South Georgia Monochromes 2 of 3

13th to 14th November 2015, South Georgia.

Links go to posts with the colour versions of the images (where there may also be more information) and if an image does not have a link, use the preceding one.

Penguins and elephant seals in the early morning at St Andrews Bay.

St Andrews Bay (Take 1).

King penguin conga line.

Elephant seal. Nice place to sleep.

Young elephant seals.

St Andrews Bay.

King penguins.

At sea on the way to Moltke Harbour.

Moltke Harbour.

Fur seals, Moltke Harbour.

Giant Petrel.

Gold Harbour.

Macaroni Penguin.

Macaroni penguin at Cooper Bay.

Off the coast of South Georgia.

The Acropolis Iceberg.

The Chinstrap Iceberg.

The Chinstrap Iceberg

Jul15

14th November 2015. Far south end of South Georgia.

(Map of journey . . . . . . . . . (11. Icebergs)).

An hour after sailing around the Acropolis iceberg, we encountered an iceberg with siz chinstrap penguins along for the ride. There are two of them here, and six snow petrels in the background.

Here are the other four, not far from the first two.

And from another angle, as the ship sails by.

Frank Zappa warned “Don’t you eat the yellow snow” (Apostrophe, 1972), though here it’s ice and there are no huskies (or eskimos) to be seen.

Snow petrels and chinstrap penguins.

Here the are from a bit further back. Hard to tell whether this is the bow or the stern of their ship.

An overall view from the back. So no penguins visible now.

Its shape looks quite different from different angles.

Here they are again. After they calve from an ice shelf, icebergs can melt in the sun, become unstable and turn over. You don’t want to go too close to an iceberg because you never know when that will happen (though the penguins probably don’t greatly care). That diagonal; grey strip is probably a previous water line.

Here they are again. They’ve shuffled their order since first encountered.

Maybe the two on top have moved.

Blue lines on icebergs can be caused by fresh water that is quickly frozen. The brown lines.are probably from a layer of dust, perhaps when the ice was part of a glacier.

Those two penguins are certainly well away from the waves.

Here are some cape petrels beside the iceberg. Perhaps looking for some fish thrown up in the turbulence.

All six of them in the one image.

And they’re not as close together as they seemed in the preceding image.

Those big diagonal bands could be relics of rolling events.

The Acropolis Iceberg

Jul8

14th November 2015. Far south end of South Georgia.

(Map of journey . . . . . . . . (11. Icebergs)).

From Cooper Bay, we continued on towards Drygalski Fjord, near the southernmost point of South Georgia. The clear weather of Cooper Bay continued, at least for a while.

I thought we turned back from Drygaslski Fjord because of weather conditions but other accounts indicate we decided to study some icebergs instead. In any event, we turned around and returned along the north-east coast the way we had come. You might think it would be desirable to circumnavigate the island but the south-west coast offers no protection for the ship from the frequent storms so in the interests of safety we did not venture that way.

Visibility was starting to decrease.

The majestic mountains of South Georgia are retreating into the mist and fog.

The varied shapes of several icebergs provide a contrast with the murky mountain background.

Not a place out there where you’re likely to meet many people.

Our first glimpse of part of the Acropolis Iceberg. I’ll explain why I call it that soon.

Another iceberg nearby. These are all massive blocks of ice.

Long and low and in front of the coast. Most of it is of course under water.

I’ll name this one soon for its appearance from another angle.

Back with the Acropolis iceberg. It is late afternoon, nearing sunset.

Acropolis iceberg in the front (we’ve only seen a small part of it previously) and the Sphinx iceberg in the distance (as seen previously from a different angle).

This is why I call it the Acropolis iceberg. the face of the big foreground block is like a frieze from the Parthenon. Carved by penguins perhaps. Click on the image to see greater detail.

A view from round the corner. The frieze is now facing out to the left.

So is it the Acropolis or perhaps the Parthenon or maybe the British Museum where Elgin lost his marbles?

A section from the massive side. The penguins have only just started carving out a frieze here.

The sea breaking against the iceberg and the background is clearing a bit. You can see the smooth band at the bottom of the visible part of the iceberg where it rides up and down against the sea.

A convoy of icebergs including the Sphinx in the middle and the Acropolis at the right.

A last glimpse of the Acropolis.

Godthol

May27

12th November 2015. Godthol, South Georgia.

(Map of journey . . . (5. Godthol)).

From Grytviken, we sailed south along the coast towards a small harbour called Godthol. The first three images are views of icebergs and the shore along the way.

A recently wounded bull fur seal, encountered just after disembarking from the zodiac.

It was Spring and at many places along the coast, male fur seals were fiercely defending territory while they awaited the arrival of the females.

This is a young fur seal. You had to be careful walking though the knee-high tussocks by the beach, so as not to stumble into a fur seal.

Not so much of a problem asleep in the open, though.

Here Roy Mangersnes is having a close encounter with a female elephant seal. Elephant seals are not a problem in the same way as fur seals.

Gentoo penguin.

