If you stop at Deception Island and are brave – or perhaps foolhardy! – enough, you can join the Antarctic Swimmers Club with a brisk but brief plunge in the Antarctic Ocean.
Although no landing site can be absolutely guaranteed in this stunning, but remote, location as weather conditions can change quickly, many Antarctic cruise ships do land on the shores of Deception Island. The island is a crescent shape, remnant of a sunken volcanic caldera and there is still geothermal activity in the waters beneath the sand here. Discover more about the history of whaling in Antarctica at the former whaling station there, abandoned since the 1970s and wander among the chinstrap penguin colony there. If you are brave enough, take a plunge first in a hot bath dug out of the sand and filled with the warm volcanic waters before dashing to the ocean for a quick dip, and then back to the ship for hot chocolate and a tot of something stronger to warm you up after your polar plunge!
By Marcela Kunova - 20th April 2017
Nicola Shepherd, founder and CEO of The Exploration Company, organises unusual trips for HNW and UHNW clients ranging from birthday parties at an Indian Maharajah's palace to reliving Sir Vivian Fuchs's 1950s expedition to the South Pole. Citywealth caught ...
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