A native of Toronto Ian has been a tireless explorer since 1995. He has been an Expedition Leader and Lecturer in the Russian Far East, Alaska, Arctic Canada, Greenland, the Chilean fjords, up the Amazon River, across Polynesia, and throughout the remote islands of the South Atlantic. He's been beaten up by monkeys in Gibraltar, lived in a Taoist temple, broken into a top secret naval base in Vladivostok, he's been tattooed in Tahiti, sunburned in Brazil, and had breakfast in the eye of a hurricane. Nevertheless, Antarctica and its history remain his true passion. He is a veteran of over 85 Antarctic and 20 Chilean expeditions and has been a staff member aboard M/S Nordnorge since she first sailed South in 2002. Ian has a genuine enthusiasm and affection for the Deep South that he strives to share with others. In between expeditions, Ian speaks, writes, sleeps in, and tries in vain to improve his Tai Chi.

Born in Norway, grew up among the Norwegian fjords in Jølster, moved to Bergen in 1991, where she studied law for 5 years. Karin joined the Hurtigruten fleet on the Norwegian coast in 1998, and has worked on various ships as Cruise Director. Since 2001 Karin worked as Chief Purser and she joined the "Voyage of Discovery" concept with M/V Nordnorge in Chile & Antarctica already the first season, in 2002-2003.

A Chilean Born Ornithologist, he received his PhD from Louisiana State University in Zoology/Ornithology. He was formerly Director of Research of the Western Foundation of Vertebrate Zoology in California, now currently living in central Chile. Besides being a researcher on neotropical birds, Manuel also leads bird-watching trips through Chile. Manuel publishes regularly in many ornithological journals. For the last 25 years he has been travelling extensively through many countries on ornithological research and explorations.

Originally from Montreal, Christopher now resides in Toronto, Canada. When outside of the Antarctic Circle, he works as a writer, photographer, and tour coordinator. Christopher graduated from the University of Toronto with an Honours BA in Anthropology and Archaeology and an MA in History. He worked as an archaeologist in Egypt for years before turning his sights to the Deep South. Putting down his towel and leaving one desert for another, working in the Antarctic. Christopher's life-long interest in the history of Antarctic discovery and exploration focuses on the Heroic Age.

Miguel's fascination for fishes has taken him to several places away from his native Mexico City: Alaska, where he lived for one year processing and cooking salmon; England, where he obtained a PhD from Bristol University researching parasites in trout hatcheries in the Isle of Man; the Sea of Cortez and the Gulf of Mexico, as on-board fish parasitologist on oceanographic expeditions; the Caribbean, Thailand, Australia and Newfoundland, where he has dived to get a closer look at marine life. He has travelled extensively with his wife Alejandra, both for pleasure and as field assistant studying the biology of seabirds. Miguel has lectured on general biology and parasitology in Mexico, the UK and Denmark, and is currently a researcher at the Instituto de Ecología in Xalapa, Mexico. He's the author of ca. 100 popular science articles in magazines and newspapers, and winner of the 2000 Novartis Prize for Journalism in the Life Sciences.

Alejandra was born and spent a happy urban childhood in Mexico City. During her undergraduate years, she fell under the spell of wild places while studying the Blue-Footed Boobies in Isla Isabel off the Mexican Pacific coast. Over the past decade, she has followed the birds to other remote islands and has spent several wet, cold and exhilarating field seasons in Labrador, Newfoundland and the Aleutians, and a couple of hot and sticky ones in the Costa Rican rainforest. After a year of gypsy life traveling through Asia, she moved to England where she obtained a PhD in Biological Anthropology from the University of London for her research on the reproductive ecology and evolution of her fellow humans.

Klaus was born in Germany but moved to Denmark and its "colonies" Greenland and the Faroer Islands in 1972. He studied Nordic history, language and literature in Reykjavik and translated some of the islandic sagas into German. He currently works as a free-lance journalist and has been producing TV documentaries and writing for newspapers and magazines about the polar regions. Klaus has also been working as a lecturer for polar history on board expedition cruise ships in the high Arctic and Antarctic for many years now.

