Text and photos by Mary L. Peachin
July, 2015 Vol. 19, No. 10
“There are two kinds of Antarctic penguins, the white ones coming towards you from the water and the black ones going away from you.”-Anonymous
Antarctica’s penguin highway is one of nature’s great two-lane, gridlocked non-stop traffic rush hours. Unfortunately, this incredible sight is not readily accessible. Icy penguin trails curve, meander, detour then disconnect along treacherous terrain that frequently follows a path obscured by snow or cloud cover.
Penguins inhabit this inhospitable environment, one where there is a only a three month—December through February—window of daylight hours or “summer” conditions that melt enough of the ice pack to allow ship navigation.
The penguin highway traverses steep, snowy terrain, although it occasionally follows an easy path along a beach. Shivering in below freezing cold is irrelevant to onlookers. Surrounded by penguins, everyone’s eyes are glued to binoculars or camera lens. Shutters click rapidly along the indented web-footed path.
Following the penguin highway is not the only way to view Antarctica. The opportunity to quietly glide in a kayak affords a better view of the “clean” white penguins propelling themselves through the water. Some adventure travel companies allowed certified divers to view this scene in frigid water beneath icebergs. A few even offer the option of camping overnight on the ice.
Kayaking in the Antarctica offers the unique opportunity for an eye level view of the sleek swimming penguin. At Cuverville Island, located in the middle of the Errera Channel between Ronge Island and the Arctowski Peninsula on the mainland, paddlers admired the compact, streamlined, short bodies of the penguins from kayaks. Stiff wings attached to strong muscles are used for propulsion, while their feet and stubby tails serve as a rudder.
Totally unconcerned about humans on land, the penguins were afraid of the yellow kayaks. Water is the one place where penguins are vulnerable to predation. Porpoising out to sea, trails of guano float in the water.
At Aitcho Island in the South Shetland Archipelago in the Weddell Sea, colonies of Chinstrap penguins hunkered on the beach. A distinctive narrow band of black feathers artistically extended from ear to ear beneath their chin. White-splashed rocks covered with the ammonia-like, fishy stench of guano and skeletal whale bones littered the beach. Experts theorize that white guano indicates that penguins have dined on fish or squid. If it’s pink, they’ve gorged on krill. Three or more days without food, it turns greenish in color.
Here, penguins shared the beach with lethargic 3-ton 12-foot elephant seals. The bull, known as the “beach master,” can mate with as many as 100 females, but he must first fight other bulls to dominate and earn the right to service his harem. Occasionally, a whiskered head would rise to yawn or snarl at another seal. In the 1800s, these creatures were almost wiped to extinction solely for their oil.
Many of the brush-tailed chinstrap penguins had week old chicks. This species of penguin lays two eggs, but in many cases, only one chick will survive. Sleek and fast underwater swimmers, like all penguins, they waddle clumsily on land. Males and females squawk as they exchange turns nesting and nurturing the chicks. Habitually picking at pebbles on the beach or attempting to steal from another nest, males compulsively tidy their nest.
Species like the Gentoo may collect approximately 3,000 nest pebbles, while the Adelie (named for a French explorer’s wife) may gather only a mere 300 stones. Like a nursing infant, the chick, its fluffy rump sticking out with head snuggled under the warmth of the parent’s breast, will emerge to nibble a regurgitated meal from the parent’s orange beak.
Brown Bluff, at the northern tip of the Antarctic Peninsula, is home to a colony of approximately 25,000 black-headed Adelie and Gentoo penguins. The size of these chicks and their growing appetites require both parents to hunt for shrimp-like krill. In groups, they waddled to the edge of the water then spontaneously, as if on queue, synchronically plunge into the ocean. Allegedly, the penguin in the front is pushed, and if a leopard seal doesn’t attack, the others feel safe to enter the water.
For the novice, it’s difficult to differentiate between Gentoo and Adelie species. Gentoo have a subtle white spot on their crown, while Adelie have small white rings around their eyes. Expedition leader Tom Ritchie compares penguins to tubby little people in formal attire. They walk upright, and stumble over and slip on ice, just like people.
Bailey Head on Deception Island is a composite of volcanic calderas. It features a natural amphitheater with a unique “penguin highway.” Spotless Gentoo returning from the sea walk on the right side of the path, while dirty penguins heading to the sea, pass on the left in this 100,000 pair colony.
Swimming in the Antarctic? If the penguins are so adept, well, why not give it a try? First, the expedition pitched in to build a “swimming hole” on the beach in Whalers Bay. A better description might be a muddy hole heated by fumaroles or sulphuric-smelling steam rising from the flooded center of the crater.
Whalers Bay, also known as Port Foster, was a Norwegian whaling station in 1900. The beach is scattered with whale skeletons, rusted metal shelters, and broken remnants of wooden boats used to carry water. Hiking the steep saddle of Neptune’s Window provided a feeling of appreciation of the challenging climbs made by penguins.
40-knot catabatic winds swirled clouds of snow down the glacier in Neko Harbor. No big deal for the penguins. They turn their thick layer of blubber and feathers against a wind strong enough to knock a person off their feet.
Returning north, the mile-wide Lemaire Channel, located between the mainland and Booth Island, is considered one of the most beautiful places in the Antarctic. Its seven miles are hemmed by high, steep, glaciated snow-covered mountains.
Antarctic expeditions offer the adventurer onshore, up close opportunities to observe three or four of the seventeen species of flightless birds. Here, in an icy wonderland in magnificent scenery are footprints in the snow, those of the penguin highway.