLIE -

January 30, at sea - sailing to the South Orkneys
January 31, South Orkneys

Not a lot to report on a sea day. We had a couple
lectures, one on seals and one on photography
tips. The highlight of the day was the 'World Cruise
Lunch' in the main dining room, with buffet stations
set up featuring Scandinavian, Mediterranean,
Caribbean and North American cuisine. The big hits
of the day were crab legs, marinated shrimp,
paella, and rare roast beef - prime rib - but
mis-translated on the menu as 'ripe eye'. The 'pooch' tournaments
continue.

Some of us dined with the captain and Sylvia, the
naturalist lecturer, Monday night. We had a group
photo taken which they delivered to the cabin
along with a signed menu yesterday morning.
The captain is a nice guy, not terribly charismatic
or chatty, but all reported that they enjoyed the
dinner. Interestingly, neither the captain nor Sylvia
asked any of us any personal questions, like where
we are from, what brought us to the Hanseatic
etc., nor did they reveal much about themselves.
Periodically the captain would lob the
conversation ball back to Sylvia and she'd talk
about penguins, etc.

We did learn that Sylvia
holds he same opinions of the boot room behavior
as we do - in fact she told the captain she thought
it was a 'real problem', although I can't imagine
what he can do about it. We also learned that they plan to upgrade the
computer system and have web access available, although
it wasn't clear that that would be available in the
cabins. This text stuff is for the birds. We also got
a little gossip about one of the passengers who
more or less lives on the ship (although he's not
on now), including some stories of passenger
infractions if they try to sit in his 'seat' at both
restaurants.

Seas were fine for our sea day, although it was
foggy and gloomy - the report was that quite often
the journey from South Georgia to the South
Orkneys can be very rough, so we got lucky.

On to Antarctica!

We crossed the 60 degree latitude
last night. Signs have appeared on the deck doors that
the decks may be slippery due to ice and snow.

Our first stop was supposed to be
Signy Island, site of a marine biology research
center, but the wind was quite strong and the
weather not suitable for landing, so the captain picked up
the anchor and we went on to Sandefjord Bay and
Monroe Island, where zodiac cruises are being dispatched
for the brave and the bold. It is sleeting, snowing and quite windy.

It is our first sight of pink penguin poop on the glaciers.
The penguins we have seen further north eat fish; down here they eat
krill. (producing stinkier and pink poop!) We saw a couple whales off the
bow earlier.
We now have icebergs out the windows with more dramatic ones to follow
as we head towards the Antarctic Peninsula with Elephant Island on the
itinerary for tomorrow.