Our last shore excursion was probably our best and made me wonder why we didn't do it first.. Apparently the landing at Baily Head on Deception Isle is very difficult and usually does not allow visitors to come ashore. I made the mistake of not taking any iPhone pics or the ones I took were not any good, but basically Baily Head was a small beach landing in the shadow of a large cliff which opens up into a valley or amphitheater full of penguins, mostly Chinstrap.
Most of the Chinstraps had already successfully bred and left the island but there still were thousands and they reached some staggering heights. You might wonder why they would hike all the way up to the ridge lines but imagine this scene with 20x more penguins and you will understand the need to find new real estate.
Such a beautiful place and the penguins dotting all the hillsides just augmented the effect.
Here is a short video to give you some idea of the scale of the place.
And one video just because penguins can't be truly appreciated until you see them walk. Apparently the way penguins walk is more efficient than most bipedal animals because they conserve energy by using a pivoting walk instead of having to lift legs up high and step forward. That explains how they can walk so far despite looking so goofy while doing it. It looks exhausting to walk like that, but I think they are onto something. I am going to start waddling and see if I can store more energy as I get older.
Lindblad is onto something with the bright orange suits, it complements pictures nicely as if to say, these are real explorers even though most of these people were just sipping cocktails 20 minutes prior.
Silly me with my blue jacket. I stuck out like a sore thumb.
I love how the Chinstraps would be waddling purposefully and then just stop and take a nap.
After the walk at Baily Head amphitheater we hooked around the head and entered the caldera of the volcano which had opened up and created what is called Deception Island. It is deceptive because from the outside it appears to be a large island, but if you enter the narrow entrance on the south side, it opens up into a large bay which is actually the caldera of an active volcano that has erupted several times over the past couple hundred years.
Picture thanks to Wikipedia.
One side of the entrance.
Inside the bay we found another ship for the first time the whole trip. Lindblad does a good job of coordinating with other tour companies to give the impression that you are alone in the vast southern ocean but in reality there are a ton of tour operators circulating the same spots.
One of the cliffs on the way out was stained red presumably from Iron Ore.
I later found out by trolling eBird that someone had Antarctic Petrels flying in this area just one day before us! So close but yet so far!
We said goodbye to Antarctica the best way we knew how, with cocktails and an excellent meal.
The next day was spent crossing the infamous Drake, but again it was a very tame version of what it can be. I think the tour leader planned it that way. There were monster waves in the days prior that we didn't see because we stayed in sheltered fjords.
White-chinned Petrel
When this bird flew up close we saw that it was lacking the ear wax spot of a Wandering and appeared to have a nicer line delineating the bill so we knew we had one of our Royals.
When it banked and showed its dorsal surface we eliminated Northern Royal since they have solid black wings in all plumages. The Southern can have solid black wings when young so this is an older bird.
Later on I saw an Albatross without Matt which at the time thought was a Northern Royal based on the solid black wings but now that I study the pics, I think its a young Southern. So it turns out we both missed Northern.
At the time I ticked this as Northern Royal based on the dark leading edges to the wings and the solid black. But now I see that there are small white patches in the center of the wings which would make this a young Southern Royal. Young Wandering Albatrosses can also have black wings but they would also have a black tipped tail.
We got some better looks at Soft-plumaged Petrels mid Drake. Very similar to Fea's.
Great Shearwaters also made some appearances.
A few Gray-headed Albatrosses said their farewells.
Finally on the morning of the 27th we sighted land! Cape Horn! We ended up having to kill time for 3-4 hours while we waited for a pilot to be available to take us into the Beagle Channel. Unfortunately the captain or whoever was steering decided to take us to a spot devoid of sea life, but on the way there we did see lots of birds and mammals at the Cape itself.
Black-browed Albatross were everywhere!
Dark morph of the Southern Giant Petrel
We went by some massive flocks of Sooty Shearwaters which had a few Greats peppered in.
As we rounded the horn, the wind died out and it made for some good photo ops.
Finally as we entered the channel, the Magellanic Penguins started to appear.
I managed to catch a seal in mid jump!
Magellanic
Hard to tell size from this pic but this was a very small whale, I think Minke.
Dusky Dolphin! New mammal species for me.
Some scenery pics from where we picked up the pilot.
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