32 Cool and Unusual Things to Do in Antarctica - Atlas Obscura

Unusual Attractions in Antarctica

Blood Falls

Natural time capsule containing an alien ecosystem.

Deception Island

An abandoned whaling station on an active volcano offers hot springs in Antarctica, surrounded by ruined giants of industry.

Mt. Erebus

Fire meets ice at the southernmost volcano on Earth.

The Bar at Vernadsky Research Base

The world's southernmost bar.

Antarctic Exploration Museum & Post Office

The best place to send your postcards home from Antarctica.

The Ceremonial South Pole

Naked scientists race around the pole in the frigid cold to try to join Antarctica's exclusive 300 Club.

Trinity Church on King George Island

Russian Orthodox church built on an Antarctic island.

IceCube Research Station

The world's largest neutrino telescope searches for secrets of the universe at the South Pole.

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Cool Places to Eat & Drink in Antarctica

The Bar at Vernadsky Research Base

The world's southernmost bar.

Explore Antarctica

Launch Map

Antarctica Leaderboard

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Recent Antarctica Activity

PaulFisher99 wants to go to IceCube Research Station

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Stories About Antarctica

The James Caird at Elephant Island, preparing to set off for South Georgia Island.

Remembering a Little-Known Chapter in the Famed Endurance Expedition to Antarctica

The epic survival story of Ernest Shackleton and his crew included a harrowing journey to Elephant Island.

by Ranulph Fiennes

January 18, 2022

In Antarctica, the aptly-named icefish survives extreme cold thanks to an unusual suite of anatomical oddities.

The Evolutionary Quirk That Allows Antarctica's Icefish To Survive Extreme Cold

Unique adaptations allow the ambush predator to thrive in an environment that would kill most other organisms.

November 4, 2021

Podcast: Martian Meteorites and Greek Columns With the AO Places Team

Join us for a daily celebration of the world’s most wondrous, unexpected, even strange places.

by The Podcast Team

September 21, 2021

In 2010, through a narrow hole in Antarctica’s Ross Ice Shelf, researchers found thousands sea anemones clinging to the underside of the ice—a mysterious species, new to science.

Exploring Antarctica’s Upside-Down World

Clinging to the underside of ice hundreds of feet thick, strange communities eke out a living, while researchers race to study them before they disappear.

A carved post, or <em>pouwhenua</em>, erected at New Zealand's Scott Base in 2013, overlooks the Ross Ice Shelf in Antarctica.

Can the Māori Connection to Antarctica Help Safeguard the Continent’s Future?

Indigenous ties to the bottom of the world go back more than a millennium, and could point the way forward.

by Gemma Tarlach

Ernest Shackleton, Captain Robert Falcon Scott, and Edward Wilson (right to left) as they were preparing to explore the Ross Ice Shelf as part of the British National Antarctic Expedition in November 1902.

Why Did Antarctic Explorer Ernest Shackleton Keep 'Conking Out'?

A vitamin deficiency may have changed the course of a continent's history.

by Gemma Tarlach

An iceberg floats in the Atlantic Ocean, April 26, 2017 off the coast of Port Kirwan, Newfoundland, Canada. Icebergs break off from Baffin Island and Greenland every spring and drift down the stretch of water along the coast of Newfoundland and Labrador known as Iceberg Alley. According to media reports, the higher number of icebergs this season can be attributed to uncommonly strong counter-clockwise winds that draw the icebergs south and possibly global warming, which could be making Greenland's ice sheet melt faster.

The Iceberg Trackers Keeping an Eye on the Ocean's Behemoths

As well as smaller bergs that can be more dangerous to ships.

The camera descended beneath the ice, and found something researchers didn't expect: life.

Scientists Accidentally Discovered Strange Creatures Under Half a Mile of Ice

Researchers drilled through an Antarctic ice shelf to sample sediment. But they found animals that weren't supposed to be there.

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