by David Cothran, undersea specialist for Lindblad Expeditions-National Geographic

I was descending a steep muddy slope near Crystal Hill, in the Weddell Sea. More or less feeling my way along, I continued down to about 60 feet, stopping when I was lucky enough to come across a group of Antarctic feather stars. I had just started filming them when something moved among the rocks nearby. It was a scale worm, a flat, bristly creature also called a sea mouse. Very cool! I had only seen a few in the Antarctic and this one was quite large, about six inches long. It was difficult to get a good shot of it in the swirling mud, but I did my best and then moved on, looking for more strange polar marine life to share with our guests on the National Geographic Endeavour.

Not pretty, but really interesting; an unidentified scale worm in the Weddell Sea.

Back on the ship I tried to identify the unusual worm. According to my reading, all known Antarctic scales worms are quite a bit smaller than this one. What had I seen? Was it a species as yet undescribed by science? In places as remote as the Weddell Sea, it is quite possible to come across unknown animals, but it is also very difficult to know for sure that what you have found is really new. In order to establish a new species, scientists must examine specimens in the laboratory and publish a definitive descriptive paper, called a monograph. In this case there was no way to do that, but it was still an exciting possibility and worth a casual report to some friends in the scientific community.

Shadows and light at the entrance to Woodfjord.

In the remote and beautiful wilderness areas where we travel on Lindblad-National Geographic expeditions, this kind of thing happens every once in a while. For me, the most interesting encounter of all was in the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard, on a day when I was using our ROV to look at the bottom of Woodfjord, about 300 feet below the surface. The creature I found there looked very much like a small brown mushroom, but as I carefully focused the camera for a better look, it slowly unfolded, opening a crown of branched tentacles that it raised to form an upturned cup. The Antarctic worm was unusual, but at least I knew what kind of animal it was. This was really strange! I had never seen anything like it and couldn't even guess what it was related to. And, as it turns out, neither could any of the expert marine biologists I have shown it to.

We don't yet know if either the scale worm or the strange mushroom creature are really new species, but it is certainly both exciting to consider and compelling motivation to keep our eyes open as we continue to explore. One of the best things about traveling to remote wilderness regions like the Arctic and the Antarctic is the opportunity to encounter the unknown, and, through these encounters, to enrich ourselves and contribute to the ever-growing scientific understanding of our beautiful...

By Marc Cappelletti, Director of Expedition Development, Lindblad Expeditions-National Geographic

The instant I locked eyes with that iguana I was in love -- or as close to it as one can be with a reptile. I couldn't stop staring, and couldn't help thinking that these were the eyes...

By Ralph Lee Hopkins, Lindblad Expeditions-National Geographic Director of Expedition Photography

When people think of Baja California they immediately picture Cabo San Lucas, the playground for holiday makers and movie stars. What too few realize is that beyond the sport fishing, golf and nightlife lie unspoiled expanses of...

LA PAZ - With a whirl and a smile, the dance begins. Much like the colorful courtship performance of a bird of paradise, the Jarabe Tapatío, the quintessential folk dance of Mexico, is a captivating display of form and flow.

Although there are dozens of Jarabe styles seen throughout the...

By Marc Cappelletti, Director of Expedition Development, Lindblad Expeditions-National Geographic

Most people come to Alaska for the whales, the bears and the soaring eagles. And rightly so! These majestic creatures are the stuff of legends, the "heavy hitters" that have drawn the curious vacationer and the bold adventurer...

By Jack Swenson, Lindblad Expeditions photo instructor. This is a dispatch from one day in the Mala Mala Game Reserve in South Africa during a 2012 Lindblad Expeditions & Bushtracks photo safari by private air.

We began another beautiful...

By Ralph Lee Hopkins, Director of Expedition Photography, Lindblad Expeditions-National Geographic

Stepping ashore in eastern Greenland, I realize immediately I'm way overdressed. My expectation this far north of the Arctic Circle was for an ice-cloaked landscape. Instead, it's sunny and 65ºF (18ºC) today, quite amazing for...

On July 16, I had the privilege of spending a couple hours with Cape Hunting Dogs on the Mala Mala reserve in South Africa. Their den site had been found that morning, and it was a remarkable sighting. I'd seen them before during my six years living in...

