Antarctica represented a real unknown for all of them. Rebecca had by no means envisioned it for herself, and bringing a toddler to one of the distant locations on Earth launched a brand new layer of uncertainty. Would Violet be bored? Restless? “One of my major concerns was that it would be wasted on Violet and that I would spend a lot of time trying to entertain her when she was confined to a ship,” Rebecca says.
Those issues turned out to be unfounded.
Plan for a multi-day journey earlier than you even board
Getting to Antarctica is an expedition in itself. The Rowleys flew out of Salt Lake City two days forward of schedule, involved about potential TSA delays tied to a threatened authorities shutdown. They spent an surprising day in Atlanta, then boarded an in a single day flight to Santiago, Chile, a rustic that they had by no means visited and did not need to skip.
They in-built three further days in Santiago earlier than becoming a member of their Lindblad-National Geographic expedition group. That buffer allowed them to discover the Chilean capital, make a day journey to the coastal cities of Valparaiso and Vina del Mar, and go to a resort in Portillo. It additionally helped ease the transition throughout time zones. The trade-off was packing complexity: they wanted clothes for eighty-degree Santiago warmth and Antarctic temperatures concurrently.
From Santiago, the group took a chartered flight to Ushuaia, Argentina, adopted by a guided bus tour by means of Tierra del Fuego National Park and a catamaran cruise by means of the Beagle Channel. By the time the household boarded their ship, the Lindblad-National Geographic Resolution, that they had already been touring for practically per week.
What Antarctica truly looks like the primary time you step ashore
Nothing fairly ready Rebecca for the second they first went ashore. “Utah has a lot of snow and so I didn’t expect walking on snowy paths to be exciting or even feel like something new,” she says. But Antarctica is not Utah. It is not anyplace. The icebergs, the porpoising penguins, the whale spouts seen from the deck—the sensory expertise collected shortly into one thing overwhelming.
On the primary shore expedition, the household hiked to a peak overlooking the ship and walked to a small penguin colony. Partway up the path, three penguins waddled previous, completely unbothered by the people who stepped apart for them, after which belly-slid into the freezing water. From the summit, Rebecca appeared out on the Resolution surrounded by icy peaks and watched small Zodiac boats ferrying expedition teams to shore. “I’ve been to over 60 countries, but I don’t think I have ever felt so much like a visitor in a place and so out of my element,” she says. “It was exhilarating to be so far from home and to realize how isolated and small we were compared to Antarctic landscape around us.”