After a sea day to sail from the Falklands, our first Antarctic landing was on Half Moon Island in the South Shetlands near the Antarctic Peninsula. Many of the rocks on Half Moon are covered with brilliant orange, yellow and black lichens. Half Moon is home to about 3000 breeding pairs of chinstrap penguins. Half Moon is home to a number of Weddell seals, although the only seals we saw were some sun bathing southern elephant seals on the beach. There were quite a variety of shorebirds on the island including the brown skuas which are constantly scouting the rookeries for opportunities to take an under-protected egg.