After lunch we went across to another area within Deception Island. We were at the location of a former British Antarctic Survey station that has been abandoned since the 1960s due to volcanic activity. There are buildings still standing, but they are in very poor condition and unsafe to enter. In the time between finishing lunch and getting ready to land, the weather changed completely. The winds picked up to 15-20 knots (28-37 km/h) and snow started falling quite heavily. We still boarded our zodiacs and landed ashore where we had a welcoming committee of one Gentoo Penguin.
We walked down the beach towards a lookout towards the end where it meets the rock. From there it is a short hike up to a viewpoint where on a clear day you can see the Antarctic Peninsula… definitely not the case this afternoon. Along the beach there were many Fur Seals just lounging around.
They are all juvenile males and spend their whole youth learning who they can push around. Thus they try to push you around along the beach. They have an aggressive posture, start “barking” at you, then start advancing towards you. If you run or back away from them, they will chase you all around everywhere, so you have to stand your ground, make yourself big, and make noise and they retreat and leave you alone.
All through our walk down the beach, we had our welcoming penguin guiding us and showing us the way.
We got to the end of the beach, then headed back, which was much harder going into the wind and snow. We got back to the landing point, where it was time to do the polar dip. The air and water temperature were both 0°C but the wind chill made it closer to -15°C. Mike and I stripped down to our board shorts then went down the beach and into the water.
It wasn’t all that bad. The coldest part were your toes after walking along the frozen sand beach. We quickly dressed back up and caught a zodiac back to the ship to warm up in the sauna. We had our recap and briefing for tomorrow and we are headed to the entrance of the Weddell Sea. There we are longing to see sea ice and large tabular icebergs. Hopefully I’ll get some maps for tomorrow to show everyone where we are at.
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