ANTARCTICA: Deception Island

Deception Island, once a whaling station, was a British Base during WWII. The base was built to ‘deceive’ the Germans into believing that the Allied Forces had mis-translated their coded communications. In fact, the Allies had advanced interpretation equipment and knew exactly what the German forces had planned… but did not want them to have any clue of the truth.

Our welcoming committee of Gentoo Penguins came to the warm beach to greet us. Steam rose above the beach as this area has a lot of geothermal activity. In fact, the island is an active volcano that last erupted in 1970!

If you place your hands into the rough, pebbled sand you could feel the warmth. We were actually IN the volcano’s huge caldera!

Penguins found their way into nearly every scene. These tanks, I assumed, were for storing oil or fuel.

Remnants of the whaling days stood all around as decomposition in this climate is extremely slow.

South Polar Skuas flew about, seemingly unafraid. A few Antarctic Fur Seals felt otherwise and hid among the ruins barking a brief warning from time to time.

Anchored in the flooded caldera, the Plancius beckoned. We had so much yet to explore as we had not yet reached the actual continent. Tomorrow…

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