Today, our agenda was for a morning landing on Penguin Island (what a novel island name for Antarctica) and an afternoon landing on King George's Island, both islands in the South Shetland Island group.
In addition to the somewhat usual sights of penguins, seals, whale bones and such, Penguin Island offered a hike to the top of an extinct volcano. We landed on the island relatively early in the morning, and the expedition crew members alerted us to the many seals that were sleeping about. A main concern is that as they are curled up, they can sometimes be mistaken for an ordinary grey rock. If you happen to stumble onto a seal and wake it unexpectedly, it could attack you. The leopard seals reportedly can be very aggressive and with their powerful jaws can take a good bite out of a human. Advice taken.
I came across one seal, rising to greet the morning and our group of intruders. What I thought was unusual was the moss-like grass on Penguin Island. There is very, very little vegetation on the Antarctica islands, so this came as a surprise to me. I think the main diet for penguins and seals are various kinds of sea life, not vegetation.
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