We finally had a period of good weather and spent three days on Hotine Glacier above Lemaire Channel to climb Mt Matin. At 2450m, Mt Matin is the highest mountain ofthe Antarctic Peninsulanorth of 69°S (apart from Mt Français on Anvers Island and Mt Parry on Brabant Island). Its name relates to the Suisse Romande newspaper Le Matin which was one of the main sponsors of Jean-Baptiste Charcot's Antarctica expedition in 1903-05.

The landing spot inside Lemaire Channel was surprisingly free of ice, but there were a few scary crevasses at the beginning of the glacier. We pulled our pulkas 11km up the glacier and installed the base camp at 800m altitude. The next morning we climbed the SW ridge of Mt Matin, first with crampons then skis, and reached the summit after 8 hrs. This was only its third ascent ever. The view from the top was incredible (see the picture with the mountains of Anvers Island and Paradise Harbor in the background). The skiing back down was pure adrenaline.

The next day we walked up the south summit of Mt Cloos, before heading back to our anchorage situated in the middle of an Adelie penguin colony at Petermann Island.