Astounding Antarctica

A photographer’s journey through the Antarctic is an expedition packed with awe-inspiring vistas, magnificent wildlife, perilous travel and unforgettable memories.

- AMARTYA MUKHERJEE

“CITY PHOTOGRAPHER OFF TO SHOOT POLAR BEARS”, said a headline in the Times of India (2014), just before my Arctic expedition. And ever since that trip, I had known in my heart of hearts that it was but a matter of time before I went and photographed the icescapes and penguins in the Antarctic. The stars aligned in November 2019. I was set to go to perhaps the last, truly pristine landscape left on Planet Earth -- the Seventh Continent -- via Argentina.

On 1st November, we departed from the port of Ushuaia, a frontier town nestled where the Andes finally drop into the sea, on board the MV Ushuaia, our expedition vessel, and travelled through the Beagle Channel.

I soon met up with my primary contact, Ole Jørgen Liodden, one of the top polar photographers with whom one could gainfully explore the frozen ends of the planet, along with other members of the expedition team, all photographers and veterans of polar excursions.

The ship crossed the Drake Passage, the rough seas famously associated with the nearly 1,000 km of water between South America and the Antarctic, on 2nd and 3rd November, and I relished spending several hours on the very windy deck with my cameras and lenses, capturing the fascinating but brutal life of pelagic birds. Wandering and Blackbrowed Albatross followed the ship, as well as Cape Petrels, Giant Petrels, Storm Petrels and later on Southern Fulmars and Antarctic Petrel.

Welcoming us into the Antarctic region were our first tabular icebergs, some of which dwarfed most of what I had seen earlier in the Arctic. Temperatures had plummeted. But so entrancing was the beauty of nature that it was almost impossible to stop photographing despite blasts of the icy polar winds.