3 Dec 25 - Antarctica 25 - Deception Island

The second morning at sea saw the Ortelius continuing to head South in the Drake Passage. We were heading for Deception Island, which lies at the South West end of the South Shetland Islands. The South Shetland Islands are a three hundred mile long chain of islands. They lie about six hundred miles South of the mouth of the Beagle Channel and are about seventy-five miles North of the tip of the Antarctic Peninsula.

The visibility was limited first thing

It was hard work early on with the visibility down to as little as one hundred metres. Fortunately, the visibility improved as we got closer to Deception Island. The seas were still good for the Drake Passage, with a moderate two and a half metre swell. Due to the limited view from the bridge wings, I switched to watching from the bridge, which was a lot warmer as we were so much closer to Antarctica. On the downside, I was having to take photos through the bridge windows.

The bridge: One of the good things about Oceanwide Expeditions, is they allow the passengers to view from the bridge

We passed this impressive Fish iceberg

Humpback Whale: This was one of two Humpback Whales that I saw as we approached the South Shetland Islands

Chinstrap Penguin: As we approached Deception Island, we started to see Chinstrap Penguins in the sea

We arrived at Deception Island around late-afternoon. This volcanic island is about nine miles across in circumference. The sea has broken through to form a narrow five hundred metres wide entrance, which leads to a flooded caldera. There is a very shallow rock just below the surface in the centre of this entrance. The most recent volcanic activity occurred in the late 1960s. Soon we were inside the caldera and dropping the anchor in Whaler's Bay. The zodiacs were launched to allow us to head ashore to explore the old whaling base. It was going to be an interesting landing, as we had thirty knot winds and a snowstorm.

Heading for the entrance channel: There is a safe anchorage within the caldera

Deception Island nearly featured in the Shackleton story. When Shackleton and his crew put to sea in their three lifeboats, they were aiming for the recently established whaling station at Deception Island. They failed to reach Deception Island, as the sea currents were too strong and they finally reached Elephant Island, over two hundred miles to the North East of Deception Island. The crew spent the next four months on the beach at Point Wild on Elephant Island, while Shackleton and his five companions put back to sea in their attempt to reach South Georgia. Fortunately, they were successful. After getting a boat to South America, Shackleton made three attempts to rescue his stranded crew. He finally reached Elephant Island and rescued the crew, only a few weeks before they were due to attempt to reach Deception Island. Shackleton knew that if his attempt to reach South Georgia failed, then the crew had a chance of making it to the whaling base at Deception Island. In comparison, they had no realistic chance of rescue at Elephant Island, as it was well off the route of other whaling ships.

The zodiacs landed us on the beach near the old whaling station: This had only been in operation for a few seasons before Shackleton's Endurance expedition

This poor visibility made seeing the Ortelius difficult

The local Penguins were on the beach to welcome us. Unlike us, they looked unfazed by the cold, snowy weather.

Chinstrap Penguin: This monotypic species breeds on the Antarctic Peninsula & surrounding islands

Gentoo Penguins with a sole Chinstrap Penguin: This is the ellsworthi subspecies of Gentoo Penguin which breeds on the South Shetland, South Orkney & South Sandwich Islands, as well as, the Antarctic Peninsula

It was time to have a look around the old whaling base. It was a lot smaller than the South Georgia whaling bases I've seen at Grytviken and Stromness.

Looking right along the beach

Another zodiac lands: The crew were efficient at getting our hundred passengers ashore. When considering an Antarctica trip, the number of passengers is an important consideration, as only one hundred passengers are allowed ashore at a time. Larger ships have to land passengers in relays and ships with over five hundred passengers are not allowed to land passengers

The main Whale oil tanks with the whaling base beyond

The main part of the whaling base

More old Whale oil tanks

Looking back on the old Whale oil tanks

Kelp Gull: This is the austrinus subspecies which breeds on Antarctica & the surrounding Antarctic islands. It was nesting on top of the old Whale oil tanks

These old wooden huts wouldn't have provided much insulation from the cold conditions in the South Shetland Islands

The main office building: Visitors are not allowed to enter any of the buildings to protect them. However, they were too unsafe to enter

Before we arrived, there were plans to allow the passengers to have a polar dip, as the South Shetland Islands are considered as part of Antarctica. However, this was cancelled due to the strong winds and snow. A pity as I had gone ashore intending to do a polar plunge. Conditions were better on our return to the South Shetland Islands on our way back to Ushuaia. However, I had to skip that opportunity, as I was struggling to get over a nasty bug that had been going around the ship. We were back on Ortelius just before dinner. After dinner, I headed back to the bridge and saw two Fin Whales and four Humpback Whales as we headed for the Antarctic Peninsula.

