What We Did on Our Family Trip…to Antarctica

Chapter 1:

Penguin Love

The second we stepped off the Zodiac boat, that air simply hit us. It was this beautiful, overwhelming blast. Crisp, clear, completely pollution-free. A surprising, large distinction to the acquainted density of New York City, the place we stay. The ice? A stark white—pure, blinding, chic. And the noise was the inverse: a profound, stunning quiet. It was damaged solely by the crackling of surrounding ice, like an immense bowl of Rice Krispies snapping within the distance.

This was Antarctica. This was my son Wilder’s seventh continent. He was seven years outdated.

The Zodiac had deposited us right here on a rocky Antarctic touchdown, the place black stone and snow met the ice-strewn sea. Wilder didn’t run straight for the colossal iceberg floating close by. Instead, my little orange marshmallow, encased in layers of thermal gear, his large boots making him waddle, noticed a pair of Adélie penguins on a rocky outcrop. They had been engaged in a fast, wobbly second of copulation.

He ignored the majestic vista—a scatter of towering blue-white icebergs drifting in a steel-gray sea—and pointed a bright-orange sleeve on the birds. “Look, Mom,” he shouted, his voice impossibly small within the pristine expanse. “They’re high-fiving!”

The delight of that second had been seven years within the making. Back in January 2018, my husband and I had stood on this very same white expanse. I used to be 5 months pregnant with Wilder. That journey was vital for us; it was the place we checked off our personal last objective—seven continents earlier than having children. Antarctica was our end line, a hard-earned private achievement proper earlier than the good unknown of parenthood started. We introduced through Instagram we had been having a child proper right here.

This previous November’s return journey, aboard the icebreaker National Geographic Resolution, with National Geographic-Lindblad Expeditions, felt like a full-circle second: bringing the son whose arrival we’d celebrated right here again to shut the loop on his personal seven-continent journey.

Seven continents by age seven: It’s a rare milestone and one which begs an apparent query: Who would do that to a toddler, and why?

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Wilder touching a glacier. He’d raced up a steep and rocky hill to achieve it, then wished to return down and do it once more.

Chapter 2:

A Global Syllabus

We didn’t begin with some grasp plan or a objective to gather continents. We’re vacationers. I’m a journey author, and my husband’s a sports-tech government who’s additionally an adventure-loving athlete. When Wilder was born, we made a vital determination: We didn’t need him to place a cease to our way of life. We wished him to make it higher, additive. His first journey was to Portugal at eight weeks outdated.

From there, we took benefit of labor alternatives and private time, transferring from Australian seashores to African safaris (he noticed the Big Five sport animals by the point he was 4), snorkeling with sea lions within the Galápagos, weaving by means of steaming hawker stalls on a meals tour in Singapore, and swinging on a playground sixty-three hundred ft above sea stage in Switzerland—all throughout greater than thirty-five international locations with our mini journey buddy in tow. It wasn’t till we tallied up the checklist earlier than a visit to South America that we realized, form of to our shock, he’d been to 5 continents by age 5.

“Well,” my husband mentioned, wanting on the spreadsheet prefer it was a forgotten to-do checklist, “we should probably just go for seven by seven.” Just like that. An informal dedication turned a centered, last push.

We didn’t need our son to place a cease to our way of life. We wished him to make it higher, additive. His first journey was to PORTUGAL AT EIGHT WEEKS OLD.

Of course, you don’t must go to the literal ends of the earth to expertise the advantages of this sort of parenting-by-plane-ticket philosophy. The level isn’t Antarctica; it’s intention. Family journey is exploding proper now, and our personal expertise matches right into a rising cultural shift. According to the American Express 2025 Global Travel Trends Report, the subsequent era is altering how holidays are deliberate: A full 68 % of millennial and Gen Z mother and father surveyed say their youngsters assist inform features of journeys. This is sensible, as 81 % of world respondents choose family-centric locations with actions for all ages.

Our dedication to excessive journey aligns with one other key discovering: 72 % of millennial and Gen Z mother and father surveyed are keen to take their youngsters out of faculty to journey as a household throughout the offseason. For us, this wasn’t about shirking schooling. It was about elevating it to a really international, hands-on syllabus. It was in regards to the chaotic, costly, and deeply rewarding option to make journey—and all the journey and discovery and thrill that may go together with it—the very cornerstone of our household life.

