I wasn’t sure what to expect of a cruise to Antarctica, but admit to packing a lot of books. I’d never considered becoming a “cruise person” – the idea of hanging about on a boat always seemed faintly claustrophobic. And while curious to see one of the last frontiers, I secretly wondered whether 12 days of looking at ice might get a little, well… boring?

Colour me five hundred crystalline shades of wrong. As soon as the first icebergs appeared on the horizon, the cynicism began cracking off me in large frozen chunks. There are no words for the scale of the vistas down here, nor for the sense of awe and wonder they draw forth. The sheer beauty breaks you open.