CUVERVILLE ISLAND AND NEKO HARBOR

Saturday Eve, 16 Feb 08, MS Nordnorge, In or near Andvord Bay, Antarctica

A WHALE OF A DAY

Gentoo penguins galore!
Humpback whales four!
Glaciers and icebergs everywhere!
Scenery extraordinaire!
Fur seal in a drowsy stupor!

!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Man, oh man! Fantastic! A whale of a day (pun intended) [actually a four-whale day] !!!!!!!

We went ashore for 1-1/2 hours on Cuverville Island on a beach that is home to an enormous gentoo penguin rookery. Thousands of penguins! Up close. [But we’re instructed not to get too close or in any way interfere with or hinder them. Minimum 45 feet is the guideline, but we’ve all been closer, especially if we stand in place and they come our way.] Took tons of photos. Weather pretty good. Much better than yesterday on Deception Island. Not raining. Not too cold.

There was a lot of ice to see on Cuverville Island, but we were to see a great deal more, as about noon we set out for Neko Harbor in Andvord Bay off the Gerlache Strait.

I saw a total of four whales during the day in Andvord Bay. We saw two (not at the same time) from the dining room during lunch. The first one made an impressive display of its tail fins as it dove. Helen and I were the first to spot the second one. We saw one from the dining room in the evening during dinner. That one lingered a longish while, showed its whole body length, and clearly showed its hump. I saw the fourth one while walking around the deck for exercise after dinner.

Going into the bay was spectacular. (Coming out also.) This is what I expected Antarctica to be. [Well, we were looking at the mainland, not an island.] Ice and snow, glaciers all around us, mountains (their peaks often hidden in the low cloud cover), floating ice chunks and bergs of various sizes galore. Very picturesque. I took scads of photos.

One little iceberg that we met had a flat top surface close above the water, and a fur seal was lying on it. It looked comfortable and hardly moved. We passed very close to it and from the 5th deck could look right down on the animal. Eventually, it slid itself off the ice into the water.

From the ship we saw groups of penguins “porpoising” (jumping out of the water).

Sailing in the bay was smooth. No swells. No rocking of the ship.
At the end of the bay, called Neko Harbor, we anchored and went ashore for 1-1/2 hours.. Another enormous rookery of thousands of gentoo penguins. On the beach, on the rocks above, and thinly scattered also on the snow above that. Took another ton of photos. Some of the shots we would have liked were not possible because Helen’s disposable camera got used up, and the battery of my digital camera ran down. Especially, we finally had the opportunity, except for the lack of a functional camera, to photo a mother feeding her chick. There is a pretty good hill, an area with no penguins, which we were permitted to climb, and several people did, and I climbed it too. Not Helen, definitely beyond her repertoire. The surface was slushy snow, and it was fairly steep and quite slippery. The view from atop that hill was just incredible! And I did get a few shots before my battery went dead. The weather was excellent, though overcast, and it was “warm.” (I was plenty warm in my winter garb.)

It impresses me that the chicks are so large. I asked a staff member how old the chicks are and she said 6 to 8 weeks old.

In both rookeries we saw a few predatory birds – I think they’re skuas – flying overhead and walking among the penguins. The penguins seem to pay no more heed to them than to us humans. We didn’t see an attack, but I saw two such birds eating what was left of a baby penguin chick – after I ran out of camera capacity.

I walked an estimated 5 miles -- 1-1/2 on shore and 3-1/2 around deck 5.

:-)

Bernie