Expedition Guide: The Drake Passage

If ever there was a portend of rough seas ahead in Antarctica’s infamous Drake’s Passage, it’s coming out of your cabin to discover the strategic placement by stewards along the corridor handrails of paper sickbags. If your ship is beginning to pitch and roll, two outcomes appear available at this juncture. Firstly, for those who haven’t taken anti-seasickness medication, an abrupt return to the cabin may be required to pray for Poseidon’s mercy. For those medicated or possessing stronger sea legs, it’s time to embrace Drake’s wildness and avoid spilling your soup at dinner. Yet conditions down Drake’s Passage are notoriously fickle. I sailed it once in a seven-metre swell, so bad I couldn’t stand upright enough to put my trousers on in the morning. Alternatively, I’ve experienced a ‘Drake Lake’ when the passage is calm and sunny. Then, Drake becomes one of the most magical sea voyages on Earth with the thrilling prospect of the Antarctica Peninsula due south.

There’s a classic poster for the movie ET, where the main protagonist, a boy, stretches his finger to touch the spindly digit of an alien. This is somewhat akin to the tip of South America’s Tierra del Fuego stretching south towards the apex of the Antarctic Peninsula, which points northwards. The sea in between is the Drake’s Passage. It was reportedly discovered by Spanish explorer Francisco de Hoces in the early 1500s but was named after Queen Elizabeth I’s favourite pirate, Sir Francis Drake, who was severely blown off the course of Cape Horn in the 16th century and noted icebergs due south. Sailing it nowadays is much quicker than by an old Spanish galleon and takes approximately two days to cover the 1100 kilometres from Argentina’s southern port of Ushuaia or Chile’s Punta Arenas. 

After what can be a windy start beyond Cape Horn, where the Pacific and Atlantic oceans collide, you sail south into the Southern Ocean to cross the latitude 60ºS. By now, storms can be ferocious because there are no land impediments to dampen west-to-east winds circling the globe. You will cross the circumpolar current after a day, feel plummeting air temperatures, and start seeing icebergs. Research suggests the churning Drake’s Passage generates upwellings of nutrients to enrich the lowest level of the food web, photosynthesising phytoplankton, which functions as a significant carbon sink, sequestrating atmospheric carbon to store on the deep ocean floor below.

Yes, you can. Most small ship expedition voyages make return sailings up and down the Drake, yet some cruise operators offer either a one-way or return flight down to Teniente R Marsh airstrip on King George Island in the South Shetland chain. It’s roughly a three-hour flight by Antarctic Airways. There, your ship will be waiting and continue south overnight across the Bransfield Strait to likely the western side of the Antarctic Peninsula called the Bellingshausen Sea. 

There are two fundamental issues with this hybrid-flight approach, however. The airstrip is notoriously difficult to land for pilots because of weather conditions. I did it once from Punta Arenas. The previous flight-sail cruise to mine failed on two flights to land and turned back mid-air because of inclement weather. Their cruise was by now curtailed by two days. Had they failed a 3rd time, their cruise would have been cancelled. I didn’t enjoy arriving by air. I felt I’d cheated the spirit of the Antarctic experience, and that’s not a state of masochism, putting up with rough seas, but I missed the sense of growing expectation and excitement the Drake voyage offers. I had this image of Robert Falcon Scott looking me in the eye and pronouncing me a ‘lightweight’.

Take seasickness medication at the first sign of roughness; it's too late when a storm has already started. Those worried about this must take and keep taking medication starting two hours before sailing. Even if the voyage remains calm, the peace of mind is invaluable. Once your vessel reaches the Antarctica Peninsula, ships are better sheltered, and taking medication is no longer necessary. My tip would be to ask the purser upon boarding the ship as to the sea conditions ahead to guide your decision on whether to medicate. Motion sickness tablets, or patches, are readily available from all chemists, and ships often provide them at the reception desk. 

There are other ways to mitigate the impact of a rough Drake. If you're particularly worried, prebook a cabin mid-ship on a lower deck. When the ship is pitching bow-to-stern in rough seas, cabins at a central fulcrum are more stable than ones closer to the bow or stern. You will feel less movement. Also, look at your vessel's design. In recent years, I've sailed AE Expeditions' newer ships, including Greg Mortimore and Sylvia Earle. Both possess a revolutionary rounded bow that absorbs wave energy called Ulstein X-Bow and is super stable. Likewise, the ships have retractable underwater stabilisation fins that dampen the rolling movement between starboard and port. 

Being active is essential for well-being when the Drake gets frisky. Go to the meal sittings and eat a light simple meal. Avoid too much alcohol. Step out on deck if it remains open and gulp down fresh air. Above all, occupy your mind by participating in numerous sea-day activities.

Your expedition team will ensure days are packed with activities so there’s no chance of boredom during a Drake crossing. Most ships have small gyms, spa therapy rooms, and libraries so that you can supplement your day. However, the expedition team will be drawn from a crew possessing myriad skills and specialist areas, from geologists and polar historians to experts on wildlife, ornithology, and oceanography, which means informative lectures.

