On the 17th, it was pretty much the same as the previous two days - still quite a few birds around the ship; Wilson's storm Petrel were seen in good numbers as were Slender-billed and Antarctic Prions -mind you, getting images was another thing - all of these smaller pelagic birds just do not hang about! (well, that's my excuse, anyway!)
By the morning of 18th, we had reached Ushuaia. Sue and I were booked on a tour to sail the Beagle Channel on a motorised catamaran to Martillo Island where there is a Magellanic Penguin colony. On the way, we stopped at an Imperial Shag Colony and also a South American Fur Seal colony. Going further down the channel we noted Chilean Skua, Kelp and Dolphin Gull, South American Tern and a distant Flightless Steamerduck
After a couple of hours going East along the channel we finally reached the penguin colony there were approx up to a thousand Magellanic Penguins quite few Gentoo Penguins and just one King Penguins a few Upland Geese and lots of Chilean Skuas
On our way back more Black-browed Albatross were encountered - probably up to a hundred or more birds - and Imperial Shags are abundant, with the odd Olivaceous Cormorant and a few Rock Shags.
On arriving back at the port, we had a walk around the quayside, and eagle-eyed Sue picked up a Chimango Caracara sitting on a pontoon out in the water; also a Grey-flanked Cinclodes was seen o the waters edge and Crested Duck was noted too.
We had a brilliant day at Ushuaia, but it was soon time to board the ship, and the following morning, hopefully, we would watch the sun rise over Cape Horn! Below is an image of a Magellanic Penguin. If you are asking yourself where are the other Penguin images, well I'll post them in part 3 when we visit the Falkland Islands!
That concludes part 2
As always thanks for stopping by and hope you have enjoyed the blog.
