Category Archives: Antarctica

All about the destination

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@SeaWorld: Inspiration is at the core of the experience

Writing for a travel audience one must create a fine balance between one’s personal point of view and the interests of the broader travel audience. My visit to SeaWorld in Orlando is a prime example.

Rollercoaster fanatics, horticultural travelers, live performance audiences and those travelers with a penchant for wildlife will find SeaWorld enthralling. There is something for everyone – even souvenir shoppers. [My whale fluke Santa's hat has become my absolutely favourite holiday souvenir!]

I, on the other hand, love to be inspired and educated when I travel. I want to be challenged by a different point of view. I want to compare my values to those of my destination. Do I come up short? Should I change in the light of a new point of view?

Education has been a core value of  SeaWorld for nearly 50 years.  SeaWorld teaches by example and through outreach programs like their animal rescue efforts. Recently the park announced it was doing away with plastic bags – shoppers you can buy some handsome reusable bags at the park. According to the information found at the park, this decision was in response to the evidence uncovered during rescues of sea turtles and other marine life that have consumed bags floating in the ocean. The consequences are deadly to the animals.

During a behind-the-scenes tour we were shown graphics on a staircase. The bottom step represented the number of people killed by sharks in the previous year around the world. 5. Each step up represented another cause of death. As we rose higher and higher, the number of deaths increased, until we landed at the top. 100,000 sharks were killed last year. That put things into perspective in a highly visual way.

One Ocean with high production values and starring a pod of killer whales was a multimedia water show that explained why we need to protect our oceans. Inspirational, factual and compelling.

Meeting the staff, however, may be the most inspirational aspect of visiting the Park. Everyone we met in a wide range of capacities had a story to tell. Most of them had visited SeaWorld as a child. They were so captivated by the experience that they set their sights on becoming members of the SeaWorld team, either as members of the Education and Conservation team or behind the scenes.

Admission to the park underwrites the rescue program. 24/7, every day of the year the rescue teams are ready to be deployed: Rescuing manatees hit by powerboat engines; beached whales; birds covered in oil from a spill. Those that cannot be returned to the wild are brought back to the park and become part of the education presentations. Reminding visitors to ease up on their outboards in manatee areas; or to pick up trash like fishing line and dispose of it.  One particular moment that I found compelling was learning that beach house lights and street lamps can keep baby sea turtles from reaching the sea when hatching. They mistake the lights for the light of the moon. Turn off the lights people during hatching season.

The Antarctica exhibit will open in the spring of 2013. During construction SeaWorld Orlando’s penguins are not on display. I got to meet a Magellanic penguin on the behind-the-scenes tour, which is way cooler than watching them through glass – just saying. The tour is an additional charge, and worth every penny!

The education program for Antarctica is under development. Based on the programs already in existence, visitors to the park will come to understand how the choices we make in our every day lives impact the habitat of the Antarctic penguins.

If you equate education with boring, then you have never visited SeaWorld. Next time you visit Orlando, make sure you packed an open mind and deep curiosity for the natural world, and include SeaWorld on your itinerary.

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Antarctic Outrage; Antarctic Lesson

I will never forget my first visit to Petermann Island in Antarctica. The sky was overcast. The Antarctic summer was winding down. The snow bloomed red and the Adelie Penguins were moulting. I did not see the travel-brochure Antarctica that day. I saw Eden.

Feeling puny in the grand scheme, I pondered my relationship with the natural world. I reflected on the Bible’s call to stewardship.

Genesis 1:26. Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth and over all the creatures that move along the ground.”

Blasphemy it may be, but that verse set us on the wrong path. Because humankind interpreted it to mean we were superior and had the right to interfere with the natural order. We forgot that humility is essential when given the responsibility to care for anything.

So when I read an article this morning about tourists in Antarctica attempting to sow seeds, inspired by a Bible verse, I was outraged. Outraged at the Tour Operator who failed to educate its travelers before they landed ashore. Outraged at the so-called Christians who failed to recognize Eden. Ignorance boards every tourist vessel, and the consequences of ignorance put Antarctica at risk.

