Gold Harbour

Gold Harbour is a small bay near the southeastern tip of South Georgia, named for the golden light the morning sun throws on its cliffs. The Bertrab Glacier hangs above the bay and sheds ice into the water, and below it a beach and a green plain are crowded with around twenty-five thousand pairs of king penguins, gentoo penguins and hundreds of elephant seals. Light-mantled albatrosses nest on the ledges of the cliffs. Many expedition ships make an early morning landing here to catch the light. Like the other east-coast landings it is exposed to the swell, and a visit is never certain.