Close encounters of the seal kind

Now I know what you are thinking, seals are cute little things you see at Seaworld, they balance balls on their nose and throw things around. But it is all a show, they have you all fooled. Fur seals are in fact vicious little bastards. They are ugly and have big teeth and charge at you when they think you are getting too close for comfort, even when you are walking along innocently and don’t even see them hiding in the tussock grass.

So here I was just walking along to the cemetery to see Shackleton’s grave on South Georgia Island. These 2 fur seals decided that they didn’t want to let us pass and came charging towards us with their teeth bared and growling. The way to get them to stop is to stand your ground and yell, clap, wave your arms and generally try to appear bigger and more frightening than they are. It usually works and they back off. Anyway, I retreated and went around the long way but Jo was brave and charged on to the gate.

Then we decided to go to the cross which is on the other side of the bay. Now Ros did warn is about the vicious little seals guarding the steps to the cross and said, only go there if you are really keen. Along the way we met other people, the seals are a bit angry, but stand your ground and make some noise. One man was given a stick by the locals to protect himself. Undeterred, well Jo was – I went reluctantly, we headed off there anyway.

We managed to weave our wave through the gauntlet of seals, elephants as well as fur, fending off the occasional charge, until we arrived almost to the base of the stairs. Then the boys got a little stroppy, I think maybe by that time about 60 people had invaded their area they were well over it. So one charged us, but we scared it off, then another came and finally a third to it’s aid, we were surrounded! By this time I was using Jo as a shield and was ready to sacrifice her to the fur seal. She is trying her best to scare the things off and I am being the big hero hiding behind her.

You have no idea how hard it is to stand your ground and not run like hell away from there, apparently not a good plan because as ungainly as they look, they can move quicker than we can even on the land. By then I had decided that I was not going to try and proceed, so convinced Jo to retreat.

I was looking for help from other people but there were none in sight. So we backed off, and 2 of them were cool with that, but the third, who was in the direction that we wanted to go, wouldn’t concede. He kept coming at us even as we turned our backs and tried to leave. I can’t remember the last time I was that scared. Obviously we got out, but there was still some more seals to frighten me on the way back to the boat.