24 Hour daylight at 65S Antarctica viewed by tourists

There are many cruise boats leaving South America to make the 2 day crossing of Drake passage to the Antarctic Peninsula.

On Utube you can find a large number of these videos and many are timelapsed and in high quality.



One of the most photographed Antarctica areas for tourists is the area around Peterman Island, Pleneau Island and Booth Island.  These islands are all at the Southern end of a channel known as the Lemaire channel.

Lemaire channel begins at Unas peaks and ends at the Southern end of Booth island.    The channel runs South/west North/East

Most of the boats are heading south west thru Neuymayer channel to reach 65S and Lemaire channel.

You can see the entire trip thru neuymayer and lemaire channel with these two time lapse videos

In this view you have the long journey southwest to the end of neuymayer channel with palmer station on the right on anvers island.



And in this view the journey continues from palmer station on another trip in the morning with the sun shining from the north down le maire channel.



Many of the cruise boats position themselves in the southern end of Lemaire channel to capture the midnight sun framed between the Continent of Antarctica and Booth island.   However around Summer solstice the boats have to position themselves a few miles further South near pleneau island to see the Sun setting just a few degrees west of Due South.    (If the boats are in Lemaire channel the Sun is too far to the left around solstice)

Videos often show boats en route to lemaire channel situated amongst the islands on the western coast of the mainland of antarctica.

The route goes thru gerlache channel into neuymayer channel and then onwards in the direction of lemaire channel. The route shown in the videos is generally south west

The first of these videos begins heading towards south west towards paradise bay, shows the boat going into Paradise bay and then coming out the same direction and going into Neumayer channel. Neuymayer channel has a zig zag but begins and ends in a southwest direction for this direction of travel.

North bound lemaire channel



Southbound by the same person



North bound thru Le maire channel. Video ends just as the boat enters lemaire channel. The northern end of Booth island is in the near distance on the left.



Star princess heading southwest down Neuymayer channel and then onwards 20 miles (not shown) to within one mile of Le maire channel (shown) beyond which the large ship is not allowed to travel further south due to the antarctic treaty limiting large passenger ships carrying more than 500 passengers from going over the line of 65S. Detailed explanation given by the captain near end of video.



""Good afternoon...The plan here is to increase speed a bit........we are now at the south end of Neuymayer.......head slightly towards the southwest through the butler passage for about 5 miles and then get to the southern limit of where we are allowed to travel.....and look down the lemaire channel...before heading out again..............Great view here....twin peaks of Booth island and the Lemaire channel stretching southwards.....Good Afternoon ladies and gentlemen this is the captain, . just to give you a bit of a background as to why we have stopped where we have, chosen right here and now, we came down the Butler pass down to look at this wonderful view down to lemaire strait. You might indeed wonder why we have not gone a bit closer down that passage, well there is a particularly good reason for that......... At the moment we are just less than one mile from the position that....the insurance...would cease to function....that is the parallel of 65 south......so we edge down to just half a mile to that position..... This is as far South as this ship is ever allowed to travel. The latitude of 65S is actually set as part of the Antarctic treaty, and all the larger ships, ships such as ourselves, ships carrying more than 500 passengers on board, are restricted from travelling farther than 65 degrees South. So thats the ethos behind it. Thought you would like to know


This is the same view the cruise ship has at the Northern end of Lemaire channel looking South

Unas tits are the massive rock on the left (not the twin peaks further along the ridge). The twin peaks of Booth island are on the right



Northern end of lemaire channel looking South





In this video the man is holding a GPS showing their location at the northern end of le maire channel with a view of 'Unas tits' (0.12 and 4.04)) on the mainland at the northern end of le maire channel with the boat travelling southwest.



Le Maire channel Northern end

Unas tits





www.shutterstock.com/video/clip-725164-stock-footage-una-s-tits-at-lemaire-chanel-on-a-beautiful-day-in-antarctica.html

Looking east in le maire channel showing unas tits at left





Le Maire channel Southern end

The steep cliff at the southern end of the channel is the east side of booth island. Wandel peak there is 750m high going more or less straight up.




Climbers route up east face of booth island

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Passing thru the Southern end of Neumayer channel you can see the northern end of Lemaire channel about 15 miles away.

Unas tits are fairly massive at 747M. Wandel peak on Booth island is even bigger at 980M.




You can confirm it is lemaire channel here where this continues from the southern end of Neuymayer channel. The northern lemaire view is best seen at 0:23



The northern end of Booth island is shown here on the left