At Sea!

Deck 4 and three of the Zodiacs we will use to disembark on our excursions.

The view of the ocean from the 5th deck overlooking the 4th.

The G Expedition.

Some of the staff: Jonathan the Team Leader, Susan the manager, Juraj Zekan the ship's captain and on the far right Gabor the manager of the 'hotel' portion of the ship.

Thursday, October 24^th.

At Sea

Despite the predictions of the crew last night, this morning the sea was fairly rough and we were rocked about a bit. We enjoyed a buffet of any sort of food you could imagine for breakfast including grapefruit. Numerous people were feeling the effects of the motion sickness, including John who did not look well and retired to the room for a lay down.

At 10 there was a lecture in the lounge by Chilean ornithologist Marcelo. He had a slideshow to try to teach us how to identify different seabirds using key markers that are specific to that species. We learned how to tell different types of albatross and petrels apart and about other sea birds as well. There was also a discussion about what makes a seabird. (See below).

After lunch there was another lecture about tips for nature photography from resident photographer Andrew. Meanwhile John and I were trying to set up our cameras for burst shootings, which makes it easier to get bird photos. After this we went on deck to try to photograph the seabirds that were following our ship.

At 4 there was a screening of the first of the Frozen Planet series, followed by the captain’s welcome cocktail (a glass of champagne) led by CEO Jonathan Green and Captain Juraj Zekan from Croatia. He introduced us to the rest of the officers on board who are mostly from eastern Europe.

Then we had the recap or review from John (another of the GAdventure staff), who led us through a recap of the day, which is meant to be a daily activity where we can share and ask questions about anything about the trip or the day.

Dinner followed, which was rack of lamb or salmon. We are going to be spoilt for choice of food and not gaining weight is going to be a challenge.

After dinner John and I went up to the Polar Bear Bar to have a pint of Expedition red lager and listen to a set of songs from a dynamic young American musician (who is part of the G staff), Blaise Guld, playing acoustic guitar, harmonica and foot tambourine. He started off with Johnny Cash's standard Burning Ring of Fire. We went back to the room by 9:30 and found Bruce already in bed. We all turned in about 10:00.

Great first day at sea. I always wanted to cross the Atlantic and this is giving me some idea of that standing on the decks, rocking back and forth and being out of sight of land. We have met several nice people so far. The people on board are mostly English speakers from the UK, the US, Australia, Canada and New Zealand. There are a couple of Germans and a Norwegian as well.

What constitutes Seabirds?

They are characterized by their nesting grounds, which tend to be on the bare pieces of ground in colonies; their food sources, either krill or fish; feeding strategies and reproductive strategies.

They feed from the ocean and breed on land. They obtain their food from the ocean food chain and spend 90% of life at sea. Their breeding colonies are often difficult to access on remote islands, islets, and cliffs.

Coastal seabirds are onshore feeders and ocean seabirds are offshore feeders.

Individual birds will tend to nest near successful breeders to get benefits of the favourable conditions and the social attraction of their species and the relative safety of numbers. 

Species are identified by ‘field marks’, with specific marks that are peculiar to the species: such as bill shape, body coloring, or marks on the body.

The Albatross: Wandering albatross, the largest, is differentiated from the Royal by: black tips in tail, faint pink mark back of head, no black line in bill largest wing span of any flying bird, 3.5 metres.

Northern and southern petrels are like vultures of the seas but can kill animals larger than themselves, like young seals or penguins.