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On the dock in Ushuaia, Argentina, earlier than boarding the Lindblad National Geographic Resolution, within the background. The ship is an icebreaker and can be the household’s dwelling for the subsequent week.

Chapter 3:

What Instagram Doesn’t Show You

Let me be completely clear about what this sort of journey is. It is not the shiny, pastel-filtered fantasy at present saturating social media. It is dear. It is exhausting. It is commonly very, very arduous, and let’s not faux in any other case. First, we have to discuss in regards to the monetary problem of a visit to Antarctica or some other very big-ticket vacation spot. I’m the primary to confess that these journeys aren’t possible for everybody.

The actuality of funding such a pursuit requires disposable earnings, sure, however, extra importantly, it requires dedication. While my being a journey author supplied a major low cost on this expedition, for many of our different journeys, we depend on strategic, nonglamorous decisions. This means utilizing points-hacking credit-card rewards to cowl flights and accommodations. We typically select the offseason for locations (like Australia of their winter or Paris in January). And we make the very pragmatic option to share a room, typically even a mattress, to maintain prices down. These are approaches anybody can take that may make the entire world extra accessible. I additionally must acknowledge a key privilege right here, although: We have just one little one, by selection. Traveling and reserving tickets clearly develop into exponentially dearer the extra youngsters you might have.

Wilder noticed two penguins engaged in a fast, wobbly second of copulation. “LOOK, MOM,” he shouted. “They’re high-fiving!”

The bodily and emotional toll of those journeys is a large hurdle too. For this last continent, we flew in a single day from New York to Santiago, Chile. Crammed in economic system. A marathon flight that completely drained us. We woke earlier than daybreak for the flight south to Ushuaia, Argentina. A whirlwind of bleary eyes, uncomfortable airport flooring, and quick meals. That’s the unglamorous fact of utmost journey with a child, even a well-adjusted seven-year-old: You must get by means of it. You don’t all the time get pleasure from it. I get cranky on lengthy hauls; he will get cranky when the airplane meals isn’t prepared when he desires it.

The third hurdle? On this journey, the ocean. In my hasty reserving frenzy, I had meant to order the Fly the Drake possibility (whereby you fly to Antarctica as a substitute of going by sea). But I tousled and unintentionally booked the twelve-day cruise, which implies we had been dedicated to the notorious two-day Drake Passage crossing.

Even although we had the “Drake Lake” (when the seas of the notoriously tough passage occur to be calm), the rolling was sufficient to induce nausea. Wilder, who can’t sit nonetheless for something, refused to heed our warnings. “You have to lie still, buddy, or you will get sick,” we pleaded. He tried a fast sprint towards the lounge. And, shazam, he threw up.

It was a humorous, unhappy second, however it gave him a swift, indeniable lesson in listening to the legal guidelines of physics. For the subsequent day and a half, his little physique was confined to our cabin mattress, satisfied he needed to be completely nonetheless to keep away from one other disaster. When he lastly felt effectively sufficient to exit, the emotional launch got here quick: Inside our cabin, with our Zodiac group already on final name, he melted down over the layers, the life vest, and the 4 steep flights of stairs nonetheless forward. “I can’t do it,” he sobbed as we wrestled to get him comfortably transferring, in the end negotiating soccer time later to get him by means of it. This is the a part of household journey that Instagram feeds intentionally omit: the mood tantrums, the moments of concern, and absolutely the exhaustion that demand deep, deep reservoirs of parental persistence.

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Peaks rising from the ocean on the coast, the place the skies had been strikingly clear blue a lot of the journey, a rarity.

Chapter 4:

The Frozen Sea

The second we handed the confluence—the purpose the place the Atlantic, Pacific, and Southern oceans meet—the seasickness haze started to carry, and every thing simply modified. We had been blessed with bright-blue skies virtually your entire journey. Even the crew couldn’t consider our luck.

Standing on the bow of the ship, we obtained our first sight of a large tabular iceberg—not jagged or sculpted like those I’d imagined however impossibly flat and geometric. For a second, I really thought my eyes had been enjoying tips on me, as a result of it regarded as if somebody had sliced the highest clear off a frozen continent and set it drifting at sea. Its sheer white face stretched on and on, a towering wall of ice faintly streaked with blue, the waterline giving solely a touch of the large bulk hidden beneath the floor. As the ship slowed and other people crowded the railings in silence, the joy wasn’t simply within the scale of it however within the feeling that something may seem subsequent. A whale? Another iceberg? A passage opening the place there had been none earlier than? It was all potential.

