ice

When one considers the mile-thick ice shields which cover the Antarctic continent today, it is hard to imagine that Antarctica used to be fertile land and completely free of ice. Some 170 million years ago Antarctica was still part of the Gondwana supercontinent - until it broke up and Antarctica drifted south and slowly began to freeze over.

Maps of the Antarctic cannot even come close to reflecting the geographic diversity of the region. Beneath the massive ice layers lie mountains that are kilometres high with deep craggy ravines. As the seasons change, the sea ice forms ever new coastlines, and thus the exact surface area is also in a state of constant change.

"Imagine a country as large as Australia and Europe together, sunnier than California but colder than the icebox of a refrigerator, dryer than Arabia and higher than Switzerland, emptier than the Sahara. There is only one place in the world that fits this description: Antarctica — this strange but beautiful continent in the lowest part of the Earth." (J. M. Dukert)