Macquarie Island - the sub-Antarctic rock that’s a wildlife nightclub in the middle of the Southern Ocean.

Macquarie Island: November’s wild, windy, and wonderfully weird wildlife party

Welcome to Macquarie Island in November. Our sub-Antarctic rock that’s basically a wildlife nightclub in the middle of the Southern Ocean. The guest list you ask?

Well of course its hundreds of thousands of penguins, elephant seals the size of cars, a smattering of birdlife everywhere you look and a few windswept humans trying not to get blown away by the consistent 50 knot winds.

Royal penguins have strutted back ashore, shaking off their winter ocean glow and claiming their nesting spots like they own the place (which, to be fair, they kinda do). King penguins are busy doing the parental shuffle — taking turns to guard the egg while the other heads off for an all-you-can-eat seafood buffet at sea.

Meanwhile, the gentoos are running around like flustered parents who forgot the school bake sale — feathers flying, chicks squeaking, and everyone yelling.

Down on the beaches, it’s peak elephant seal season — which means the air is thick with the sound of snorts, bellows, and general chaos. The big males (we’re talking massive) have been fighting for beach real estate and bragging rights, while the pups are learning to flop adorably into the surf.

Our fur seal friends are also back, showing off their best 'windswept and salty' look and occasionally chasing each other just for the drama of it.

If you thought the penguins had drama, wait until you see the albatrosses. These graceful gliders are swooping over cliffs, looking majestic and slightly judgy. Petrels and shearwaters are nesting too, often in burrows that make you wonder how they ever find their way home again in the fog.

On a weather front, November’s weather can only be described as character-building. One minute it’s sunny, the next it’s sideways hail. The wind here doesn’t just blow — it slaps. But that’s all part of the charm.

What. A. Place

Troy Henderson

A black, white and gold Gentoo penguin feeds its chick
A fluffy brown King penguin chick
A large dark grey bird with an imposing white beak stares at the camera as though sizing up the photgrapher.
Hundreds of black, white and yellow king penguins and their fluffy brown chicks alongside elephant seals on a beach
A large, weaned seal pup sits at the rocky base of a creekline.
A large solitary male elephant seal scratches the side of its head with its flipper while sitting on a rocky beach.
A large male elephant seal sits amongst a very dense patch of seaweed and kelp in the ocean shallows.
A female elephant seal raises its head and cries - it is sitting amongst dozens of other elephant seal cows who are all asleep.
A black and white bird flies across a tussock covered landscape - it is holding nest building grass in its beak.
A very large male elephant seal lying on the beach staring straight ahead.
A large grey bird with a pale-yellow beak in flight over the seashore.
A striking grey and black albatross flies over the ocean.
Two New Zealand Fur Seals sitting adjacent to one another on a rocky beach, stare straight ahead.
A spotty leopard seal lies on a pebbly beach
A rockhopper penguin amongst the dark rocks - its bright red beak, yellow eyebrows and yellow head feathers stand out from the dark background.
A group of five royal penguins walk in single file past a colony of king penguins standing in the background.
An image of a gentoo penguin captured mid-stream while going to the toilet - a jet of white liquid shoots from behind it.
A large group of brown fluffy king penguin chicks await their parents return from the ocean with food.

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