Polar Regions
THE ARCTIC & ANTARCTICA
Diving in a frozen world
Water Temperature: Cold!
The fantastic Polar Bear, a true symbol of the Arctic, though they don't make great diving buddies! (Pete Morris)
Our sister Ocean Adventures programme offers exciting, expedition-style cruises to Spitsbergen and other areas in the high Arctic, and to Antarctica, the Falklands, South Georgia and other Subantarctic Islands.
Some of these cruises have diving options (mostly those in Spitsbergen or the Antarctic Peninsula), offering a real ‘diving with a difference’ experience. For further information take a look at the Ocean Adventures website: www.oceanadventures.com, and then give us a call at Divequest. We can provide the cruise operator’s conventional paper brochures on request (although our website has more details than can be found in the brochures) and we will be very happy to answer any questions you may have.
Spitsbergen, Europe’s only large High Arctic territory, extends from over 76°N to nearly 81°N latitude, its northernmost point being only about 1000 kilometres (about 600 miles) from the North Pole! Discovered by William Barents, who reached the west coast in 1596 during his doomed attempt to find a Northeast Passage to the Pacific, Spitsbergen became a whaling base and later the focus of Polar exploration and science. Today Spitsbergen is an environmental showcase and it is the absolutely stunning Arctic scenery and rich Arctic wildlife and plantlife that draw visitors. Here are fantastic pointed mountains draped in snow (the same mountains that gave Spitsbergen its name), enormous interior ice caps, vast glaciers that carve their way down to spectacular fjords, immense areas of sea ice, impossibly blue icebergs carved into weird shapes by the action of wind and sea, teeming seabird colonies (including the delightful Little Auk), the ice-loving Ivory Gull, nesting Barnacle Geese and a host of beautiful Arctic wildflowers. The star attraction is of course the huge and powerful Polar Bear, which one has an excellent chance of encountering (and you may even enjoy a series of sightings, with one or two up close from the ship or zodiacs), but the bizarre Walrus is also a favourite with visitors.
Antarctica is the last frontier on our ever-shrinking planet, a place that every traveller longs to explore but so few ever see, and a place that only a handful of divers will ever be fortunate enough to experience. An uninhabited continent of more that twelve million square kilometres almost entirely encrusted with ice – an awesomely silent but starkly beautiful frozen world. Here some of the most magnificent scenery of all can be seen under the cleanest skies on earth. Towering volcanoes, stark mountain ranges, lowering headlands, icebergs like floating cathedrals ¬– all are enhanced by the peculiar quality of the light, which lends an ethereal beauty to the savage grandeur of the landscapes. This is a land of superlatives, at one and the same time the coldest, highest, windiest, driest, most barren and least known area on earth. One of the strangest features of this lost continent is the fact that Antarctica is surrounded by the richest oceans of all, thronged with marine life ranging from tiny krill to elephant seals and whales, and supporting enormous numbers of seabirds. The tameness of Antarctica’s seabirds and sea mammals is legendary and here you can wander right amongst their breeding colonies, accepted without question by creatures that have learned no fear of man. Whale-watching is a feature of Antarctic cruises and you are likely to enjoy some spectacular views of these leviathans breaching and sounding right next to the ship. A visit to Antarctica is like no other journey on earth; it is indeed about as close to visiting another planet as any of us are likely to get. It can be said, without hesitation, that this is a wilderness experience that is truly uplifting and one that will stay with you for the rest of your days.
These cold Arctic and Antarctic waters possess a remarkable diversity of life. Here one can find hydroids and anemones in jewel colours, ribbon worms, starfish, crustaceans and unusual fish. Life beneath the ice is hazardous. Sea ice moves with each tidal flow and can scarify the shoreline to a depth of 10 metres, scraping away and crushing animals and plants that have no strategy of escape. Kelp is dislodged and barnacles are crushed. In the high summer limpets creep slowly up the shore line, grazing on the rapidly growing algae. The Antarctic summer is the season for krill and you can expect to see many thousands of these, and perhaps even some penguins underwater!
During voyages with a diving option, experienced dry suit divers can enjoy a series of dives, although it should be noted that diving is just one part of the expedition cruise experience.
Ice sculptures are an amazing part of the scenery (Pete Morris)