It's a pity that the Beagle Channel Commerson's Dolphins didn't show this well earlier in the trip

Soon after it was dark, I was heading to bed as I had another early start planned as we would be around the Antarctic Peninsula and in range of an Emperor Penguin.

2 Dec 25 - Antarctica 25 - Sailing South In The Drake Passage

I decided on an early 05:30 start for the first day at sea in the Drake Passage. Even with this early start I failed to see the sun rise. After a quick cuppa tea I headed up to one of the bridge wings. The seas were remarkably calm for the Drake Passage, with a moderate two and a half metre swell. Ortelius is ninety metres long and she is still a fairly small ship by polar standards. These seas were creating a bit of movement, but it wasn't a problem from my perspective.

The main lounge on deck 6: It was nice and empty as I was one of the first up that morning

Deck 7 is the top deck

The big disadvantage of Ortelius is it is not possible to see forward from the bridge wings: The front of deck 6 has a forward-facing wrap-around walkway, but observers are very exposed to any headwinds on this walkway

Mid-morning in the Drake Passage: That is an impressively calm sea for the Northern end of the Drake Passage

Me watching from the port bridge wing: The photo was taken by one of the other passengers and the copyright remains with them. Unfortunately, I can't remember who took it

There was a reasonable selection of expected Seabirds on this first day at sea.

Black-browed Albatross: This is the nominate melanophris subspecies which breeds in the Antarctic & Subantarctic Islands, including islands off southern Chile, the Falklands, South Georgia, South Sandwich, Crozet, Heard & Kerguelen Islands, Macquarie Island & New Zealand's Antipodes, Snares & Campbell Islands. They range across the Southern Oceans from North of the Antarctic Convergence to the Tropic of Capricorn

Grey-headed Albatross: They breed on Subantarctic Islands off Tierra del Fuego, South Georgia, Prince Edward, Crozet, Kerguelen, Macquarie & Campbell Islands

Grey-headed Albatross: They are easily my favourite Albatross

Light-mantled Sooty Albatross: They have a cute body shape

Light-mantled Sooty Albatross: The breed on the circumpolar Subantarctic Islands and range throughout the Subantarctic & Antarctic Oceans

Cape Petrel: They are always an attractive Petrel to watch

Cape Petrel: This is the nominate capense subspecies which breeds from South Georgia to Macquarie Island, as well as, the Antarctic coast. A second subspecies breeds in the New Zealand Subantarctic Islands

Wilson's Storm-petrel

What I wasn't expecting to see were two species of Penguins, given we were over a hundred miles from the Southern-most point of mainland South America.

King Penguin: They breed breeds on the Subantarctic islands in Tierra del Fuego, the Falklands, South Georgia, the South Sandwich Islands, Prince Edward, Crozet, Kerguelen & Heard islands, as well as, Macquarie Island

Western Rockhopper Penguin: This party of eight Western Rockhopper Penguins were at least a hundred miles from the nearest colony which seems a long way to travel to feed

Western Rockhopper Penguin: A closer crop of the last photo. They breed on the Southern Chilean islands of the Magallanes Province and Cape Horn Archipelago & the Falkland Islands

The overall highlight of the day was a couple Antarctic Minke Whales which passed fairly close to the ship. Unfortunately, they were the only Antarctic Minke Whales I saw during the trip.

