19.12.2021 Christmas 2021 Update from Pelagic Expeditions.

Vinson of Antarctica arrives at Puerto Williams escorted by the Lasers and Optimists of the sailing school

‘Merry’ might be stretching the use of the word for this Christmas . . . . here we go again!

Well, some things are going well. Vinson of Antarctic, the new flagship of Pelagic Expeditions is now berthed in Port Stanley, Falklands, having sailed the length of the Atlantic from Holland with stops in the Canaries and Uruguay. Along the way she hosted researches from the Ocean Genome Atlas Project (OGAP) https://www.ogapvoyage.org/ She then continued to Puerto Williams on the Beagle Channel which if not her official port of registry will be her spiritual home.

 

This is where the dream of this vessel was conceived by my colleague Nicolas Ibanez from Chile, who built and continues to support the sailing school for the children of this most southern community in the world, Cedena. https://cedenapw.cl/

I met Don Nicolas many years ago in Puerto Williams and he was taken with our Pelagic Australis as a concept and more so with our philosophies and methodologies of operating such a vessel in these remote southern regions. Vinson of Antarctica is the culmination of this journey we and our team of designers, builders, project managers and of course our sailing crew have lived through during the last three years since we pushed the ‘go button.’

Skipper Kenneth Perdigon and crew Jose Gritti, Manue Bily, film maker Domingo Abelli, our educational specialist Marta Duch and two Cedena students; Arturo Oyarzun and Jose Munoz arrived in Puerto Williams in early December to a spectacular welcome with all the sailing school’s Optimists and Lasers on the water to accompany the Vinson into the world famous Yacht Club Micalvi. Vinson will continue to embark Cedena’s students for adventures in the South Atlantic with the purpose of engendering professional sailing skills for these young, Chilean aspirant sailors.

THIS SOUTHERN SEASON

In the final days of 2021 Vinson of Antarctica will set sail with a group of penguin biologists for South Georgia and the Antarctic Peninsula, collecting DNA samples and taking censuses of colonies by drone. Alec Hazell, former Pelagic skipper will be on board as Expedition Leader. In February I will be on board as the EL for our film support role with a UK production company. Then in March, onward to Cape Town for some down time for vessel and crew. This will end year one for VOA, and what a year it was!

LOOKING BACK

For some Pelagic Australis nostalgia, watch Chris and Sophie’s Youtube Channel OCEAN ADVENTURES with Sophie & Chris - YouTube or https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCUxN4vvRDhxV9ePvO7lvC2g for their series of films from their two seasons on PA.

See you in 2022,

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