Ezekiel 34:17-18. As for you, my flock… Is it not enough for you to feed on good pasture? Must you also trample the rest of your pasture with your feet? Is it not enough for you to drink clear water? Must you also muddy the rest with your feet?

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The Ancestors or The Descendants, A Cinematic Perspective

The Descendants (film)

The Descendants (film) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Three subjects of particular interest to me came together in The Descendants:

  1. Family History
  2. Cinema
  3. Antarctica

Family History: My Perspective

If  family history is viewed as an exploration of those who came before – ancestors, the weight of obligation is less than if one views family history from a descendant’s perspective. That is illustrated brilliantly in the film, as Matt King struggles with the responsibility of stewardship of land he and other descendants inherited. Matt King is a man who can recite his pedigree, passes it to his children and shares it with a gaggle of cousins. The past is present in their lives.

A Cinematic Perspective

This film is rife with cinematic cliches. Hawaii as paradise.  Workaholic father and distant husband. Dysfunctional family. Disloyal wife. Matrimonial implosion. Precocious tween. Teenage daughter acting out. Dull-witted teen beau. Eccentric supporting characters.

BUT

Every time I became impatient with the cliche, there was a situational twist; or a piece of dialogue that belied the cliche; or an unexpected insight into a character. That’s a really big but. The Descendants is a much, much better film than it appears in promos, reviews or on the DVD cover. There are human truths brilliantly depicted. I’ll let you pick the ones that resonate with you. My moments were the hospital scenes when the characters spoke to the comatose Elizabeth as if she could hear. Been there, done that.

Antarctica

My dream as a marketer of polar product was to see the Arctic and Antarctica become ubiquitous. Like Walmart – even if you never shopped there – you know the name. The Descendants confirmed that that dream of mine is now a reality. I won’t spoil how the film set in Hawaii manages to do that. Just watch it.

As a matter of fact that is the best piece of advice I can give you about this film – just watch it.

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100 Years Ago: Extreme Disappointment

Scott memorial window, Binton, panel 4 (detail...

Image via Wikipedia

Robert Falcon Scott and four companions reached the South Pole 100 years ago today. The goal of that British expedition team was to be the first in history to reach the bottom of the world. They failed by five weeks.

The team rested. Scott wrote of his disappointment in his journal. Then they began what became a death march. A month later the team was one man down. Two months later all lives were lost.

The five died for the glory of King, Country and Science…and in the manner of Greek Tragedy – for personal loyalty. Not quite a band of brothers – Scott was a stickler when it came to rank and class – they shared a common purpose.

Scott became a national hero, lionized in press and film. His companions became mythic heroes, whose names were conjured when examples of selflessness were required during dark and difficult times.

In a twist that has fascinated me for a lifetime, the man who became the first to reach the South Pole, became a footnote in British history books, overshadowed by Scott in the English-speaking world.

Captain Scott’s accrued accomplishments should outweigh his one, dramatic, tragic and complete failure. They should, but that has never been the case. His expeditions to the south polar region contributed greatly to science, art and photography. Let’s spend the next 100 years celebrating that, not his deadly hubris.

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More Polar Poetry

Writer Chris Epting uses the haiku format to express his polar experiences. I can understand why. Gushing to anyone who will listen – and those who do not want to – about Antarctica or the Arctic is a first response inevitability. But there comes a time, when a visitor to the polar regions searches for the essence of the emotion of the experience. That is the moment when less becomes more.

I have been writing about the polar regions for more than seven years. In a year when centenaries are the norm, seven years is insignificant. I expect I’ll be writing about the north and south polar regions for the rest of my life. I have yet to express my deepest feelings with the precision they demand.

My quest to uncover polar poetry has led to the following links:

I was flabbergasted to discover that Emily Dickinson wrote something with an arctic aspect. I should not have been. Dickinson lived during that period of Arctic history when the Royal Navy searched for Sir John Franklin and his lost expedition. That event permeated English society like the aroma of roses on a summer’s evening.

If you want a sneak peek at Chris Epting’s polar haiku, you’ll have to join Facebook. You’ll have to scroll some, but you’ll find bite size pieces of his heart’s polar song.