When one has been cruising though Antactica for the past ten days it is easy to think that there could be no more dramatic surprises. How wrong you would be.
Deception Island is situated in the South Shetland Islands just north of the Antarctic Peninsula. This circular shaped island has been formed by volcanic activity over time. There is only one entrance to the harbour and that is through the Devil's Bellows, a narrow channel with high winds and precipitous cliffs on either side through which the ship must pass through very carefully. Once inside the harbour you are actually floating within the caldera of an active volcano that last erupted in 1967. All around are dark, stark cliffs and snow covered slopes. The beach of Whaler's Bay is formed of the cinder detritus of previous eruptions.
On the beach are the remains of two bases from the past. Norwegian whaling activities in the early 1900's left behind huts, huge fuel tanks, and other materials. Through the 1950's and 1960's the beach was the site of a British Antarctic Survey Base which was evacuated due to the last eruption. Buildings and even an aeroplane hanger scattered over the beach remain standing and serve to increase the starkness of this dark, volcanic place. Three graves with crosses and rock cairns serve as a reminder that not all who came to Deception Island made it home again.
Today the only residents are the Antarctic fur seals, interrupted by the occasional visits of travellers such as us. Even the penguins shun the beach. One solitary penguin did swim ashore, took one look around, and promptly went back into the water.
This island does, unlike others, have some scant vegetation. Bright orange algae coats some of the rocks and there are drifts of green moss across parts of the beach.
This is a desolate, dark, windswept place where it is easy for one to imagine the extreme hardships of the whalers and researchers who inhabited this island long ago.
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