62° 58'S 62° 58'W, None - Polarsteps

Today is the final day on the peninsula. Time flies when you're having fun! Already the landscapes look vastly different. No more icebergs and unlimited glacier vista's. This is replaced by beautiful rocky islands with heaps of seabirds. ⛰️🐦 After our last morning sunrise, with Jean in action trying to free a lost snow petrel, we came at our next destination. In the morning we planned to land at elephant point🐘. But although the weather was great, the swell caused the boat to rock and made an excursion impossible. So we continued on to Deception Island. It was aptly named so after sailors discovered that the island was not a normal island, but a huge collapsed vulcano🌋. When they discovered the entrance into the caldera, they felt deceived by the island and promptly named it Deception Island. We entered through the same narrow passage, which is called "Neptune's Bellows" due to the heavy winds that often rage here. Inside we made a landing at Whalers Bay, an huge centre of sealing and whaling activity in Antarctica. Due to the sheltered nature of the bay, it was used extensively and the remains of the whaling station are still visible in the form of rusted whale oil depot's and partly collapsed buildings. During our landing we strolled through these remains, marveling at the huge amount of fur seals who, after being almost hunted to extinction, made a great recovery and are omnipresent here. It is great to see how they took over the whaling base, and made the remnants their own. What goes around comes around! We also hiked up to Neptune's Window (they like Neptune here apparently), al collapsed side of the Caldera. Here we were met by Norm, who told us more about volcanic rocks and showed us two Chinstraps Penguins on top🐧. Weird fellas, hiking all the way up here while there are perfectly fine spots on the beach down the hill. From here we said our final goodbyes to the antarctic peninsula, visible as a small white line in the distance. Before heading back, we had to dig our hands into the sandy shoreline. The vulcano is still active and a few centimeters below the surface the water is still scalding hot! 🌡️ Before heading back to the ship, we had our last zodiac cruise🚤. We were happy to be able to share this moment with all of our World Explorer family. We saw many penguins and fur seals, who were playfighing on the beach and in the shallows. Our final zodiac guide was Greg, who again managed to make us laugh with his many jokes? -Why are sharks encircling boats? Because it will be tastier when they scare the shit out of their meal- As we were sailing out of Deception Island we started to feel a bit melancholic🥲. Our Antarctic trip is almost over. In the evening we were told to start preparing for the crossing. We were again headed for the Drake Passage and as such needed to "Drake proof" our cabin. As we started to head to bed, we felt the waves increasing and the wind picking up....🌊🥴