Covered with ice four kilometers deep.

Temperatures can drop to minus 93 degrees Celcius.

75 percent of our planet's fresh water is locked up in its ice sheet?

...and yet it's classified as the largest desert on Earth.

This could be the only place in the world

where diverse countries have rallied together in the name of peace

and science — to protect the environment.

The part about the ice and temperatures... sure.

But the part about peace and the environment - it's hard to believe.

Not just because I'm concerned about nature.

But also because I lived in Syria in 2009.

So, I don't have much faith left in peace...

...or in the international community.

But I'd love to be proven wrong.

We've come to Punta Arenas,

where the polar research vessel Hespérides is picking up

a group of Spanish scientists to take them to Antarctica.

I'm already nervous.

You'll get used to it. It's no big deal.

It's amazing.

I've even got a window.

Bottom bunk? Last night was rough.

We went to bed early, but I had a hard time falling asleep.

I must have slept just four hours because I was so nervous about the trip.

I embarked on this journey to explore the myths of Antarctica.

After one day at sea, we reach the end of the world.

At the southernmost tip of Argentina,

Tierra del Fuego is still a thousand kilometers

from the continent of Antarctica. This is the Drake Passage.

Eddies and wind churn freely here,

whipping up violent seas in one of the Earth's roughest waterways.

The worst storm to date hit us this year.

It was our second trip back from Antarctica,

we were about 18 hours from South America

when a severe weather system hit us from the starboard.

We faced 7-meter-high waves and winds of up to 50 knots.

Every time the crew sails into the Drake Passage,

they have their mobile phones camera-ready.

Here comes a monster wave!

Could be taller!

These are the outlines of Cape Horn, a notorious maritime graveyard

that harbors the sunken wrecks of hundreds of ships.

Even today the Drake Passage commands respect:

everyone battens down the hatches.

It wasn't so dramatic on our trip, though.

Luckily, technology has improved a lot, and today, before setting sail,

we can check the weather forecast to find the best window

for crossing the Drake Passage.

The adventure may not be as wild as it once was.

But it's still beautiful.

Antarctica has been subject to territorial disputes for centuries.

The passage was first sailed by Spaniard Francisco de Hoces in 1525.

Fifty years later, it was discovered by the English explorer Sir Francis Drake

- and bears his name to this day.

In the early 20th century,

seven countries laid territorial claims to parts of Antarctica.

The overlapping claims of the United Kingdom,

Argentina and Chile caused tensions that erupted into armed conflict

between Britain and Argentina in 1952. As the Cold War set in,

the last thing the world needed was a new geopolitical flashpoint.

It was that realization that gave rise to the Antarctic Treaty.

Many people including scientists were looking for ways to cooperate

and there was the International Geophysical Year in 1957-1958

and that worked out so well that there was this idea

that there could be cooperation in Antarctica.

They felt that there was a way,

and it's shown in the article 4 of the Treaty,

to set aside the claims and to say that there would be a demilitarization.

But it's also, as?you may know, one of the first arms control treaties,

so it was focused on keeping the peace in that respect as well.

But none of that was the result of good will alone:

the extreme climate made it difficult to exploit the region economically,

and the US and Soviet Union staked their territorial claims

quite late in the game.

Four days after leaving Punta Arenas, the Hespérides reaches Antarctica.

Everyone is excited. We got up at five in the morning

to catch our first glimpse of the coastline.

What we hadn't expected was the fog.

We are two and a half miles away, and you can't see anything.

A few hours later, the fog lifts, and at last we can see Antarctica.

The Hespérides' first stop is King George Island.

The Spanish team is delivering supplies to the Uruguayan station Artigas.

Antarctic cooperation is running smoothly.

The Antarctic Treaty is very effective.

Under its terms, this location is devoted solely to science.

It has played a key role in getting all countries

to set aside their other interests, at least publicly,

and it's been that way for a very long time.

Unfortunately, the same is not true in other parts of the world,

where usually economic interests take precedence over scientific cooperation.

Could this model be exported beyond Antarctica?

That's a good question. It's something many on the planet would support.

Because King George Island offers the easiest access to Antarctica,

it has the greatest concentration of stations on the entire continent.

There are facilities here belonging to Uruguay, Russia, Chile, Argentina,

Brazil, China, Poland, Peru, Ecuador, the Czech Republic,

South Korea and Bulgaria.

The Antarctic Treaty regulates how many new stations can open

so that it doesn't get too crowded.

It's always better to coexist peacefully with your neighbors

and get along. The first thing we did was to establish good relations

with all our neighbors. Cooperation is vital in Antarctica.

When there are tensions between the US and Russia,

does it affect the cooperation in Antarctica?

I wouldn't say there is no effect.

But, by and large the cooperation has continued.

It doesn't mean that those tensions aren't in some respects

in the background somewhere, But at least in the terms of the Antarctic

programs and the Arctic programs and the work of the scientists together

by and large that continues.

In 2004, Russia imported wood from Siberian pines,

its national tree, to construct a small Orthodox church here in Antarctica.

Critics say it's a sly way to stake a territorial claim.

The Chilean station has its own church too.

It also has a school for the children of soldiers

stationed on the base year-round.

It is the closest thing you'll find to a settlement in Antarctica.

In the 1970s, Argentina's military dictatorship

sent pregnant women to give birth in Antarctica,

to underscore its territorial claims.

Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet copied the tactic.

But it was widely viewed as provocative,

and after the birth of eight Argentinians and three Chileans,

both countries ended the policy.

Today, more subtle strategies are used to cement territorial claims,

as seen on Chilean television.

The Easter Island will be overcast with partially cloudy skies,

whereas Chilean Antarctica... whereas Chilean Antarctica will be mostly sunny.

What do Chileans think about their country's claims to Antarctica?

To be honest, there isn't much public debate on the topic.

When I was little, people did talk about it a bit.

But later on, the political discourse subsided.

Today people primarily associate it with environmental protection.

That's the trend I've observed, especially among young people.

Chileans my age hardly discuss the issue. For us it's simple:

we see Antarctica as a place where many nations come together.

There's no reason why we should be more entitled to it than anyone else.

Do you think we can save Antarctica

if we've failed to do the same in other places?

I think it's exactly because we've made so many mistakes in other places

that we have a shot at saving Antarctica.

Spain has two stations in Antarctica.

Its National Research Center operates the Juan Carlos I Station

on Livingston Island. It was built in the late 1980s

and remodeled in 2008 into a modern facility

that looks a bit like a space station.

This station is used in the summer.

It doesn't need to withstand the harsh conditions

you'd expect to encounter in Antarctica.

Today, there is hardly any wind,

but two days ago we had gusts of nearly 40 knots, or 80 kilometers an hour,

which drives the wind chill factor down to minus 15 or 20 degrees Celcius.

Jerónimo López and his team study the continent's geology,

which they say is of essential importance to the rest of the planet.

Antarctica affects the whole world's climate, doesn't it?

It is the planet's cold factory.

It's really cold in the Arctic, too, but not to the same extent.

There's also a lot more ice in Antarctica than in the Arctic.

Antarctic deep seawater reaches as far as the Iberian Peninsula

and continues to circulate around the northern hemisphere.

These waters sometimes flow all the way up to the Arctic,

where they cool back down again.

The motor driving this circulation is Antarctica.

One of the most important projects at the Juan Carlos I Station

is its study of the Hurd and Johnson glaciers.

In recent years

we've evaluated the state of the mass balance of the Antarctic Ice Sheet.

We found that the gains of ice have been greater

than the losses of its thinning glaciers.

But next year's data will probably indicate the exact opposite.