Scotia Sea
After weeks of exceptionally fine weather, today we finally experienced the normal state of affairs in the southern ocean. Forty knots of wind right out of the west produced waves of up to eight meters, which made for a bit of a bouncy ride.
A quiet day at sea was just the ticket after our five busy days at South Georgia. Sensory overload was a universal affliction with no known cure. Flashcards are filled with images, but heads are absolutely overflowing. Tens of thousands of King penguins vie with millions of Antarctic Fur seals as Light-mantled Sooty albatross wheel over tussock covered cliffs and Elephant seals belch and bellow in their fetid wallows. We’ll be experiencing glorious flashbacks of this remarkable island for years to come.
Images are not all we have. Heads are also crowded with new ideas and questions, some answered, some not. It’s truly difficult to imagine a young Wandering albatross spending years at sea, circumnavigating the globe time after time. How can Elephant seals, so ungainly on land, manage to dive to depths of over 1000 meters for an hour or more? Amid the cacophony of a King penguin colony, how does an adult manage to single out its chick from all the rest? And how can an ecological system be so flexible and resilient as to absorb the depredations of early sealers and still deliver millions of Fur seal pups (pictured here) to these beaches? Along with startling memories, South Georgia has given us plenty of food for thought.
After weeks of exceptionally fine weather, today we finally experienced the normal state of affairs in the southern ocean. Forty knots of wind right out of the west produced waves of up to eight meters, which made for a bit of a bouncy ride.
A quiet day at sea was just the ticket after our five busy days at South Georgia. Sensory overload was a universal affliction with no known cure. Flashcards are filled with images, but heads are absolutely overflowing. Tens of thousands of King penguins vie with millions of Antarctic Fur seals as Light-mantled Sooty albatross wheel over tussock covered cliffs and Elephant seals belch and bellow in their fetid wallows. We’ll be experiencing glorious flashbacks of this remarkable island for years to come.
Images are not all we have. Heads are also crowded with new ideas and questions, some answered, some not. It’s truly difficult to imagine a young Wandering albatross spending years at sea, circumnavigating the globe time after time. How can Elephant seals, so ungainly on land, manage to dive to depths of over 1000 meters for an hour or more? Amid the cacophony of a King penguin colony, how does an adult manage to single out its chick from all the rest? And how can an ecological system be so flexible and resilient as to absorb the depredations of early sealers and still deliver millions of Fur seal pups (pictured here) to these beaches? Along with startling memories, South Georgia has given us plenty of food for thought.
