Penguins and Scenery in Fortuna Bay

The king penguins are not quite as numerous in Fortuna Bay on South Georgia as they are on Salisbury Plain, but they're still plentiful and displayed in spectacular scenery.

A great petrel in the foreground, probably waiting for something to eat.

Hercules Bay Creatures

Hercules Bay, with its steep cliffs, is not as rich in wildlife as Salisbury Plain, but it has an intriguing diversity.

Young fur seal

Cormorants

Southern giant petrel

A huge leopard seal which played around our flotilla of zodiacs and punctured a compartment of one with its powerful jaws.

Hercules Bay, South Georgia: Cliffs, Caves, and Kelp

In the afternoon of March 5, we did zodiac rides along the cliffs of Hercules Bay, enjoying the dramatic geology, orange lichen against blue water and sky, caves, and sinuous kelp.

Seals and Penguins on Salisbury Plain, South Georgia

Seals and penguins coexist peacefully, but don't mingle much.

Seals like the tussock grass.

Penguins like the rocks.

Both like the water, but there are only seals in this picture.

Still More ...

King penguins in astonishing profusion, mountains, and mud.

Rookeries at sea level and up the mountain

Note the chicks in their brown fluff.

More King Penguins

One

Two

Three

Many

Seal Pups on South Georgia

The king penguins aren't the only inhabitants of South Georgia. There are lots of fur seals, and the pups are as cute and inquisitive as young children of any species.

South Georgia - First Encounter with King Penguins

Probably the biggest attraction of this cruise is South Georgia. It is rightly famed for its king penguins, and in this set of photos I tried to portray our first encounters with both the penguin inhabitants (tourists in red, natives in black and white) and the dramatic landscape of Salisbury Plain.

Ernest Shackleton probably crossed the mountains in the background during his rescue mission.

There are probably more than one hundred thousand king penguins in this photo, perhaps as many as half a million on the island.

The penguins were just as curious about us as we were about them.

Shag Rocks

March 4: Still en route to South Georgia, we passed Shag Rocks, a peculiar upcropping of volcanic rocks, completely isolated from any other land features for hundreds of miles.

Wandering Albatross

March 3: The first of two days en route from the Falklands to South Georgia. Some wandering albatross accompanied our ship.