Geologists conduct studies in Antarctica to show it's past relationship to the other continents. 180 million years ago all the southern continents, including Antarctica, were part of the great supercontinent called Gondwana. Great forces within the earth's interior caused them all to disperse into the shapes we know today. Underneath the ice in Antarctica are rock outcrops that make this place look every bit like Table Mountain in Cape Town, South Africa.

But ice is what defines Antarctica. It is the one thing that makes Antarctica unique from the other landmasses. This is the great ice factory of our planet and glaciers cover 98% of a landmass the size of the US and Mexico combined. There is a lot of ice! The ice is conveyed to the sea in huge ice streams called glaciers. As these glaciers flow over very rugged terrain the brittle ice cracks into fissures called crevasse. The spacing between crevasse determines the ultimate size of icebergs that float into the sea.

Captain Leif Skog loves to sail within these great rafts of icebergs. Today the Caledonian Star anchored in a lovely cove near Cuverville Island and you can see just how big and beautiful this ice is. In many ways, Antarctica is just like it's continental neighbors. And in other ways it is unique. Such is the magic of this place.