Today’s destination is Penguin Island.  Very apt, however penguins are not the star of the show.  This is a small volcanic island, looking like a little red hill.  We land on a pebbly beach where I immediately find a bird’s ring.  (the kind they have clipped to their leg as ID).  Knowing we cannot take a pebble or a grain of sand as a souvenir (we’ve literally signed for this), here is an exception.  Lex, the ornithologist, agreed to report in to the people who track such things and took the ring.  He thinks it probably came from a giant petrel as it’s quite big.  So not penguin size.  I’m now looking forward to knowing who my new feathered friend is (or was).

Behind the beach and up the red and black cindery slope of the volcano.  At the top a surprise !  Not one volcano, but two.  Inside the caldera (crater) there is another, smaller cone.  A BOGOF !  And a big plug of granite.  The geologists are excited.  Mist is sweeping over the crater as we walk round the top, seeing it from 360 degrees.  The pebbles crunch like ginger nut biscuits under our feet.  Colours ranging from reds to greys, blacks, purples and sandy yellows.

The path is barely a person wide.  One false step and it’s into the crater one way or into the sea the other.  Outside the crater the views to the other islands is a different and brutal colour palette.  White, grey and dark, dark green describes the snow, ice and cold sea surrounding us.  Close to the volcano’s shore it’s turquoise.  Elsewhere it’s just icy.  The clouds brood grey and black overhead in complement.  Cameras are working overtime to capture this moodiness.

Back at the beach we check on two chinstrap colonies and chuckle at the antics of these little chaps, busy in their work.  Annabel and I are on the last Zodiac back with the guides.  Over the radio Klaas asks us to detour for a fender.  A large orange fishing marker has washed up in group of penguins on the rocks and he wants us to remove it, keen to keep the landscape pristine.  Jordi handles the Zodiac like he’s in the RNLI and holds station between the rocks in a stiff crosswind while Sarah, another guide, nimbly jumps out of the boat, among the penguins and picks up the ‘float’.  But it’s heavy and her return journey narrowly avoids disaster, however we work as a team to get them both in the boat without incident.  Just.  Mission accomplished.  All parties are soon safely back aboard the ship enjoying a cup of hot chocolate.  (well, not the orange float!)

Later that evening Lex tells me I can keep my bird ring as a souvenir.  A legitimate one, too.  Woo !

(footnote: the ring indeed belonged to a Southern Giant Petrel, ringed as an adult in 1989 on Elephant Island)