Rare Bear Spotting in Antarctica

Antarctica needs a new name — the continent is so named because it is the polar region without bears. But now, a Baylor Bear has flung her Green and Gold to the southernmost corner of the earth!

It’s a rare thing to claim to have been to Antarctica. Sue Steakley, B.A. ’71, gets to boast just that after checking off the bucket list trip in January.

Steakley traveled with her niece and two good friends aboard the National Geographic Explorer. They learned about the continent in afternoon lectures, and the professional team was able to guide passengers to places that a normal cruise ship could not. They would travel further inland in dinghies and kayaks. In one memorable moment, a humpback whale breached right next to the dinghy Steakley was in! Steakley took advantage of these one-of-a-kind opportunities to learn and see everything she could.

“It’s like being on another planet,” Steakley said.

Beached icebergs towered above them, and Steakley described finding shapes in the mountains of ice like finding figures in the clouds. Although the landscape is barren of recognizable vegetation, it is teeming with life. Steakley saw four kinds of whales, five species of penguin and several species of seals and birds, including the albatross.

Walking among colonies of penguins and seeing the playfulness with which they dove into the water made an especially strong impact on her.

“It’s a beautiful, wild continent,” Steakley said.

Steakley has always loved to travel, and the trip to Antarctica completes her goal of visiting every continent in the world.

“My philosophy is God gave us the chance to see this earth, and he only gave us one, and I want to see as much of it as I can,” she said.

Next on her travel bucket list: she has six more states to visit before she has traveled to all 50 in the United States!

Steakley has a word of encouragement to Bears across the world: “Take advantage of every opportunity you have and don’t be afraid to do something different and new.”