A humpback whale displaying its tail.

For the period of the cruise, we’d stay aboard the Resolution and take each day journeys out, exploring the dramatic shoreline of the Antarctic Peninsula, the lengthy finger of land that stretches northward towards the southern tip of South America. Every day felt prefer it couldn’t be topped, and but the subsequent one would do exactly that. On our first Zodiac trip, we had been drifting in a sheltered harbor simply off the Antarctic coast, the water calm and darkish, ringed by low, snow-covered hills. Then, whereas we had been taking within the stark white environment, the water beside us started to shift many times as one thing monumental moved beneath the floor. It darkened and lightened earlier than lastly a humpback whale emerged. Rising and sinking round our boat, surfacing gently, slipping below, then surfacing once more, its large bumpy again rolling by means of the water solely ft away, mottled grey and blue beneath the sheen. Our driver—a whale professional—gasped and pulled out her telephone, laughing as she tried to movie. In that second, the joys sharpened into one thing extra primal: the notice of how small and uncovered we had been, floating quietly because the whale ultimately flicked its tail within the air and disappeared.

This is the a part of household journey that social feeds omit: the tantrums, the moments of concern, the exhaustion that calls for DEEP RESERVOIRS OF PATIENCE.

One day, our captain, this sort of Adventure Star determine, steered the ship, a brand new icebreaker, into uncharted waters. We despatched a drone forward to see if there was a path by means of the ice, and a Zodiac to measure its depth to make certain we may move. The sound of the hull crunching towards the frozen ocean thrilled Wilder and the 120 or so adults onboard. Wilder pressed his face to the window. “This is like The Polar Express,” he mentioned, eyes huge. “When the train cracks the ice and it splits for miles.” I imply, we had been actively exploring, crashing by means of ice fields!

Another day, we stepped off the facet of the ship onto sea ice. A frozen, flat ocean stretched all the way in which to the horizon. And on one touchdown, we needed to crawl on our palms and knees up a steep, rocky, sandy hill, solely to observe my little Michelin Man pace forward. Weightless with adrenaline and curiosity, he left the remainder of the panting adults in his wake. By the time I reached the highest, he was already there, bouncing in place as different folks nonetheless struggled upward behind us. “That was easy,” he mentioned with an enormous smile. “Can we do it again?”

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Kids can be children, and naptime is naptime, even once you’re kayaking amongst icebergs.

Chapter 5:

Soccer on the Bottom of the World

The problem of parenting in such extremes lies within the friction between the grownup sense of awe and the kid’s easier, extra rapid wants. The biggest service we are able to provide mother and father contemplating big-ticket journey is acknowledging that even when the vacation spot is classy, your little one nonetheless simply must be a child.

One afternoon, my husband and I had been kayaking amongst floating icebergs. I returned to seek out the kayaking crew simply cracking up. My husband was paddling solo: Wilder was out chilly—completely handed out—within the kayak. Yes, it was probably the most epic nap spot potential. Everyone else’s jaw dropped in marvel; my son dropped in exhaustion.

As somebody who struggles with nervousness, I’ve discovered that moments like this throughout journeys frequently educate me the arduous artwork of letting go. Your youngsters are already adapting a lot to your grownup way of life; it’s a must to meet them midway. You can’t count on profound, grownup reactions to epic moments. And you may’t be offended in the event that they’d quite use an iPad for an hour than attend the microplastics lecture. They want regular downtime and to simply be children.

Wilder drawing penguins. The ship’s instructor confirmed him tips on how to paint utilizing watercolors constituted of sea ice.

Beyond the important relaxation, you have to create area for his or her pursuits. Wilder is obsessive about soccer. So my husband and I spotted the yoga room was not often used and introduced a small ball, enjoying soccer with him each day in that makeshift area. It was our method of honoring his want to maneuver, making certain he obtained the bodily launch he craved.

That’s why the cruise outfit we selected, National Geographic-Lindblad Expeditions, was essential. Companies like this are enthusiastically kid-centric and maintain the important thing to parental bliss: eradicating the psychological load. Every single meal, each exercise, each journey was deliberate by our crew chief, Andy. The ship’s culinary workforce embraced these priorities too. At the flamboyant, zero-waste tasting dinner, the chef knew Wilder’s favourite meals—plain, uncooked cucumbers and sliced tomatoes—and served him a gorgeous plate of them proper alongside the tasting menu.

