Beyond Eundurance (Pat Falvey and clients), Cruising around St Georgia and The Antarctic Peninsula

 

Here is a PDF format press dossier of the expedition

November 30st 200§ / Deception Island
From their website : " With an early start at 0500 we landed at Brown Point on the north eastern side of Deception Island. Deception Island is an active volcano that has collapsed and is also called a candela. The collapsed volcano is filled with seawater with a remaining horse shoe shaped cone island.
Some 30 of us treked over the top of the ridge, first walking carefully through a chin strapped penguin colony, and then up the steep lava and pumice slopes. At the top we were presented with a magnificent view over the bay.
The ship slowly entered the bay through the narrow channel at Neptunes Bellows before waiting in Whalers Bay inside the bay. We walked down the inner slopes of the volcano descending into the derelict whaling station.
After breakfast many of the team headed over to the beach to have a polar swim in the water. Hot springs heat up the sand from below, so pits were dug in the sand which filled with hot water making the swim a little more tolerable.
We're heading north across the Drake Passage to Ushuaia where we are due back on Tuesday morning.

Photo : courtesy of the expedition

November 26th 2006 / Landed on Antarctica
Juste after their crossing South Georgia, the group of Pat Falvey went to see Sir Ernest Shackleton's grave ; one of the tourists playing a number of tunes on his bagpipes and other ones praying. The day after they went on sea again and sail to the South Orkney Islands.
During the cruise, some of the participants showed their film footage of the crossing while some other made presentation of their experience during the trip so far.
These last days, this travel has passed through legendary and histotical sites like Elephant Island (where Shackleton's expedition splited in two, those remaining on the island and those embarking on board on the lifeboat James Caird), the Gerlache Strait, the Lemaire Channel, Deception Island, the Bernard O'Higgins chilean station on the Antarctic Peninsula and Port Lockroy.
While some tourists choose to sleep on the continent insides small tents, other ones prefer to remain on board and have some better confort.

November 16th 2006 / On the glacier
N.V. Ushuaia arrived safely at South Georgia Island. The 32 happy ones who got the permission to redo the Shackleton's route are underway since two days - into the Shackleton Gap and towards the Crean glacier. They should be now already in Stromness Harbour where the rest of the party was awaiting them.

November 13th 2006 / On sea
The Irish Beyond Endurance team (in all 83 persons, "adventurers", says their website !) left Ushuaia three days ago (November 9th) and is now sailing towards South Georgia, on board of MV Ushuaia. the sea conditions are good according to their communiqué and they plan to reach South Georgia, today or tomorrow. Once arrived, only 32 of those tourists will go for redoing an historic traverse across the island - the one Shackleton has made when coming from Elephant islands and setting foot on South Georgia Island after a epic three weeks sailing in the hell of Scotia sea (May 10th 1916), thye were searching for rescue. And decided to make the 30 km across a glacier separating them from the Stromness Bay.
See here a map of the Shackleton's most heroic odyssey.

November 8th 2006 / Beyond Endurance Expedition reaches Ushuaia
The Irish Beyond Endurance Expedition are pleased to announce that we have all made it safely to Ushuaia, the Southernmost City in the World! All three seperate expedtion groups were reunited yesterday after a considerable haul from Ireland and Norway.

The journey was not without incident however, the most disconcerting being the collapse of a passenger with a suspected heart attack four hours into an eleven hour flight from Madrid to Buenos Aires. Fortunately, Dr Clare O’Leary and Dr Cormac O’Dubhghaill were at hand and immediately took control of the situation. The passenger’s condition improved such that he was able to disembark at Buenos Aires to seek further medical attention. It is important to note that the passenger was NOT connected or known to the expedition in anyway.
We regret to also report that three bags belonging to the expedition were "lost" enroute and it is now looking increasingly unlikely that we will have them before embarking tomorrow. We are currently compensating for this loss and expect to proceed as planned.

Finally, all expedition gear shipped to Ushuaia last month has now been loaded abord the MV Ushuaia. We leave you now to head down to the port for a final kit inspection before setting sail for South Georgia tomorrow morning.
Slan Go Foill