There is a passage in Jules Verne's aquatic masterpiece, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, in which Captain Nemo is asked if he likes the sea. "Yes! I love the sea!" he says. "It is an immense desert where man is never lonely, for he feels life stirring on all sides......

Antarctica is a landscape of superlatives: Stunningly beautiful in a very big way, it harbors the largest amount of freshwater ice in the world and it sits on top of a salty sea. These icebergs are huge beyond description, regularly the size of large buildings and occasionally the size of...

The explorers of the heroic age, Scott, Amundsen, Shackelton and many others, left a great legacy of contributions to science, devotion to duty and simple survival, one that is both staggering to the imagination and difficult to appreciate in today's world of high-tech fabrics and global information systems. It's always exciting to read their stories and think about their experiences when we visit the places where these adventures played out.

In particular, I am a big fan of the French polar explorer, Jean-Baptiste Charcot. Sailing first in the Français and then in the Por Qua Pas? (the Why Not?), he overwintered at Booth Island in 1904 and then at Petermann Island in 1909, both places frequently visited by our ships today. His expeditions are now justly famous for their attention to the creature comforts of the men, for their successful exploration of then-unknown parts of the Antarctic Peninsula and for their pioneering investigations of the marine biology of the region.

One hundred years after Charcot was there, Petermann Island was the site for the Oceanites field camp, from 2003 until 2009. Oceanites, named for the Wilson's Storm Petrel, is a non-profit research foundation, which has been studying changes in penguin populations around the Peninsula for more than 20 years. Their partnership with Lindblad Expeditions and National Geographic allowed them to supply and staff the camp on Petermann and has also helped them reach many other penguin colonies that would otherwise be inaccessible.

Each time the National Geographic Endeavour has visited Petermann Island we have taken the opportunity to do a little exploring of our own, diving off the rocky shores of the island, filming marine life with our video cameras and using our ROV to investigate the greater depths of the adjacent Penola Strait. Over the course of many visits, between 2001 and 2011, we collected quite a bit of footage and recorded many fascinating and beautiful species of seastars, mollusks, anemones and, of course, penguins, living near Petermann Island in the early 21^st Century.

Recently, one of the Oceanites biologists, Heather Lynch, was able to gain access to Charcot's journals. In these, the Frenchman recorded his observations of the marine life around Petermann, one hundred years before our visits. Heather suggested to us that we could help to make a valuable comparison of Charcot's records with those we had taken more recently. The Antarctic Peninsula region is one of the most rapidly warming parts of the globe and much of Oceanites' research involves studying the effects of these changes on penguin populations. The opportunity to see how marine communities had changed over a full century could be a very helpful addition to this work.

My colleague Lisa Trotter and I combed through hundreds of shots in our video archive, creating a database of our observations that Heather will use to compare with Charcot's records. The study is not yet complete, but we are eagerly awaiting the results. How has the marine biology of the Antarctic Peninsula changed in the past century? Can understanding these changes help us to ensure the future of this beautiful region?

We have always enjoyed working with the Oceanites biologists who have accompanied our expeditions, and we're very excited to have this opportunity, working from the comfort of our modern expedition ships, to add to the body of scientific knowledge begun by heroic men like Charcot.

By David Cothran

Interested in exploring Antarctica? Get a free brochure from Lindblad Expeditions-National...

One week in Baja California last month, Sven Lindblad, founder of Lindblad Expeditions, led an expedition exploring the Sea of Cortez. These expeditions, open to all curious travelers, have no set day-to-day itinerary. Instead the expedition leader, naturalist staff and captain rely on their deep knowledge of the...

In a small ship anchored off of Lemesurier Island in Alaska's Inside Passage a naturalist shares a few parting words to a group of tourists in the ship's lounge, and then flips back-first into the icy water. Covered head to toe in a neoprene dry suit and armed...

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The seas around the Antarctic Peninsula are quiet and still. Storm winds and waves are left behind as you slip beneath the surface and, once you get used to the bone-chilling temperature, it's a very peaceful place. There are no schools of fish in these waters, just occasional...