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Deception Island   Antarctica

Deception Island

Reaching the bay of this strange island isn’t easy; ships must navigate the narrow entranceway known simply as Neptune’s Bellows. But this unique geography is what has made the island one of the safest ports in Antarctica. In fact, even the term "island" is a little misleading. Deception Island is actually the caldera of an active volcano that last reared its head in the 1960s. This unique and slightly dangerous geography is ultimately what made it so attractive to sealers and whalers in the 19th and 20th centuries who used this remote outpost as their base of operations.

Although the sealers established a base here in the early 19th century, the volcano forced them to leave and ultimately, it's why no permanent settlement succeeded. Most recently, the island hosted a Norwegian whaling company in the early 20th century; whalers used the island to boil down whale carcasses to process the oil. Ultimately they left too, leaving nothing more than a few tanks and a sad and lonely graveyard.

Many expeditions include a stop at this mysterious island, which is also the best place on the peninsula to go swimming, thanks to that all-too-active volcano.