This lone macaroni penguin was surrounded by hundreds of chinstrap penguins. This photo is taken just meters from the location that 28 members of the Ernest Shackleton Expedition made landfall in their small life boats after their expedition boat, The Endurance, was crushed by sea ice and they struggled to live for over a year.
The following paragraph is from Ernest Shackleton’s book, South, that is an outstanding testament to the condition of the men arriving on Elephant Island.
“Rowing carefully and avoiding the blind rollers which showed where sunken rocks lay, we brought the Stancomb Wills towards the opening in the reef. Then, with a few strong strokes we shot through on the top of a swell and ran the boat on to a stony beach. The next swell lifted her a little farther. This was the first landing ever made on Elephant Island, and a thought came to me that the honour should belong to the youngest member of the Expedition, so I told Blackborow to jump over. He seemed to be in a state almost of coma, and in order to avoid delay I helped him, perhaps a little roughly, over the side of the boat. He promptly sat down in the surf and did not move. Then I suddenly realized what I had forgotten, that both his feet were frost-bitten badly. Some of us jumped over and pulled him into a dry place. It was a rather rough experience for Blackborow, but, anyhow, he is now able to say that he was the first man to sit on Elephant Island.”
Location: Elephant Island, Antarctica