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Two views of Whaler's Bay on Deception Island near the Antarctic Peninsula. This was a whaling station and scientific research station until volcanic eruptions and mudslides in 1967 and 1969 forced its abandonment. (It's not well known that Antarctica has some recently active volcanoes.)
These are not black and white photos, but there was no color in the scene on this overcast, rather stormy day.
Kitchen (click to enlarge)
Bathroom (click to enlarge)
Living in the Port Lockroy station on the Antarctic Peninsula was pretty primitive.
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The Port Lockroy museum on the Antarctic Peninsula is charmingly ramshackle, though it chills one (literally and figuratively) to imagine spending much time there. The instruments (radio, etc. ??) are definitely pre-WWII and perhaps pre-WWI, as is the booze. I would have thought it a bit nippy for gin and tonic.
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Two perspectives of Port Lockroy, a former British military base and then research station on the Antarctic Peninsula. It was abandoned in 1962, and now the larger building functions as a museum. I came across this note about Port Lockroy on Wikipedia:
"A major experiment on the island is to test the effect of tourism on penguins. Half the island is open to tourists, while the other half is reserved for penguins. So far, interestingly, the results show that tourism has a slight positive effect on penguins, possibly due to the presence of people being a deterrent to skuas - Antarctic birds that prey on penguin chicks and eggs."
A brief detour from summer in Antarctica to winter in New Mexico. The San Felipe de Neri church in Old Town, Albuquerque was built in 1793, but the parish is nearly 300 years old, almost the same age as the city.
Luminarias -- candles in paper bags weighted with a little sand -- festoon Albuquerque at this time of year. This display in Old Town struck me as particularly graceful.
Happy Holidays!
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Many Antarctic icebergs are blue, some intensely so. It's all because of light scattering. Snow, and snow-covered or uncompressed icebergs are white because all colors of light are scattered equally by the large particles -- just like milk. On the other hand, the ice in blue icebergs is highly compressed so that gas and bubbles are squeezed out. In that condition, blue light is scattered more strongly than light of longer wavelengths -- just like a blue sky.
A Google search turns up that there are occasionally green icebergs, colored by the algae that coated their underwater part, which then rolled over. We didn't see any of those. Blue was plenty good enough.
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Some of the icebergs in the waters off the Antarctic Peninsula are huge. The comparison with the 12-person Zodiac raft gives the scale. What's most startling is that 7/8 of the iceberg is under water. We took care not to get too close, because these icebergs can roll with little notice.
Dawn in Antarctic Peninsula (click to enlarge)
From Penguin Island (click to enlarge)
Despite the harsh environment, the light in Antarctica can be incredibly subtle and delicate.
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In honor of winter, I'm switching from warm equatorial Galapagos to the chilly Antarctic Peninsula (not quite to the Antarctic Circle) where we took a cruise in November 2005. Actually, since it was late spring in the southern hemisphere the temperature was a bit above freezing (as can be seen from the open water) and it was warmer than in Minnesota at the same time. In any case, Antarctica is a stunning place, as can be seen from these 4 AM shots from the deck of our ship, and other photos that will follow.
Galapagos Land Iguana (click to enlarge)
Red-footed Booby (click to enlarge)
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The birds are so unafraid of humans that you can approach them closely in their most intimate moments.
Another creature, in addition to iguanas, that the Galapagos has in great abundance is boobies. Red-footed boobies (click to enlarge)
and blue-footed boobies (click to enlarge)
Also masked boobies, but I seem not to have gotten any worthwhile photos of them.
They look scarier than they are. (click to enlarge)
Digging a nest site. (click to enlarge)
Marine iguanas (click to enlarge)
Land iguana (click to enlarge)
A profusion of marine and land iguanas is one of the most striking aspects of the Galapagos.
Bachelor colony (click to enlarge)
The Galapagos are volcanic islands, some quite desert-like. Seeing a sea lion posing alongside a cactus is one of the things that makes the Galapagos so striking. (click to enlarge)
Galapagos tortoise at the Charles Darwin Research Station, Santa Cruz Island (click to enlarge)
For the next few weeks or months, this blog will become a bit different. I've begun having slides scanned that I took on trips in the 1980s and 1990s, to places like the Galapagos, China, Morocco, and Turkey. There are also more recent trips to Antarctica, South America, and Iceland. Many of the images are striking, and have no obvious counterparts to those I've taken (or might take) in Minnesota or New Mexico. Therefore, I've decided to post one or two photos each day from one of these trips, rather than trying to match "there" with "here". I hope that what is lost in thoughtful and/or humorous comparisons will be more than compensated by the remarkable images from around the world.
I'll start with the Galapagos Islands, on the equator about 500 miles west of Ecuador. The entry in Wikipedia about Galapagos tortoises -- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galápagos_tortoise -- makes interesting reading. The large size, long necks, and humped shells of these ancient creatures are particularly striking.
Minneapolis Institute of Arts (click to enlarge)
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (click to enlarge)
Minneapolis Institute of Arts (click to enlarge)
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (click to enlarge)
Minneapolis Institute of Arts (click to enlarge)
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (click to enlarge)
Weisman Art Museum, University of Minnesota (click to enlarge)
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (click to enlarge)
Weisman Art Museum, University of Minnesota (click to enlarge)
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (click to enlarge)
Minneapolis Institute of Art (click to enlarge)
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (click to enlarge)
I've just published another Blurb book, this one on China from our trip in 1987. The pictures are from scanned slides, so may not be as crisp as digital. But I still feel that this was one of our most visually (and culturally) interesting trips.
Minneapolis Institute of Arts (click to enlarge)
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (click to enlarge)
Minneapolis Institute of Arts (click to enlarge)
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (click to enlarge)
Minneapolis Institute of Arts (click to enlarge)
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (click to enlarge)
Minneapolis Institute of Arts (click to enlarge)
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (click to enlarge)
Minneapolis Institute of Arts (click to enlarge)
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (click to enlarge)
