Hercules and St. Andrews Bays, South Georgia
Early morning light found the National Geographic Explorer dropping anchor in the cliff-encircled basin of Hercules Bay. Like the bay’s namesake Norwegian whaling vessel that had sought shelter from foul weather in the early 1900’s, we were in calm waters, surrounded by waterfalls and wildlife, and simply aching to explore by Zodiac.
At the head of the bay melt waterfalls came cascading into the sea, with a few elephant seals and gentoo penguins to lend scale and perspective. On nearby cliff faces macaroni’s plied penguin highways cut into the rock by tiny feet and nails coming to and from the colony in the tussock grass above. Excited photographers tried to capture the millisecond of a macaroni penguin leap from rock ledge to ledge. Light-mantled sooty albatross pairs wheeled in the skies above us, their aerial courtship displays dazzling one and all.
The morning slipped away in its serenity, and a sense of calm was pervasive on board the ship. The chatter in the dining room at lunch was light and easy. We thought that we would be in for a similar experience at our afternoon landing at St. Andrews Bay, but South Georgia had a trick or two in store for us!
Sending a scout boat out to assess the situation, the decision was made that the landing at St. Andrews Bay was indeed acceptable. The winds had picked up a little from the morning, but seemed to actually be moderating somewhat as the afternoon went on. Safely ashore we were dazzled by the sunlight hitting the ice-covered mountains all around us. King penguins by the tens of thousands were coming and going from the beach to the colony above. This is the largest king penguin colony on all of South Georgia and the sight, sound, and yes, even the smell, were simply overwhelming.
It is at this point in the narrative that I should inform you, the reader, about a very specific type of wind: the katabatic wind. The word katabatic comes from the Greek katabatikos, meaning, “going downhill”. It is most often associated with cold air masses gathering over glaciers or ice fields, then “spilling” down the face of that glacier, gathering speed as it falls. Katabatic winds can (and do) form quickly and can be very severe.
As these katabatic wind speeds increased Captain Oliver Kruess and Expedition Leader Lisa Trotter wisely made the call to abort the landing and the ship’s horn blasted the recall alarm. Guests calmly made their way back to the landing, albeit with some difficulty as the winds continued to increase. The Zodiac rides from the beach out to the ship were for many the highlight of the day, as wind gusts reached near-hurricane strength speed. The expedition staff were the last off the beach, taking an absolute drenching in the wind and waves, but singing sea shanties at the top of our lungs all the way back to the safety of the ship! What a ride!
