Gentoo Penguin

The gentoo penguin was first described in 1781 by Johann Reinhold Forster, who took his type specimen from the Falkland Islands — still one of the more reliable places on the itinerary map to find them ashore in numbers. From there the species' range fans out across the Southern Ocean, and on our voyages it turns up consistently at South Georgia and along the Antarctic Peninsula, as well as in the South Shetland Islands, South Orkney Islands, and around Anvers Island, King George Island, Deception Island, the Gerlache Strait and Bransfield Strait.

Within the genus Pygoscelis it sits alongside the Adélie and Chinstrap penguins as its closest relatives, and on mixed-species landings you may well see all three sharing the same stretch of beach or scree. What sets the gentoo apart on a still morning is the sound: a loud, trumpeting call, thrown out with the head tipped back, that carries well beyond the colony itself and is usually the first sign you are near one before you see the birds.

Guides on these routes tend to build in time at gentoo colonies precisely because the birds are approachable and vocal, making for one of the more immersive shore landings on a typical expedition itinerary.