Was born in Santiago de Chile where he went to school. In 1975 he left to Germany to study biology. After being in Hamburg for seven years, he wrote a thesis in applied botany studying the impact of the grazing of alpacas and lamas in the natural distribution of the native flora of the Chilean highland in Lauca National Park. With his masters degree, he returned to Chile, moved into the city of Arica and worked in the agricultural institute for almost seven years. There he began to study the highest lake of the world (Chungara) describing speciation processes in freshwater fishes belonging to the genus Orestias, the same ones of the Titicaca Lake in the Bolivian and Peruvian highland. After two years of field work, he returned to Germany to finish his PhD on this matter. Since 1990 he has been living in Santiago where he teaches ecology at two private universities and also works as consultant for environmental impact assessments. He also runs a small hatchery of trout in the lake district of southern Chile at Lake Panguipulli. Rudolf is happily married and has two daughters.

Growing up, Bob always wanted to be outdoors. He chose geology as it met that goal both academically and professionally. As an under-graduate, he started working on oceanographic expeditions, traversing the Pacific and Indian Oceans. While in the US Army he spent two summers in Antarctica and two in Greenland, studying engineering properties of snow and sea-ice. The field work for his PhD, was conducted along the coast of Alaska and offshore in the Northern Bering Sea. In 20 years with the US Geological Survey, the research ranged from Indonesia to Ivory Coast, and encompassed pollution studies, environmental impact surveys plus project management and the UN Law of the Sea. He circumnavigated after retiring. Consulting jobs in Indonesia and New Zealand followed and for the last several years Bob has been a consultant to the USGS on Law of the Sea issues.

Born near Cologne, Kristina studied geology in Stuttgart and Bern where she received a Ph.D. in the geology of the Berner Oberland. An interest in the protection of the environment brought her to the Department of Environment, Stuttgart, where she is responsible for the protection of groundwater as well as the remediation of contamination of the soil and groundwater. Fascinated by fauna, flora, and geological structures, she often spends her holidays far away home; Himalaya, Asia, Australia New Zealand, and South America for example. Apart from that, Kristina spends her leisure time reading, trekking in the Swiss Alps, and taking long bicycle tours.

Paola was born in a small city called San Carlos, Chile, also known as the "wine region" because of all the vineyards and the abundance of private production of special kinds of wines. She has a diploma in Environmental Management but her real passion lies under-water. After being certified as a Dive Master, she started to work in Egypt on the Red Sea, Antiparos in Greece, Playas del Coco in Costa Rica, and several other exotic locales. Nowadays, she is established in Stanley, Falkland Islands/Malvinas, working as a birding tour guide. Also, she works for Falklands Conservation doing marine-bird surveys around the Islands. Paola is also involved in some cetacean projects with orcas and Peale's and Commerson's dolphins, collecting data through photo identification and behavior. Fisheries is a big industry in the Falklands, so Paola is helping to translate some leaflets into Spanish for the fishermen so as to help them decrease the mortality of marine birds caught on baited lines.

Axel Krack was born in 1960 in Cuxhaven, a small city on the Elbe River in Northern Germany. He was therefore already connected to the sea and nature as child. In 1989, after his Masters in biology, he was received at the German Polar Research Institute. Marine fungi and their position in the sub-sea-ice was the focus of his research. He commuted constantly between Antarctica and the Arctic on R/V Polarstern in a joint venture with the pharmaceuticals industry and the Alfred Wegener Institute. In 1993, Axel moved to the newly founded Max-Planck Institute for marine microbiology in Bremen. There he could lend his experience to the development of deep-sea robots and new sampling methods. Also in 1993, he began lecturing on expedition cruises to Antarctica and the Arctic. He extended his field work to Chile between 1994 and 1997 and in 1999 took and extended expedition around Svalbard on R/V Polarstern in conjunction with a stay at Koldewey Scientific Station.

Petra has a truly international background; she holds a Swiss passport, was born in Germany, and grew up in Brazil. As a little girl she frequently visited her grandparents who lived far away from civilization in the Sierra de Córdoba in Argentina. It was here that Petra started to develop a passion for wildlife and remote places. She studied zoology and soon found that she was especially interested in marine mammals. Her M.A. thesis was carried out in a natural reserve in Patagonia where she studied the activity and behaviour of southern sea lions. Petra also participated in research projects on Minke whales in the Hebrides, on dolphins in Italy, and sperm whales in Norway. Last year, she worked for the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society at its Wildlife Centre in Scotland. Her responsibilities were mainly focussed on environmental education. In her free time Petra likes sailing, tennis, and photography. She also loves to meet new people from all over the world.