Antarctic Minke Whale: They were once thought to be a subspecies of Minke Whales, but these days they are split. They average about nine metres long, but they can grow to over ten metres. Unlike Minke Whales they have grey flippers

Antarctic Minke Whale: They occur across the Antarctic & Subantarctic Oceans and range as far North as Madagascar to North Australia in the Indian Ocean and across the Pacific to Peru & Guiana to North Angola in the South Atlantic

The plan for the cruise was to head far enough South into the Weddell Sea, so that we could use the three helicopters that we had on board to travel the final distance to the Snow Hill Emperor Penguin colony. This is the most-Northerly Emperor Penguin colony in Antarctica. Oceanwide Expeditions had a team of three pilots and their engineers from DAP Helicopters onboard. The three pilots had many decades of flying experience in Chile and Antarctica, including flying for the police and air-sea rescue. I felt we were going to be well looked after on the helicopter rides. In preparation for the helicopter flights, there was a mandatory briefing in the afternoon to get us familiar to the helicopters. This involved showing us how to approach and board the helicopters. It also allowed us to take some photos, as we wouldn't be allowed to do that when the helicopters had their rotors turning later in the cruise.

The three helicopters could carry fourteen passengers between them

Rob Luff in the middle was one of my cabin mates

The instrument panel was compact

It had been a good but long, day on deck, especially as I went back to spend some extra time after the evening meal. Then it was time for bed as I had another early alarm set for our second full day at sea.

28 Feb 26 - Signs Of Spring Part 4 - A February Adder

It's been a very wet and sometimes windy start to 2026. So, it is good to see signs that Spring is on its way. On the last day of Feb, I visited one of my normal viewpoints to check the River Frome. However, it was already occupied by this sleepy Adder. I grabbed a quick photo with the IPhone, before leaving it in peace and finding a different viewpoint to check the river valley.

Adder

26 Feb 26 - Signs Of Spring Part 3 - February Sand Martins

It's been a very wet and sometimes windy start to 2026. So, it is good to see signs that Spring is on its way. In late Feb, I was watching the Frome river valley at Holmebridge hoping that a Goosander or Mandarin Duck would appear for my Isle of Purbeck Year List. I had no joy on the Wildfowl front, but I did find my first two Sand Martins for the year feeding over the Frome, upriver of Holmebridge.

Sand Martin: I didn't have my camera and they were too distant for a worthwhile photo, so here one of my photos from St Aldhelms (26 Aug 22)

24 Feb 26 - Signs Of Spring Part 2 - Brownsea Preparing For The Spring

I popped over to Brownsea in late Feb to do a high tide count for the Dorset Wildlife Trust. The island is closed to the public for the Winter. However, I've been asked if I can do a few high tide counts over the Winter, which allows the DWT wardens to get on with other conservation activities on the reserve. There was a reasonable selection of Waders and Wildfowl species on the lagoon. As the tide was just switching into a neap cycle, the numbers weren't as impressive as they would have been had it been a Spring high tide.

One of the new islands

The highlight of the visit was seeing the new Tern islands that have been created. The DWT wardens, along with DWT volunteers and an external contractor have created four new Tern islands, which are looking really good. The new islands have their top stones on and the plan this season is to leave them unfenced to see how much disturbance they get from the Sika Deer. In previous years, the Sika Deer have tried to get onto the islands to eat the vegetation, which is a risk to the nest Terns and Gulls on the unfenced islands. Hopefully, with the new islands being new and unvegetated, the Sika Deer won't be a problem on the new islands this season. The Black-headed Gulls and Sandwich Terns are comfortable with being fenced in, however, the Common Terns prefer unfenced islands.

The other three new islands: It will be interesting to watch the interest in these new islands over the next few weeks

There are already signs and noises of Spring with quite a few Black-headed Gulls investigating the old islands.

Black-headed Gull: The DWT team have also turned over the stones on the old islands and the Black-headed Gulls are showing a lot of interest in these islands

23 Feb 26 - Signs Of Spring Part 1 - My First Buff-tailed Bumblebee

It's been a very wet and sometimes windy start to 2026. So, it was good to have a dry and sunny day for once. I had a good look around Studland and the highlights were in the dunes at South Haven. Within a minute, I had seen and lost sight of my first Butterfly for the year: a Red Admiral. While I was trying to relocate the Red Admiral, I saw my first Buff-tailed Bumblebee walking around on the path in the dunes. I carefully moved it to the edge of the path, to reduce the risk of somebody following me and treading on this slugging Bumblebee. Spring feels like it is on its way.

