Deception Island

Left the Antarctic Peninsula last night and steamed north, arriving this morning at Deception Island, so named because it looks like a complete island but is actually a caldera, shaped like a polo mint with a large lagoon in the middle. But there is a narrow entrance, known as Neptune's Bellows which a ship can get through. Visited another huge Chinstrap colony early this morning and spent a pleasant few hours watching their antics then went into the lagoon in the late morngin. The lagoon is a natural anchorage and there is an old whaling station here, but it was abandoned in the 60s when the volcano inconveniently erupted. We went for a walk to the top of a ridge above the whaling station and I got this photo from the top.  This is where the Antarctic Peninsula was first sighted by a whaler in the 1820s. We're now heading north, across the Drake Passage, back towards Ushuaia which will take 2 days.