Frank­lin Island – Febru­ary 25th, 2017

Sat
25 Feb
2017

A wide belt of den­se drift ice is stret­ching out into the Ross Sea from the coast south of the Ter­ra Nova Bay. Much fur­ther than indi­ca­ted by the satel­li­te images. So we spent much more time navi­ga­ting around the ice than expec­ted. That is actual­ly good news: what would the Ross Sea be wit­hout ice?

The time loss does not bother us too much so far, we can afford it after the fast crossing from New Zea­land. We take it as it comes, and what comes is an com­ple­te­ly unex­pec­ted visit to Frank­lin Island. The island lies total­ly exp­lo­sed far out in the Ross Sea, which today is flat and peaceful, allo­wing us to go ashore wit­hout any pro­blems, alt­hough it is a long zodiac ride from the ship across the unchar­ted waters.

Gal­lery – Frank­lin Island – Febru­ary 25th, 2017

Click on thumb­nail to open an enlar­ged ver­si­on of the spe­ci­fic pho­to.

Most of what should have been more than 100,000 Ade­lie pen­gu­ins have alre­a­dy left the colo­ny, but a sur­pri­sin­gly lar­ge num­ber of them is still at home. Some­whe­re an Emper­or pen­gu­in tried to hide among­st them, but he is quick­ly spot­ted thanks to his signi­fi­cant­ly lar­ger size and the attrac­ti­ve colou­ring.

It is hard to tell what is most impres­si­ve: the pen­gu­ins, the Wed­del seals which crowd the shore in lar­ge num­bers of the stun­ning coast­li­nes with its rug­ged cliffs and sea stacks of vol­ca­nic rocks. But we don’t have to deci­de, we just enjoy the who­le thing 🙂