Safari to Queen Maud Land

home to three extraordinary camps

Queen Maud Land is the sector of the great ice sheets of the southern continent that lies to the south of the continent Africa.

It is possible to fly south from Cape Town to Antarctica, but at a distance of 4150 km (about the same distance as Cape Town to Nairobi), it’s easy to see why such trips are unusual and expensive.

For comparison, New Zealand to Antarctica is around 2500 km (with interesting islands to visit along the way), whilst South America is only 1000 km from the Antarctic Peninsula.

The main reason that people visit this particular part of Antarctica is the undeniable appeal of trips that combine both safari and the polar regions.
Extremely high-priced trips range from an outrageous single-day trip to more extensive 7-12 night adventures, with flying extensions to penguin colonies and the South Pole itself.

Almost all trips are centred on one of the three permanent camps in the area, all of which are owned by the same operator and offer a similar range of local activities, including vehicle safari, hiking, climbing, ice-climbing, glacier exploration, fat-biking and bivouac camping.

The first key decision to make when considering a trip to Queen Maud Land is usually selecting which of the three camps to visit.

Note that these camps are very rarely visited in combination, with trip shapes largely being restricted by fixed itineraries.

There is little difference in price between the three camps, just a difference in design and, most importantly, in a few of the key activities.

There is a good chance that your choice of camp and itinerary may be dictated by availability (since these trips book out years in advance), so it may be best to familiarise yourselves with all three camps, or just look at the first one to get an idea of what the area has to offer.

exploring as far afield as the South Pole