Buff-tailed Bumblebee

14 Jan 26 - A Perfect Winter's Day On Brownsea

Brownsea Island has been closed for the Winter since the end of the October half-term. This allows the Dorset Wildlife Trust and National Trust to do some of those annual maintenance jobs on the island, without risk to the public. As one of the regular Birders who is also a DWT volunteer on the island, I have been invited to pop over to help out with some high tide lagoon counts while the island was closed.

Looking towards the Brownsea Castle in the early morning sunshine

With the trip to Antarctica, I didn't have the time to get over in the back end of 2025, but I was keen to rectify this in the New Year. The first Wednesday of the year saw an icy lagoon with few Birds on it, but the following week looked good for a visit. It was a day when Poole Harbour would be between two days of solid rain, with crisp, still conditions. I met up with fellow Birding volunteer Phil Bentley for the National Trust staff boat and within ten minutes of departure, we were arriving at the Brownsea Quay. As we got off the boat, there was a shout that 'there was a Seal off the quay'. A quick naked-eye scan revealed a head popping up thirty metres from the quayside. Checking with the bins, it was the closest Grey Seal, I've seen in Purbeck. I mentally kicked myself for not bothering to take the proper camera, especially when it was still on view, when we left it, after ten minutes of watching it. A bonus flyby Kingfisher put in an appearance as it flew past the quay. My first Isle of Purbeck Year Tick for the day. It was time to head onto the check the lagoon.

I really like how this cobweb caught the light

It was a high tide between the neap tides (less than one point seven metres) and the spring tides (around two point three metres) and the high tide wasn't even two metres at the harbour mouth. On these tides, many of the Waders end up roosting close to their feeding areas, rather than being pushed onto the Brownsea lagoon. Still, there was a good selection of Waders on the high tide. A bonus was seeing my first Water Rail along with the expected Bar-tailed Godwits, for the Isle of Purbeck Year List. However, it wasn't the Water Rail or the Waders that were the highlight for the day: it was the lighting on the lagoon. There was a light frost and the sunny conditions were quickly burning off the frost and dampness from the previous day. It was time to grab some nice atmospheric photos of the lagoon.

It clouded over a bit and the lagoon had become more atmospheric, by the time we reached the Tern hide

After we completed the high tide lagoon count, we headed on for a cuppa in the DWT villa. After that the plan was to walk around the island and check from various viewpoints to see if we could relocate a Red-necked Grebe that had been briefly seen by the Birds of Poole Harbour bird boat on Sunday between Jerry's Point on Studland and Brownsea. Various locals including myself, had looked for it that afternoon and on the Monday, without joy. Phil and I were hoping that the still conditions would allow us to refind it. However, before I had finished my cuppa tea, I had a call from Graham Armstrong. He was watching the Red-necked Grebe from the Studland Houseboats. That narrowed down our search area considerably. Our tea mugs were quickly emptied and we headed off to Brownsea's South shore to view the South Deep channel. Phil and I only knew the direction Graham was looking at Studland, but we were looking from a completely different viewpoint, so we were almost starting from scratch. Fortunately, I picked the Red-necked Grebe up after a few minutes of scanning, fairly near to a Great Crested Grebe.

Another view of the Brownsea lagoon from the Tern hide

The Red-necked Grebe was my fourth Purbeck Year Tick for the day to take me to one hundred and sixteen and Green Woodpecker heard for the year. As always this follows the BOU taxonomy, but it excludes any recent reintroductions and Feral Pigeons. It sounds a reasonable total, but I could add another ten species if I spent a day around the Purbeck coastline sites. However, all those species are Birds I will see without any trouble during Spring Birding. This year, I am focusing my efforts towards seeing the tricky species, rather than to get a big total quickly.

Looking back on the Avocet hide: It looks like somebody is vaping in the left hand side of the hide, but it is actually steam disappearing from the sun's rays on the hide

Avocet: An IPhone photo of these two squabbling Avocets next to the Tern hide. There was a large lagoon where they could feed without upsetting each other

We spent a couple of hours looking offshore from various viewpoints around Brownsea, before we headed off to catch the 14:00 boat back to Poole. The other highlights were the two wintering Slavonian Grebes off Redhorn, twelve Black-necked Grebes off Goathorn and four Great Northern Divers. It had been a brilliant visit and hopefully I will be able to support other high tide counts before the island reopens.