There may be no time in life more exciting than beginning college. We encounter new ideas, new friends, new challenges – ADVENTURE! Perhaps we are on our own for the first time. We work harder and play harder than ever before. Much of our lives we try to recapture a small part of that magic.

The closest I have come to that time was our first posting in Albania. We were at the beginning of new careers, untested, in an unfamiliar place. We quickly made friends. We worked hard and played hard. For Albanians just emerging from the isolation of the most repressive regime in Europe everything was new, and we saw, heard and felt everything new through their senses, Sinatra, Elvis, Dickens, Kafka, Bartok, and Bonhoffer. We sat over coffee each night discussing religion, philosophy and who was right in their view of government, Jefferson or Adams, Hamilton or Madison. It was a peak life experience.

Heading to Antarctica captures a tiny bit of that excitement, that adventure. Leaving Ushuaia, the Captain told us we were going to head straight south from the exit of the Beagle Channel, not taking our lap around Cape Horn, to try to slip in between two weather systems and get us to the Antarctic before the big wind and waves in the Drake Passage. That somehow added to the anticipation.

On board our expedition team of lecturers and interpreters included a scientist specializing in the Antarctic marine environment, a logician who was an expert in getting things done at the end of the supply line, and an expert who taught cold weather survival skills.

On the two-day trip south the lecture halls were full, as they were during breaks in our time on deck taking in the wonders of this great wilderness. The slides show something of the range of things we discussed.

The discussions with cruise mates was full of anticipation, then, of wonder.

And we did play hard. Whether it was on Fat Tuesday…

…or doing crazy things similar to what we did in college, like some of us jumping into a swimming pool filled with ice (following the lead of the captain).

…or lining up for the class photo on the bow of the ship.

And now we’re headed North. I am still trying to process the experience and the pictures. It may take a while. Antarctica will pop up in several blog posts but right now, the excitement of our first iceberg as we sailed South and then the Alpen glow, reflecting the Antarctic sunset off of the white mountains and glacial cliffs of Anvers Island shot through the rising evening mist will have to do.