| Home | Photography | Diary | Travels | Treks |

 
PreviousNext

Chinstrap penguin colony

Home > Diaries > 2019 > 789
   
   
   
   

 

About this Page

Date:

 

Location:

Country:

 

Latitude:

Longitude:

Altitude:

12 March 2019

 

Wilhelmia Bay

Antarctica

 

64°16'S
61°37'W

Sea level

 

Google Maps Link

 

   

WELL it's early afternoon and we've just made it here to Palaver Point. This is going to be our final landing on the Antarctic Peninsula. We're going to head on shore to look at some chinstrap penguins. We've seen some Adelie penguins and gentoo penguins along the coast as we have headed north. We're now near the top of the Antarctic Peninsula and have a whole different variety just out here. This is another stunning area. The mountains aren't as dramatic as they have been on other parts of the peninsula because we are nearly at the northern point of it.

This is our last landing here before we head off tomorrow to the South Shetland Islands on our way back towards South America. So we're definitely making some good progress along the coast here. I'll see you again once we've landed on the point there and hopefully we'll see some good penguins.

We've landed now and I'm up on the hill. These are chinstrap penguins and they are very noisy as you can hear. This is the third penguin species and they said at the start of the expedition if we are lucky we'll get to see three different species and we have, so we've been very fortunate not only with the weather but with the wildlife. They are very noisy, a lot more so than the other varieties. They are a bit further away so it is a bit more challenging getting some good shots, but I'm here. I'll have to get the old camera out.

We're now back from the landing where we saw our third species of penguin. We went out into the bay a bit and got some very close encounters with some humpback whales. Some very strong wind has come through and you can probably see the waves here so it was very rough getting back here. Fortunately we are back on board and we're finally leaving the Antarctic Peninsula and heading towards the South Shetland Islands which we hope to reach sometime tomorrow.

This was our last landing on the Antarctic Peninsula, and now we're heading north. Of course the South Shetland Islands are still part of Antarctica but they are offshore from the mainland.

It's been amazing coming here and exploring different parts of the Antarctic Peninsula. It is extremely cold, but apparently a little bit warmer than it was further south. The water here is about zero degrees whereas further south it was about minus one or minus two. Obviously the sea temperature will continue heating up as we continue heading north.

Anyway I need to head inside as we're having a big party celebrating our expedition on the Antarctic mainland.

We left a little over an hour ago and the land is already quite some distance behind us. We're now celebrating our experience of exploring the Antarctic mainland.

OK the sun has finally set in behind some offshore islands here. The mountains of the Antarctic Peninsula are a long way away already. Now we're back on the Drake Passage (actually in the Bransfield Strait) heading up to the South Shetland Islands. If you come over to the other side here, this is the last of the Antarctic Peninsula. Where we were was under the mountain pointing over there and only just visible now. Now we're heading along the Drake Passage, well part of it anyway. The sun has all but set on the highest peaks of the peninsula. I'll just quickly come back to the other side with one more thing to show you before I close off for the night.

You can see the sun has set over there. If we can across and look just above that little cloud we can see the moon setting at a very low angle. Coming from the subtropics it's very unusual to see this but here at almost the bottom of the planet the moon is setting at an extremely low angle and sun has set at a low angle as well. So it's quite a strange phenomenon.

The crescent, which will be hard to see on this video, the crescent is almost exactly vertical. In Brisbane, we have the moon setting almost exactly horizontal at certain times, so this is quite an unusual sight.

So I'm going to do a bit more photography as it is quite a long dusk here so I'm going to make the most of it. So it's over and out from the Antarctic Peninsula.

 
PreviousNext
 
 

| Home | Photography | Diary | Travels | Treks |

 
© 2001-2020 walkaboutjeff.com - Copyright - Disclaimer - Who is Walkabout Jeff?