Lectures will likely start after breakfast or the mandatory briefing on the IAATO (International Association of Antarctic Tour Operators) protocol governing behaviour once you reach the peninsula, especially around wildlife. Also, expect an inspection of your outdoor kit and a cleaning session to ensure no foreign matter like seeds is introduced into the Antarctic environment. After a buffet lunch, there will likely be citizen science activities. Travellers can significantly impact scientific research by helping collect data to provide feedback to scientists, for whom research trips into the Southern Ocean are prohibitively expensive. 

Two popular Drake Passage citizen science projects include the NASA cloud and eBird surveys, the data of which is inputted towards central databases. Both are great for getting you outside on deck. The Global Cloud Observer involves estimating cloud coverage and types. It’s done in conjunction with the passing of the overhead NASA Globe satellite to make observations below the clouds, which the satellites cannot see. This is valuable data for assessing how changing ocean temperature is affecting weather. My favourite is the seabird observation. With binoculars to hand and expert naturalist guidance, as many birds as possible seen on the wing are recorded for 30 minutes and data is inputted into the eBird app. It’s a great way to learn about your birds before reaching Antarctica and marvel at the beauty of an albatross in flight. 

The late afternoon includes a daily recap, revealing plans for the next day. It’s an informative time to meet the expedition team and fellow guests over a pre-dinner cocktail. It may also be time to don your eveningwear for the captain’s cocktail soiree, where you meet the bridge staff. Dinner is a three-course a la carte affair, and evenings may close with perhaps a movie - expect to see Kenneth Branagh’s Shackleton - or a digestif of piano music in the bar. 

The Drake is an hors d'ouevres before the Cinemax wildlife spectacle ahead of Antarctica. You enter the Beagle Channel shortly after leaving Ushuaia, which feeds into the passage. South American sea lions haul out on little midchannel islets in the Beagle, and it's possible to spot Argentina's most continental penguin, the Magellanic—one of five species likely seen during a typical Antarctic Peninsula trip. 

On the Drake, it won't take long before an albatross, typically a black-browed, glides around the ship. Likewise, southern giant petrels will join the party, which is good because it prevents them from slaying penguins. They can be with vessels for hours. Deeper into the journey, prions and shearwaters swoop by, as well as gaggles of speckled cape petrels, named pintado, translating as 'painting' in Spanish. Diametrically opposed in aesthetics, you'll see delicate Wilson's storm petrels dancing on the ocean while snowy sheathbills, who are pug ugly, often hitch a ride on deck.

Whale-watching is fantastic down in Antarctica but could be more fruitful in the Drake because the expanse makes spotting them akin to a needle in a haystack. You may see distant 'blows'—the waterspout exhalations as they surface—of possible humpback, pilot, or fin whales, but better encounters lie ahead. As Antarctica nears, penguins, sometimes in their hundreds, porpoise (flying out of the water) pass on long-distance deep-sea fishing trips to collect krill for their chicks. 

By now, deep into your second day at sea, excitement mounts as the frozen continent nears. The first sightings of land are arguably a false dawn because strung above the continent is a volcanically-formed island chain called the South Shetland Islands at 62ºS. They are 120 kilometres north of the Antarctic Peninsula. Yet they are wondrously beautiful. The angular snow-capped mountains and glaciers form a vivid contrast with dark black basalt beaches. A smattering of research scientists inhabits them. Your ship will visit the South Shetlands, but likely on the way back. The most popular stop is Deception Island: a flooded, still active caldera with black shingle beaches and a spectacularly narrow entrance called Neptune's Bellows. Half Moon Island is also a popular landing for its long walks along shingle ridges loaded with fur seals. This year, I discovered Livingston Island's incredible volcanic outcrop of black columnar basalt called Edinburgh Hill, which arcs skywards, resembling a soaring baleen whale. It would be one of the world's great natural wonders if anybody knew about it. 

If your Drake voyage is further east, a visit to the legendary Elephant Island may be planned. This is where Shackleton's men spent four months under upturned lifeboats in 1916 waiting to be rescued. The monument at Point Wild is a bust of Luis Pardo, the skipper of the steamboat Yelcho, who eventually rescued them. I've reached this island five times, hoping to land, but the wild seas around it have always been too rough.

Simply astounding. It will entirely rock your world and feel like a transformative life experience. How you see it first will depend on the timing of your arrival. The first time I sailed there via the Drake, we reached the peninsula’s northern cape around 10 p.m. I recall a beautiful half-light. Moonlight trailed across the glaciers. Around our ship were humpback whales inverted on their sides feeding. During a magical experience, I glimpsed their large eyes and flashes of their white baleen plates from the front bow deck. 

A few years later, I arrived at a divine place called Paradise Bay in the Bellingshausen Sea in the dark of night. The following day, I hurriedly dressed and headed outside. The deck and railings were frozen white. The air temperature was sub-zero. The whole landscape glistened. Seabirds flurried around the ship, and the water frothed with krill-feeding penguins. The blows of humpback whales rasped in echo across the silently still bay. Whatever hardships you may endure crossing the Drake’s Passage, this reward awaits.