Also, the National Geographic Explorers-in-Training program, run by scientist Shannon, supplied partaking, hands-on studying, every thing from utilizing sea ice for watercolor work to an in depth presentation on penguin poop.

The water beside us started to shift many times as one thing monumental moved BELOW THE SURFACE.

This form of all-encompassing service isn’t low-cost, however it paid priceless dividends. With logistics dealt with, we had been free to do one thing rarer than journey: decelerate. Over meals, we pulled out a small pocket book we’d introduced alongside, and Wilder used it to catalog his days: info he wished to recollect, various kinds of penguins we’d seen, and cautious makes an attempt at drawing one in order that it regarded prefer it was really strolling. Where do you begin, he requested, with the beak or the ft? We pushed plates apart, sketched collectively, and talked by means of what he’d observed. That unhurried consideration, greater than the locations themselves, felt like the true reward of household journey: time spent absolutely engaged together with your little one, free from the each day grind.

Of course, we confronted judgment. In the shared lounge, we often felt icy eye rolls from passengers—retired {couples} who clearly wished there have been no youngsters on their costly journey. Traveling with youngsters, even well-behaved ones, comes with that fixed low hum of public critique. But discovering an surroundings with an organization so welcoming to households is one protection towards that stress.

And, in the end, this was one other essential lesson in letting go: realizing that strangers’ judgments mattered far lower than the curiosity and marvel we had been actively cultivating in our son.

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Visiting a penguin colony on a windy day. It was nesting season, and the household noticed hundreds of the seabirds, together with some infants.

Chapter 6:

The Grand Moment and the Snack Request

On our final night time, I requested Wilder what he considered Antarctica.

He paused. Thoughtful. Looking out on the expanse of white and the mountains rising steeply from the ocean. “I thought it would be flatter,” he mentioned.

I immediately remembered taking him to Paris to see the Eiffel Tower. He’d stared up for 2 entire seconds earlier than saying, “Huh. I thought it would be taller,” then requested if we may get a Nutella crepe. That’s parenting in a nutshell: the grand second and the snack request, all the time facet by facet.

In Antarctica, he nonetheless cracked jokes about penguin poop and whined in regards to the stiffness of his life vest. Yet he additionally raced to the bridge of the ship when a killer whale surfaced close to the hull. When we plunged into the polar water—a bracing ceremony of passage organized by the ship’s crew whereby you actually soar into the Antarctic Ocean—he fist-pumped, screaming louder than anybody. He spent an hour with a scientist, turning sea ice into watercolor paint whereas asking extra questions than she may reply. Why is a few ice blue? How come the icebergs don’t sink our ship? Is penguin poop all the time pink or solely once they eat lots of shrimp?

The hardest fact is that children don’t narrate marvel the way in which we would like them to. We need immediate gratitude, a profound monologue, some form of cinematic revelation, however it doesn’t work like that. These experiences sink in slowly. The objective was by no means the guidelines. It was the lengthy sport, serving to him be taught that the world is huge, unusual, and price exploring. We had been crammed into one tiny cabin for twelve days. We shared each meal, each mess, each new discovery.

Visiting a penguin colony on a windy day. It was nesting season, and the household noticed hundreds of the seabirds, together with some infants.

None of us will overlook that.

Even if he can’t absolutely verbalize the profound classes or the gratitude now, these issues—adaptability, curiosity, and empathy—are intrinsically inside him. The funding is in his long-term character, not his rapid response.

Antarctica was the ultimate, plain proof. Proof that he may endure seasickness. Proof he may shake off the chilly. Proof he may step into the unknown and let awe take over. He now is aware of the world is navigable, and so will we. And that, way over the achievement itself, is the liberty we hope he carries with him as he grows.

On our final day, we stood out on deck because the define of Argentina got here into view: brown and strong after so many days of white and blue. The air felt softer right here, the ocean darker and busier, and the rhythm of the ship had modified. Wilder leaned towards the railing, quiet for as soon as, watching the shoreline sharpen. After a protracted second, he regarded up at my husband and me and mentioned, “I don’t want to leave.” It wasn’t a grievance or a plea, only a assertion of truth. We put our arms round his shoulders and stood with him because the land grew nearer, not saying a lot, understanding that no matter stayed behind in Antarctica, there was one thing vital coming dwelling with us too.