Finally, Penguins!

I finally saw a penguin after being in Antarctica for a month. Yesterday, after eating an early dinner, we drove north on the sea ice to try to get to the sea ice edge and to see the Adelie penguin rookery at Cape Royds. Technically, we're not supposed to use our snowmobiles for anything but work, so we also stopped to look at a few seals along the way. Our first stop was Barne Glacier. You might remember this from my Sea Ice course. Well, yesterday, we actually went up to the glacier and got some pictures and took a little ice off the ground for camp. Nothing like several thousand year old air to add a little something to your drink. Next, was the penguin rookery. We stopped but didn't see anything at first until Kelly pointed out all of the penguins along the top of the rocks. They were all putting on their dances for the females. Every once in a while, a group of 2 or 3 would walk or slide by about 50-100 feet away. But not one...more on that in a little bit. Supposedly the ice edge is just past Cape Royds, and we were expecting to get there and find snow petrels and leopard seals. But no luck. We got to some thinner ice but could still never see the edge. It started to look a little sketchy so we drilled to see how thick the ice was. Turns out it was only about 2 feet thick. If you remember, we need at least 30 inches, so we turned around and headed back. On the way, we stopped again at the rookery, and as we were watching 3 penguins walk by, I looked over and saw one heading straight towards us. I just sat there and watched it as it walked within 5 feet of me like I wasn't even there. Unfortunately, it didn't stop so I only got 1 good picture. And that was about it. Glaciers, penguins, and thin ice. One of Ernest Shackelton's huts is at Cape Royds, but I think we're saving that for another trip.