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| Livingstone Island. |
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| Hannah Point with the wider island behind. |
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| Hannah Point. |
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| Our capable zodiac skipper for this excursion. I have unfortunately lost track of who was who underneath all the hats, glasses and assorted guards against the elements. |
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| Someone towing kayaks back to the ship. |
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| At this point I was just using up the last few shots on this roll of film. |
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| And this was that last shot. |
Following our departure from Deception Island we cruised around Hannah Point, on Livingstone Island. This was to be our last chance to see things up-close before we returned to the Ocean Endeavour and began the slow traversal of the Drake Passage, back to Ushuaia. It had been an amazing trip so far and I was a little sad to be leaving. Part of me wanted to keep going forever, but the reality of the matter is that any more of the cruise catering and I would become spherical and no longer capable of boarding a Zodiac. It had also been quite tiring, so I was also looking forward to having a couple of days of rest before starting the South American leg of the adventure in earnest.
I didn't shoot much with the View-Master camera at Hannah Point, only bringing it out to finish off a roll of film on the way back to the ship. From the Zodiac I really needed a zoom lens to get the best of the penguins and seals hanging out on the rocks.
One of the penguins was lounging around more convincingly than others.
"What's that penguin doing?" someone asked, indicating the penguin. It was lying on one side, immobile.
"Er," said the skipper.
The penguin was clearly dead, which is as good a time as any to plug my novel, Dead Penguins. It's available from Amazon in paperback or Kindle format:
You will be glad to know that the dead penguin isn't in any of the photos. The other penguins around it appeared unconcerned by its corpse and shuffled past it without a second glance. And some say people on the London Underground are cold. Then again, when you test the water for leopard seals by seeing whether the first one in gets eaten, mortality is best not dwelled upon.
The return journey through the Drake Passage was relatively calm. There were some smashed glasses in the bar, and the horizon did some very unexpected things at dinner time as the waiters weaved around the tables precariously. But by then most of us were used to the sea's motion, and those that weren't knew generally where to hang on to for dear life.
There were still activities on the boat to keep us entertained. The biggest of these was a charity auction to raise funds for the WWF. Items ranged from a pack of cards to a map of the peninsula which had been illustrated by one of the crew. We were encouraged to bid high and often by crew members wearing penguin onesies and carrying bottles of champagne. Every bid earned a champagne top-up, which could potentially lead to a catastrophically ruinous bidding war. The bids quickly exceeded my means so I sat it out, happy to marvel at the generosity of the more engaged passengers. The illustrated map eventually went for $6,000. No, that is not a typo. I hope the winner didn't have a wallet-shaped hangover in the morning.
There was also a more affordable raffle, which I did enter. One of the prizes was the opportunity to drive the ship. The bridge was generally open to visitors on the condition that we don't touch any of the controls. This is a very reasonable request, although having a the big steering wheel freely accessible did seem like tempting fate. Still, only a complete idiot would touch it, right? Right. Standing next to it, the ship swayed and I absent-mindedly grabbed the nearest thing, which was of course the steering wheel. An alarm immediately began beeping and the captain ushered me aside so he could attend to matters. Fortunately I had made no appreciable change in our heading, but technically I had driven the ship, so I wasn't disappointed that I didn't have a winning raffle ticket.
One final surprise as we sailed away from Antarctica - after nearly a fortnight of seeing penguins porpoise through the water, clamber over slippery rocks and hop through snow, we finally saw something I'd given up hope of seeing - an iceberg floating past with penguins on it. Thank you very much Antarctica, it's been a pleasure.
This is the last entry featuring stereo photos of Antarctica, but if you have enjoyed them please stick around as I took lots of photos of the spectacularly beautiful Iguazu Falls, and there will be a little more Antarctic detail in the entries.
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