Deception Island, The South Shetlands
A good day at Baily Head, on the exposed outer coast of Deception Island, involves an adventurous Zodiac landing, riding atop an incoming wave, followed by a scramble up a steep beach of black volcanic cinders, hoping to make it before the next wave arrives. On a bad day we gaze out forlornly and pass it by. Today was a good day at Baily Head. We make the effort because Baily Head supports a spectacular colony of some 60,000 pairs of chinstrap penguins. As if awaiting our arrival, hundreds of penguins milled on the beach. On each surging wave some of them entered the sea to feed, while others returned to the colony with their penguin bellies full. We followed the penguin highway (returners on the right; departers on the left), which led us to a large amphitheater filled with nesting birds, each attending one or two chicks. A cacophony of sound rose each time a returning bird pointed its bill skyward to greet its mate in the “ecstatic display”, and their neighbors joined in the penguin chorus. A quick exchange at the nest, and the formerly attending bird departed for its turn at gathering food for the hungry, growing young.
We passed through the narrow opening of “Neptune’s Bellows” to enter the flooded caldera of this quiescent (but not extinct) volcano. The entrance to this fine natural harbor was discovered by sealers in 1820. The volcano erupted in 1842 and again in 1967-68-70, causing the evacuation of British and Chilean research bases. We continued through Port Foster to Pendulum Cove for a bit of frivolity. Steam rising through the cinders along the shoreline gives evidence of geothermal heat warming the water, and here we participated in the South Polar Plunge … at least, some of us did while the others cheered on the dippers and documented the occasion. We returned to Whalers’ Bay, where many thousands of southern whales – humpbacks, fins, and blues – were reduced to oil in the first third of the 20th century. Piles of whalebones, unused barrel staves and waterboats, now half-buried in cinders, mark the location of shore-based whaling camps. In 1911 a permanent station replaced the individual whaling camps. The station was used until 1932 when a glut of oil from the new “floating factories” operating in the Ross Sea caused a plunge in the price of whale oil. In 1944 the whaling station became support base for scientists of the British Antarctic Survey; it was abandoned following the eruption of 1968. Now, the remains of the station – tanks, boilers for rendering oil from the carcasses, and dwellings for the whalers and scientists – fall into disrepair. Humpback whales have returned in numbers in the waters around the Antarctic Peninsula, but the great fin and blue whales have never recovered from the decimation of their populations, their bleached bones a stark reminder of their former abundance.
A good day at Baily Head, on the exposed outer coast of Deception Island, involves an adventurous Zodiac landing, riding atop an incoming wave, followed by a scramble up a steep beach of black volcanic cinders, hoping to make it before the next wave arrives. On a bad day we gaze out forlornly and pass it by. Today was a good day at Baily Head. We make the effort because Baily Head supports a spectacular colony of some 60,000 pairs of chinstrap penguins. As if awaiting our arrival, hundreds of penguins milled on the beach. On each surging wave some of them entered the sea to feed, while others returned to the colony with their penguin bellies full. We followed the penguin highway (returners on the right; departers on the left), which led us to a large amphitheater filled with nesting birds, each attending one or two chicks. A cacophony of sound rose each time a returning bird pointed its bill skyward to greet its mate in the “ecstatic display”, and their neighbors joined in the penguin chorus. A quick exchange at the nest, and the formerly attending bird departed for its turn at gathering food for the hungry, growing young.
We passed through the narrow opening of “Neptune’s Bellows” to enter the flooded caldera of this quiescent (but not extinct) volcano. The entrance to this fine natural harbor was discovered by sealers in 1820. The volcano erupted in 1842 and again in 1967-68-70, causing the evacuation of British and Chilean research bases. We continued through Port Foster to Pendulum Cove for a bit of frivolity. Steam rising through the cinders along the shoreline gives evidence of geothermal heat warming the water, and here we participated in the South Polar Plunge … at least, some of us did while the others cheered on the dippers and documented the occasion. We returned to Whalers’ Bay, where many thousands of southern whales – humpbacks, fins, and blues – were reduced to oil in the first third of the 20th century. Piles of whalebones, unused barrel staves and waterboats, now half-buried in cinders, mark the location of shore-based whaling camps. In 1911 a permanent station replaced the individual whaling camps. The station was used until 1932 when a glut of oil from the new “floating factories” operating in the Ross Sea caused a plunge in the price of whale oil. In 1944 the whaling station became support base for scientists of the British Antarctic Survey; it was abandoned following the eruption of 1968. Now, the remains of the station – tanks, boilers for rendering oil from the carcasses, and dwellings for the whalers and scientists – fall into disrepair. Humpback whales have returned in numbers in the waters around the Antarctic Peninsula, but the great fin and blue whales have never recovered from the decimation of their populations, their bleached bones a stark reminder of their former abundance.
