Saturday, February 8, 2025
On January 21st, after completing our morning excursion to Half Moon Island (see yesterday’s post), and having another hardy lunch, we were ready to go back out on our zodiac. The captain had moved the ship to Deception Island during our lunch break. Deception Island is in the South Shetland Islands and is the caldera of an active volcano, which seriously damaged local scientific stations in 1967 and 1969. Yep. Our captain parked our ship on top of an active volcano. When we left the ship and reached the shore, we could feel how warm the water was and see the steam. The whole thing seemed pretty bizarre. The island previously held a whaling station. It is now a tourist destination with over 15,000 visitors per year. At least we aren’t the only crazy people that play on top of active volcanoes. Our guides did jokingly tell us that if we saw the water start boiling we should return to the ship.
While at Deception Island we did a pretty strenuous hike up to Neptune’s Window. Beautiful view to the other side of the island. We also saw a few more penguins – this time Gentoo. Gentoo penguins are similar in size to the Chinstraps but have yellow/orange beaks and different markings. They are the world’s fastest underwater birds. They can reach speeds up to 36kmph (22 mph). Another trait of the Gentoos is that they mate for life, and they have a unique courtship ritual where the young males give the females stones to show their interest. This may be Anne’s favorite penguin.
While on Deception, we kept seeing a clear “substance” that we did not recognize. Our guide told us this was salp. It’s a gelatinous creature that lives in the sea but is not related to the jellyfish. Looks like it should be related, but we learned that it was more closely related to humans than to jellyfish. Very strange looking creature. At times they join together to make long trains and move thru the water together. Officially, a salp or salpa is a barrel-shaped, planktonic tunicate. It moves by contracting, thereby pumping water through its gelatinous body; it is one of the most efficient examples of jet propulsion in the animal kingdom. We have seen and learned so many new things on this expedition. We live in such an amazing world.
After dinner that evening the captain sailed the ship around a large iceberg. It was about a third of a mile long and a quarter mile wide. It showed about 120′ above water, which is usually only about 10% of its total volume. The water here is deep.
RVing With a Purpose 