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Iles Crozet

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November 20, 2002: Morning

Discovered in 1772 by Marion du Fresne, the Iles Crozet total about 325 sq.km., mostly in five principal islands. There is no aiport, port, or regular transport that serves the islands.
After five and a half days of steaming almost due south, we arrive at our first island group, the Iles Crozet (Crozet Islands, pronounced "crow-ZAY"), latitude 46 degrees south. This group of islands is part of the French overseas department called Terres Australes et Antarctiques Francaises (French Southern and Antarctic Territories). The French have given us permission to land only on the largest of the islands, as the others are maintained as nature reserves. This morning we will go ashore and visit Base Alfred Faure (Alfred Faure Station), the French scientific station and the only habitation in the islands, usually hosting about a hundred scientists, workers, and administrators.
Our first view of the coast of Ile de la Possession (Possession Island), where the white buildings of the French scientific station (the only habitation on any of the Crozets) can be seen through misty clouds. The temperature is 9 C (48 F), a warm (!) spring day.
We anchor in Baie du Marin (Sailor's Bay), and get our first look at our landing site in Crique du Navire (Ship's Cove). Surrounding some obvious sheds are a scattering of white objects that some of us take at first to be rocks...
Our first landing! We are stunned to find that the rocks are actually penguins, and we stand in the midst of what the French tell us is a colony of 40,000 breeding pairs of king penguins. Adding in the fuzzy brown chicks, we realize we are looking at an aggregation of over 100,000 birds.
King penguins are the second largest penguin species (only the closely related emperor penguins, found exclusively on the Antarctic continent, are larger), the adults standing about three feet tall on land. The noise and the smell of the colony are almost overwhelming at first, but the ability of the birds to coexist (mostly) peacefully in such crowded conditions is amazing.
Like the young of most species, the immature king penguins are endearing with their thick, soft down.
In the midst of this huge colony of much larger king penguins, a single rockhopper penguin demonstrates its name by perching on a rock and looking about as if to say, "Where did I make that wrong turn?"
After a brief walk through the rookery, we climb up to Base Alfred Faure (Alfred Faure station), following the 1.6 km road used to transport supplies up to the station. On the way, I take this closeup of a clump of moss to illustrate the kind of vegetation found on the island.
The base is situated well above sea level; this view from about 60 meters (200 feet) above the cove shows the kind of day it is: cloudy, with an intermittent, misting rain.
This underexposed slide (it was a dark and dreary day, I'm afraid) has been digitally rejuvenated to show a view of the station, including the station leader's pyramid-shaped residence, newly built in 2001.

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