(Today’s Chronicle can be found here.)
Up at 7:30 am, breakfast at La Terrazza and then back to the room to change and get ready.
No messing around today – this is our last shot at Salisbury Plain, and we desperately want to reach the colony of king penguins in the hopes of finally spotting the elusive woolly penguin. (Not really a unique bird – just a king penguin chick, but it appears so different from the adult king that some explorers once thought they were entirely seperate species.)
We were first out the gate in the Falklands, which means that we’ve been moved to the back of the queue for South Georgia. It also means we should be closer to the front for Tristan d’Cunha or thereabouts, but that doesn’t make the waiting any easier.
Finally, 9:30 am rolls around and our number is called. Penguin time!
It’s as spectacular and chaotic as we remember it but we have much more room to roam this time around. I’m not kidding when I say chaotic – penguins are actively attempting to climb the expedition staff as we land on Salisbury Plain.
We follow the flags back towards the colony, doing our utmost not to get distracted by the majestic king penguins and the playful – and mischievious – fur seals.
And we do it – we reach the colony:
Initially we find it difficult to get a clear view of the chicks, but then we round the corner and find the creche:
We’re not the only ones who have found it. Skuas circle the colony, looking for unguarded eggs and vulnerable chicks:
Everything in the colony happens all at once. Even while skuas square off over the penguin’s young, adults return with their bellies full of fish:
I struggle to find a photo that captures the scope of this colony:
It’s said that there are more than 100,000 breeding pairs of king penguins at this colony alone.
Bogdan comes over and mentions that he’s spotted some penguin parents tending their eggs. And if I wait patiently, I can capture the moment the penguin checks on the egg.
It works:
I’m not going to top this moment, so I end my visit to the colony on a high note and head back to the beach to take in the stunning scenery and the overwhelming array of life.
And to photograph the elusive red-jacketed penguins:
But mostly the penguins and fur seals:
The landscape is absolutely stunning:
But the wildlife continually vies for our attention:
The expedition team fights for the landings to go as smoothly as possible. The surf is high so they rotate the zodiacs so they point into the waves which minimizes how much splash goes into the zodiac:
We hop back into the zodiac for a brief cruise, but the king penguins follow us:
It’s a fantastic outing. We are so glad we came back for a second visit.
Back to the Wind, and off to trivia! We took first place again, but I can’t remember any of the questions. Too much going on right now!
We then head to the Restaurant for lunch. My daughter had chicken nuggets from the children’s menu:
While my wife and I opt to split a pepperoni pizza:
We’re meant to head to Prince Olav Harbour, but the swells are too high. Instead we head to Possession Bay! This is tremendously exciting to us, since this is where Captain Cook first claimed the island in 1775.
The zodiac groups are called rapidly – we’ll be doing a dual zodiac cruise and landing, which makes the most of the Wind’s expedition team and zodiacs:
Expedition guide Jess awaits her passengers in the mist
A southern giant petrel:
You can tell apart Northern and Southern petrels by looking at the tip of their beak. Northern petrels have pink-ish tips and Southern have green. The ornithologists on the expedition team suggest thinking of traffic lights to remember which is which (red light on top is Northern, green light on the bottom is Southern).
There’s a huge array of life, including fur seals, elephant seals, and king penguins:
The ‘blondie’ fur seals are not albino. Instead they have leucism which is a partial loss of pigmentation. It seems to affect 1 in 1,000 fur seals although BBC has a report that it’s closer to 5 in 1,000.
We then spot something truly remarkable – a brawl between two elephant seals:
Then it’s our turn to land at Possession Bay:
Exciting!
And adorable:
There’s another significant king penguin colony here:
But what’s truly remarkable is the Jurassic Park-style scenery:
We also encounter a fur seal with clouded eyes.
One of the expedition guides thinks this may be an unexpected consequence of his recovery from avian flu. Apparently this happened with gannets in the Northern hemisphere but it has yet to be confirmed as a side-effect in seals. This fur seal did seem to be doing just fine, despite its condition. (And hopefully the impact of avian flu next year will be greatly reduced due to existing antibodies.)
We also spotted a handful of South Georgian gentoos, which may potentially be considered its own species:
There are also a handful of giant petrels nesting here, and the expedition guides urge us to give them a wide berth:
Which is understandable, as they look like murder monsters.
Soon it’s time to say our goodbyes to the wildlife of Possession Bay – adorable and otherwise – and return to the ship.
Is he scratching or waving goodbye? I’ll let the reader decide
Back to the room to change for dinner, and then off for the evening briefing and recap.
The plan for tomorrow is to depart for Grytviken at around 9:30 am, and then head to Jason Harbour for a dual landing and zodiac cruise that afternoon.
Though the prospect of a landing is quite tempting – we only did a cruise before, likely due to the numbers aboard our previous leg – I sign up for kayaking as I would like to go at some point during our time in South Georgia, and the weather often fails to cooperate.
Then into the recaps. George does a demonstration of king penguin vocalizations using my son and daughter, while Malcolm discussed the role and habits of giant petrels (not photographed).
Yvonne gives us an overview of the cook of the Endurance – Charles Green – and the terrible conditions under which he had to work:
Jonathan then offers us some backround regarding Sir Ernest Shackleton and how he came to be buried at Stromness:
And then we’re off for dinner at La Terrazza. The kids both order the steak, while my wife has the ravioli:
And I have the shrimp in cognac sauce:
My son and I both stick around for the chocolate cake with vanilla ice cream, and then we are all promptly off to bed in the vain hope of being rested tomorrow.