Antarctica: the Drake

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10 Feb 2004 4:08 pm

Day2: I woke at 3:30 am when I was nearly tossed out of my bed by rough waters. It must have been about this time that we entered the Drake passage – the body of water between America Sur and Antartida. The Drake is known for being some of the roughest water in the world. I knew this to be true when the chair in our cabin took flight and all doors and drawers opened and closed violently for hours. The entire contents of our closet exploded from within sending clothes, wine bottles, water bottles and crackers flying. I spent the rest of the night back and forth to the toilet leaping over and through the flying obstacle course in time to vomit, stumbling back to bed and holding on to the bunk just to stay in it only to get up again and again to vomit again and again. By 8 am I knew I had to make it out of the cabin or die there. I crawled out in only my pajamas up to C deck to find the doc. I wasn’t wearing contacts or shoes, couldn’t see straight, and made it as far as the dining hall. I lay there in the middle of the dining hall and called out ‘Doctor, Where is the Doctor?’ again and again (what a pitiful sight!). All sprawled out, retching and crying, I got the attention of the entire kitchen staff who took pity on me and found the doctor, cold compresses and vomit bags. It seemed like forever, but eventually the doc arrived and gave me a shot of Dramamine right to the behind as I lay on the floor. Two very large men carried me back to my cabin and placed me in bed. We were followed by some of the female kitchen staff who didn’t hesitate to scold Neil for not taking better care of me. Hee hee. Poor Neil was himself quite sick, poor guy. With the shot in the derriere I was able to sleep many hours and when I finally emerged in the lounge later that evening, I learned that everyone was sick and some were worse off than me.

3 Responses to “Antarctica: the Drake”

  1. Gordon (February 28th, 2004 at 8:18 pm)

    Oh my god Laura, what a journey. Quite a price to pay but obviously worth it from the couple of photos Cindy posted for you. Was the trip back that bad as well?

  2. Cindy (March 18th, 2004 at 7:54 pm)

    Laura, having seen you seasick from just a short airfoil trip across a bay I can’t imagine how you survived this ordeal. And although I’m filled with sisterly love and am relieved that you made it OK, I’m really, really glad I wasn’t there. Seriously though, wow!

  3. Peter (April 12th, 2004 at 6:19 pm)

    Were the guys really big that carried you back to your room?