Page 14 - Seniorstoday January 2023 Issue
P. 14
Gold & Ocean Harbour King Penguin colony with their chicks
towards a very small 5 ft seal – obviously home to King Penguins, Skuas and seals.
a juvenile, threw a flipper around it, and An estimated 1 1/2 million penguins and
proceed to copulate. This went on for their little brown chicks. An eye-popping
about 20 minutes. With a couple of 100 visual. New-borns to a few weeks old,
seals lying on the beach, albatross and cloaked in fuzzy brown fur. An absolutely
terns swooping around, and the seals delightful visual. The squawking volumes
lolling in the water occasionally raising of that entire colony had to be heard to be
their heads and snorting, releasing a fine believed. A superb morning!!
but huge spray, the whole scene was truly
fascinating.
Late afternoon we landed at Ocean
Harbour, a tiny sheltered bay surrounded
by spectacular rock mountains. The sandy
beach was home to the usual seals and
highly sensitive nesting Giant Petrels. This
island had a whaling station until 1920
and houses plenty of relics including an
old steam locomotive which was used to A molting chick
transport coal and other goods from the Early afternoon the tannoy boomed out
jetty to the whaling station. Arctic Terns calling for an emergency meeting in the
and South Georgia Pintails ran around the Lecture room on Deck 4. Captain Ernesto
green areas like little rabbits. announced the weather would be changing
FUN FACT: On board romances rapidly. So to ensure our safe passage
blossomed. Set in gossip mills churning. we would depart and change course
immediately. Not only was the frozen
Day 10 continent known for its amazing wildlife
Thursday, 3 November 2022 but also for its severe and chameleon-like
Wind – WNW 3, Sea – slightly choppy weather.
ST. ANDREWS BAY and AT SEA
St. Andrews Bay greeted us with finger Day 11
numbing cold, the wind whipping in Friday, 4 November 2022
our faces. The bay was a huge C shaped Wind – NW force 8, Sea – Rough
one with 3 giant glaciers tumbling down With South Georgia slowly receding in
from the craggy peaks to a vast plain, the distance, we awoke to the lurching and
14
