AddictedToTravel.com

Hi Zar

That's a great question!

One-day trips from Australia are becoming increasingly popular from Adelaide, Sydney and Melbourne.

The flights take about 12 hours on board Boeing 747s and include 3-4 hours over Antarctica itself, offering incredible views into the distance. Stopping for lunch is unlikely – for both environmental and safety reasons – but the food and drink served on board is said to be excellent.

The pilots have some 19 different approved routes set up before departure, so they can choose the direction with the best conditions and the trip takes you low enough to experience incredible views, but high enough to avoid the peaks of the Antarctic mountains!

Seating is divided into different classes, depending on location and view. Passengers are given two boarding cards on departure and half way through the flight are asked to swap seats. Only the top spenders are guaranteed the best seats for the whole flight, but that said, during the Antarctic over-flight people tend to move about a lot anyway so most get a decent overview. The pilots also fly in sweeping figure-of-8 movements over significant places of interest, people on either side of the aircraft should get to see any significant sights.

It is not just the vistas outside the windows that make the experience, however. On board the flight, Antarctic experts (who have lived on scientific research bases) will give talks on the environment, history, wildlife and be on hand to answer questions. Video screenings and live radio link-ups with the scientists in the research bases show what it is like to live on Antarctica and a camera mounted in the cockpit give a pilot's eye view of vast plateaux, awesome mountain ranges and gobsmacking expanses of permanent ice.

I am in touch with a local operator who is offering such a trip departing on 31 December 2008 - let me know if you are interested in finding out more.

What a way to spend the New Year!