Most of our party headed off over the hills seeking nesting birds, possibly albatrosses, I don’t remember. I stayed at the beach which turned out to be fortunate. I managed to score a zodiac ride in the bay with just a few others, as the approaching sunset cast a glow in the water, partly reflected off the yellow grasses on the hills.

Fur seal and elephant seal.

Elephant seal.

Antarctic tern …

… diving for small fish (or having just dived in this case).

Elephant seal.

And this is a South Georgia Cormorant, very similar to the King Cormorants we saw in the Falklands.

I took a whole series of these graceful birds swimming around and diving in the golden water.

Shaking off the water after a dive. You may need to click to a larger image to see it properly.

Down we go…

Fur seals.

Elephant seal.

Monochromes – South East Iceland

Apr10

30th August to 3rd September 2013: South East Iceland

These images are monochrome conversions of images from Iceland posts (#3 of 7).

Links go to posts where you may find information on the images and colour versions. For images without links, use the previous link. Likewise for descriptions.

Gufufoss.

Looking towards Stöðvarfjörður.

Djupivogur.

South coast highway.

Hofn.

Near Jokulsarlon.

Jokulsarlon.

Fjallsjökull.

Fjallsárlón.

Svínafellsjökull.

On the Beach (reprise)

Feb10

Day 66. 3rd September. Jökulsárlón, South Iceland.

I found the ice on the black sand beach near Jökulsárlón so enticing that I decided to come back for some more images before I left….

Fjallsárlón

Feb7

Day 65 to 66. 2nd to 3rd September. Fjallsárlón, South Iceland.

I had decided to be at Fjallsárlón (glacial lake) for sunrise the next day. So I decided to go there in the afternoon to ensure there was an overnight place for the campervan and no problems getting in and out. This is the view across Fjallsárlón to Fjallsjökull glacier. (For location, see the map in the Hofn to Jökulsárlón post).

We saw a wide angle view of Fjallsjökull (glacier) in the previous image and this is clearly not that, so we must be looking across nearby Breiðsárlón (glacial lake) to Breiðamerkurjökull (glacier) (which empties into the Jökulsárlón lagoon).

A distant view of a part of Fjallsjökull (glacier).

This image and following: various views of Fjallsárlón (glacial lake) and Fjallsjökull (glacier).

It’s raining now. There are a few traces of raindrops on the lens at the bottom of the image.

And now it’s clear again. A sudden five-minute weather change? Well no, actually it is now nearly sixteen hours later, at the next morning and before the dawn. Not much in the way of further comment required for following images, I think.

Finally, a view from further out upon leaving. I think I am halfway back to the main road.

Jökulsárlón

Feb5

Day 65. 2nd September. Jökulsárlón, South Iceland.

These are images from a whole day at Jökulsárlón, where icebergs drift from a glacier through a lagoon to the nearby sea. The first seven are at the lagoon.

The glacier Breiδamerkurjökull looms above the lagoon.

Now I have moved to the coast at the black sand beach near where the lagoon empties to the sea.

For these last ones I am back again at the lagoon.

These boats contain Martin Bailey’s group heading out to the edge of the glacier to find images.

I enquired at the booking office whether I could have a boat ride as well but I needed to have booked in advance..

Hofn to Jökulsárlón

Feb3

Day 64. 1st Septemberr. Hofn to Jökulsárlón, South Iceland.

Close to the south west coast of Iceland is Vatnajökull, the largest ice cap in Iceland. there are several volcanoes underneath it and more than twenty outlet glaciers. In some places these are quite close to the coast. This is Hoffellsjökull Glacier. The two mountains in the foreground are Svínafell to the left and Geitafell to the right.

On this day I travelled from Hofn to Jökulsárlón. For dawn on the day after the next I went to Fjallsárlón which I also show on the map here.

Hoffellsjökull Glacier.

This image and the four following are somewhere on the road from Hofn to Jökulsárlón but I can’t be sure exactly where.

(You can always click for a larger view).

Jökulsárlón is a very special place and one of Iceland’s main tourist foci. Literally it means “ice river lagoon”. At one stage the Breiðamerkurjökull glacier reached almost or entirely to the sea here. It has been retreating and in its retreat has formed the lagoon, in conjunction with the Jðkulsa river, which flows from under the glacier to the sea.

Consequently, Jökulsárlón (lagoon) fills with icebergs which slowly drift out to sea and fragments of them are deposited on the black sand beaches of the coastline.

All images in this part of the post are taken at the lagoon.

In 2010, Martin Bailey was one of the lead photographers in my trip to Antarctica. I joined up with him again in 2012 in his winter wildlife tour to Hokkaido. At one stage he was considering joining me as a scouting exercise for Iceland but instead he teamed up with Iceland photographer Tim Vollmer to offer his own Iceland tour. I was hoping to meet up with him at Jökulsárlón but had not had contact with him for days or weeks so it wasn’t certain that we would meet up. When I pulled into the parking area, I looked across at the bus beside me and there he was, having also just arrived. We saw quite a lot of each other in the next couple of days and I visited him and his party at their lodge in the next couple of nights.