Prince Olav Harbour is a small harbour in the south west portion of Cook Bay, entered between Point Abrahamsen and Sheep Point, along the north coast of South Georgia. [1]
Prince Olav Harbour is a small harbour in the south west portion of Cook Bay, entered between Point Abrahamsen and Sheep Point, along the north coast of South Georgia. [1]
Throughout the 19th century, South Georgia was a sealers' base and, in the following century, became a whalers' base. Prince Olav Harbour is the site of one of the seven main whaling bases established on South Georgia. Prince Olav Harbour was the location of a former Norwegian whaling station operational dating from 1911.
The whaling station was initially a floating factory site, a shore station being set up in 1916. The whaling station continued as a shore station until March 1931 and then was closed. The name was in use as early as 1912 and was given by Norwegian whalers for Olav V of Norway. [2]
The wreck of the ship Brutus remains, semi-submerged, where she was deliberately beached to serve as a coaling station. The ship was built in Glasgow in 1883 as the Sierra Pedrosa, and measured 1,686 gross registered tons. After serving as a coal hulk at Cape Town, she was towed to South Georgia in about 1912. Brutus Island in the harbour is named after it. [3] [4]
Several locations in and around Prince Olav Harbour have been charted and named by various Antarctic survey and exploration groups, primarily by Discovery Investigations (DI) personnel in their 1929–30 expedition. Unless noted otherwise, the following locations were first named by DI personnel.
Point Abrahamsen separates Prince Olav Harbour from Lighthouse Bay on the north side of Prince Olav Harbour. It was probably named for Captain Abrahamsen, manager of the whaling station at Prince Olav Harbour at that time. [5] Southwest of it sits Razor Point, first named on a 1938 British Admiralty chart. [6] Fine Point and Sheer Point are found close by. [7] [8]
Dinghy Point sits on the south side of the harbor. [9] Dinghy Point was originally called "Pram Point", but was renamed Dinghy Point by the UK Antarctic Place-Names Committee in 1991 to avoid duplication with Pram Point at Leith Harbour in Stromness Bay. [9] To the east is the descriptively-named East Bay, 0.5 nmi (0.93 km) mile wide. It was named by the Shackleton–Rowett Expedition, a British expedition under Ernest Shackleton, which visited South Georgia in 1921–22. [10] Squire Point lies at the north side of the entrance to East Bay. The name appears on a 1938 British Admiralty chart. [11]
Sheep Point marks the south entrance to the harbour, separating it from Cook Bay. [12]
Hay Peak sits at the head of the bay. [13] Near the center of the harbour sits Brutus Island. [14]
Ice Fjord is a bay 5.5 miles (9 km) long and 2 miles (3 km) wide, entered between Weddell Point and Kade Point along the south coast and near the west end of South Georgia Island. The name is well established, dating back to about 1920. A number of features along the bay's coast, including several smaller bays, have been charted and named.
Ocean Harbour is a deeply indented bay on Barff Peninsula on the north coast of South Georgia which is entered 1.5 miles (2.4 km) west-northwest of Tijuca point. It was a whaling station between 1909 and 1920. At one point, South Georgia was the whaling capital of the world.
Thatcher Peninsula is a mountainous peninsula in north-central South Georgia. Its total area is approximately 5,640 hectares, with roughly 1,620 ha covered in vegetation. It terminates to the north in Mai Point, rising between Cumberland West Bay to the west, and Cumberland East Bay and Moraine Fjord to the east. It is bounded to the southwest and south by Lyell Glacier and Hamberg Glacier. King Edward Cove on the east side of the peninsula is the site of the British Antarctic Survey (BAS) Grytviken station and the disused whaling station of the same name.
King Edward Cove is a sheltered cove in the west side of Cumberland East Bay, South Georgia. This cove and its surrounding features, frequented by early sealers at South Georgia, was charted by the Swedish Antarctic Expedition, 1901–04, under Otto Nordenskiöld who named it Grytviken. That name, meaning 'Pot Bay,' was subsequently assumed by the whaling station and settlement built in 1904. The cove got its present name in about 1906 for King Edward VII of the United Kingdom.
Hound Bay is a bay at the base of Barff Peninsula. It is 2.5 miles (4 km) wide at its mouth and recedes 3 miles (5 km), entered between Tijuca Point and Cape Vakop along the north coast of South Georgia. The names "George Bay" and "Hundebugten" have appeared on charts for this feature. The South Georgia Survey (SGS) of 1951–52 reported that this bay was better known to whalers and sealers as "Bikjebugten". The name Hound Bay, proposed by the UK Antarctic Place-Names Committee (UK-APC) is an English form of this name.
Barff Peninsula is a peninsula forming the east margin of Cumberland East Bay, South Georgia Island. It is 8 miles (13 km) long and extends northwest from Sörling Valley to Barff Point, its farthest extremity. It was probably first seen by the British expedition under James Cook in 1775. The peninsula as a whole takes its name from Barff Point, which was named for Royal Navy Lieutenant A.D. Barff of HMS Sappho, who, assisted by Captain C.A. Larsen, sketched a map of Cumberland Bay in 1906. Barff Point is considered the eastern headland of East Cumberland Bay.
Cumberland East Bay is a bay forming the eastern arm of Cumberland Bay, South Georgia. It is entered between Sappho Point on Thatcher Peninsula and Barff Point on Barff Peninsula. It is nearly 3 miles (4.8 km) wide, and extends 8 miles (13 km) in a southeast direction.
