The biggest wingspan of them all...

Prion Isle is in the Bay of Isles at the top of South Georgia, as shown on the Orion's noticeboard.

Prion Island is in the Bay of Isles in the very north of South Georgia. We're here for the wandering albatross, despite the island being named by American naturalist Robert Cushman Murphy in 1912-13 after another bird.

King penguins fishing off Prion Island.

The Orion had to get special permission to visit Prion, a Specially Protected Area in a specific timeslot, and we had to limit the number of visitors at any one time.

The beach at Prion Island, with one group climbing the boardwalk, in the gloom. Look carefully and you can see a wandering albatross just at the top of the walk.

After disembarking the zodiacs, we climb up a grass tussocked hill to see the albatross. The South Georgia government built a boardwalk in 2008 to minimise the damage caused by ourselves as we trundle up the hill. It makes the walk easier too, except when fur seals get in the way. They like the boardwalk too!

The boardwalk climbs up to wandering albatross nesting areas.

There are dozens of wandering albatross swirling around in the air currents. We are quite close to them. Just as well there was a breeze, because the birds will sit around and do nothing if there is none. Wandering albatross are huge birds, with, at 3.5m, the biggest wingspan of any on the planet. Second biggest is the Andean Condor, so Steve Egan tells us.

Every soaring wandering albatross is a sight to see.

Leaden skies behind a pair of Wandering Albatrosses.

Highlighting the massive wingspan of the Wandering Albatross.

We also see half a dozen or so albatross mothers on their nests. The chicks will be hatched by now - one passenger claimed to have seen one, but we didn't.

A wandering albatross mum tending her chick in her tussock grass nest.

Prion Island had another bonus to offer us. It is one of the few places in South Georgia never to have been infested with rats bought here either deliberately or accidentally by sealers and whalers. The rats completely exterminated the South Georgia Pipit, but Prion Island was sufficiently isolated and never suffered the rat invasion. Pipits remain here, and nowhere else in the world, and we saw two or three of them buzzing around the tussock grass.

We all loved to see the rare and endemic South Georgia Pipit.

Hard to photograph this guy, but the SG pipit has become a cause celebre amongst Orion passengers.

South Georgia has spent millions on getting rid of those introduced rats. The people from Grytviken gave us a presentation on the program involving multiple helicopters (NZ pilots) and tonnes of rat poison. It was able to be done in stages successfully, because the island is conveniently divided into segments where glaciers act as rat proof fences. The program looks to be successful so far - no rats have been located recently, and a few pipits have been seen outside Prion Island.

We couldn't get down the boardwalk until the seals got off. The seals have absolute right of way.