Born in Switzerland, Francis moved to Mexico with his family at the age of ten. There he discovered his love and passion for the oceans and eventually moved to Victoria, Canada to finish his undergraduate degree in Biology. After several years of chasing sharks in the Bahamas, whales on Georges Bank, seabirds in the North Sea, or working as a taxi driver, bar keeper, or chimney installer he moved his family to Galapagos, where he lived and worked as a dive instructor, guide and occasional translator on tourist boats. He then returned to Canada where he obtained his Ph.D. in marine ecology for his work on chronic oil pollution and its impacts on seabird populations. After a two-year post-doc at the University of Washington, he moved to Alaska. Francis currently works as the Program Manager for the North Pacific Research Board where he designs and implements marine ecosystem and climate change related research studies in the North Pacific, Bering Sea and the Arctic Ocean.

After her graduation from a German tourism academy, Petra Zeitz has been working as a guide and tour director for international travel groups both at sea and on land. She has visited over 50 different countries and has already spent previous seasons as a guide on board the Hurtigruten vessels in Antarctica. Petra was born in Cologne/Germany, but has been living in Finland since 2001. Prior to her career in tourism, she was working as Press Manager in a major music company.

Born and raised in southern California, Jim Garlinghouse has always had a burning desire to experience the mountains and glaciers of the Polar Regions. He is a mountain climber with many ascents to his credit, including the tallest peaks in North and South America, Aconcagua and Denali. Jim has made numerous voyages north and south since 1994 in the Antarctic and Arctic regions, including forays to Greenland, Arctic Canada, the Falklands, South Sandwich and South Georgia Islands. With a degree in history, Jim enjoys sharing his knowledge and passion for these special places. His photographs have appeared in such varied publications as Outside, Alaska, Polar Priorities and a reprint edition of Dr Frederick Cook's classic travel account "Through the first Antarctic night". He currently resides in San Diego, California.

Anja studied Tourism Management in Germany and went to Greenland for the first time in 2000. Here she worked in Ilulissat but lived in a small village with 40 inhabitants and 200 dogs. Since then she has been employed as an Expedition Leader in the High Arctic and joined our Expedition Team four years ago. Anja spent the past year working as a Product Coordinator for Norway, but missed the icebergs, scenery and the fresh breeze too much so she is back on board. Privately, she loves travelling and has lived in Athens, San Francisco, and London in the past 5 years alone.

German geologist, born and raised in Berlin, where he obtained both a Master degree in Administration Management and - later on - in Geology. Before joining Hurtigruten, he has gained a long experience as a field trip guide in many European countries, Northern America and Southern Africa. In his opinion, geology and the complex "System Earth" is a most intriguing and important subject. So his particular aim is to convey this fascination of geology to a wider public. For this reason he is also president of the German Association for the Active Promotion of Geology (GeoLogica).

Born in Norway in 1944. Grew up in Grimstad in the suthern part of Norway where the family lived on from 1939. Trained in London and Glasgow in TV production and have worked as an Executive TV producer /director in Norwegian Television (NRK) for almost forty years making close to a 1000 TV shows - mostly for children and young people.

Being the son of Tryggve Gran, 1889 - 1980 (Skiing expert on the R.F. Scott team 1910-13) Being told a lot of stories from his exciting life in my younger days I occasionally do give lecturers on the subject of my father who later - upon arrival back from three years in the Antarctic with the Scott expedition took up flying and became the first man ever to fly across the North Sea from Scotland to Norway in 1914. - (Later Squdron commander in th RFC in England 1915 - 1918)

Not being an "historian" but being closer to these chapters of the history than most people - having a personal relation to many of the subjects that repeatingly turns up again and again. I may have a different perspective than most people learning about these topics through the history books.

Jean-Louis is French. For the last ten years he has been in the Arctic and Antarctic as a naturalist on board cruise ships. He is a field guide and gives lectures on topics like the Arctic/Antarctic regions, ice and glaciers, marine mammals, sea birds, global warming. When not on board, he shares his time between France where he is a consultant for sustainable development, and his second home in NW British Columbia, where he is an enthusiastic wildlife photographer. Jean-Louis fell in love with the Polar Regions years ago and expedition cruises around Spitsbergen, North East and Western Greenland, Iceland, Patagonia, Cape Horn and the Antarctic Peninsula are logged in his seaman's book. He speaks French, German and English.