Fortuna Bay is a bay 3 miles (5 km) long and 1 mile (1.6 km) wide. Its entrance is defined by Cape Best on the west and Robertson Point to the east, near Atherton Peak on the north coast of South Georgia. It was named after the Fortuna, one of the ships of the Norwegian–Argentine whaling expedition under C.A. Larsen which participated in establishing the first permanent whaling station at Grytviken, South Georgia, in 1904–05. The Second German Antarctic Expedition (SGAE) under Wilhelm Filchner explored Fortuna Bay in 1911–12. Discovery Investigations (DI) personnel charted the area during their 1929–30 expedition.
The Bay of Isles is a bay 9 miles (14 km) wide and receding 3 miles (5 km), lying between Cape Buller and Cape Wilson along the north coast of South Georgia. It was discovered in 1775 by a British expedition under James Cook and so named by him because numerous islands lie in the bay. Of South Georgia's 31 breeding bird species, 17 are found here.
Jason Harbour is a bay 1 mile (1.6 km) wide, lying west of Allen Bay in the north side of Cumberland West Bay, South Georgia. It was charted and named by the Swedish Antarctic Expedition, 1901–04, under Otto Nordenskiöld. The bay was previously visited by the Jason, Captain C.A. Larsen, in 1894.
Elsehul is a bay along the north coast of South Georgia Island in the southern Atlantic Ocean. Elsehul is approximately 0.5 miles (0.8 km) wide, and is separated from nearby Undine Harbour by the narrow Survey Isthmus. The name "Elsehul" dates back to the period 1905–12 and was probably applied by Norwegian sealers and whalers working in the area. The Discovery Investigations (DI) expedition of 1930 surveyed Elsehul and the surrounding area, naming many features. A British Admiralty chart dating to 1931 provided the first instance of many other names; unless otherwise specified, features noted in this article were first named on this chart.
Larsen Harbour is a narrow 2.6 miles (4.2 km) long inlet of indenting volcanic rocks and sheeted dykes known as the Larsen Harbour Formation. It is a branch of Drygalski Fjord, entered 2.5 miles (4 km) west-northwest of Nattriss Head, at the southeast end of South Georgia Island. It was charted by the Second German Antarctic Expedition, 1911–12, under Filchner, who named it for Captain Carl Anton Larsen a Norwegian explorer, who made significant contributions to the exploration of Antarctica. The most significant of these was the first discovery of fossils on the continent, for which he received the Back Grant from the Royal Geographical Society. Larsen is also considered the founder of the Antarctic whaling industry and the settlement and whaling station of Grytviken, South Georgia.
Esbensen Bay is a small bay 1 nautical mile (2 km) southwest of Nattriss Head, along the southeast end of South Georgia. It was charted by the Second German Antarctic Expedition, 1911–12, under Filchner, and was named for Captain Viktor Esbensen, manager of the Compañía Argentina de Pesca whaling station at Grytviken, the first land-based whaling station in Antarctica.
Mount Antell is a mountain rising above 610 metres (2,000 ft), overlooking the north coast of South Georgia midway between Bjelland Point and Hercules Point. It was surveyed by the South Georgia Survey in the period 1951–57, and named by the UK Antarctic Place-Names Committee for Georg Antell, foreman of the South Georgia Whaling Company station at nearby Leith Harbour, 1913–39.
Brutus Island is a small island lying near the center of Prince Olav Harbour on the north coast of South Georgia. The descriptive name Saddle Island was given for this feature, probably by a British expedition under Ernest Shackleton, 1921–22, but the same name is used elsewhere in the Antarctic; to avoid confusion a new name has been approved for this feature. The name Brutus Island, after the hulk Brutus, which was towed across with coal from South Africa by two small catchers and has for many years been moored alongside the whaling station in Prince Olav Harbour, was proposed by Harold Salvesen.
Cook Bay is an irregular bay, 1.3 nautical miles (2.4 km) wide at its entrance between Cape Crewe and Black Head, narrowing into two western arms, Lighthouse Bay and Prince Olav Harbour, along the north coast of South Georgia. It was charted by Discovery Investigations (DI) personnel during the period 1926–30, and named by them for Captain James Cook, who explored South Georgia and landed in this general vicinity in 1775.
Factory Point is a small point on the west side and close to the head of Leith Harbour, in Stromness Bay, South Georgia. The name was probably given by whalers because of its nearness to Messrs. Salvesen and Company's whaling station near the head of Leith Harbour.
Mikkelsen Harbour is a small bay indenting the south side of Trinity Island between Skottsberg Point and Borge Point, in the Palmer Archipelago, Antarctica. It provides excellent anchorage for ships, and was frequently used by sealing vessels in the first half of the nineteenth century and by Norwegian whaling vessels at the beginning of the twentieth century.
Hansen Point is a point lying between Factory Point and Harbour Point on the west side of Leith Harbour, Stromness Bay, on the north coast of South Georgia. The name appears on a chart showing the results of surveys by Discovery Investigations personnel in 1927 and 1929, and is probably for Leganger Hansen, the manager of the whaling station at Leith Harbour at that time.
Hay Peak is a peak rising to 660 metres (2,170 ft) at the head of Prince Olav Harbour in Cook Bay, South Georgia. It was charted and descriptively named "The Snow Pap" by the Discovery Investigations in 1929, but subsequently deleted. It was renamed Hay Peak by the UK Antarctic Place-Names Committee in 1990 after Arthur E. Hay of Somerset, England, who was Technical Engineer with the Southern Whaling and Sealing Company at its whaling station at Prince Olav Harbour, 1924–35.
This article incorporates public domain material from websites or documents ofthe United States Geological Survey .
Coordinates: 54°4′S37°9′W / 54.067°S 37.150°W
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