Hilarious Penguin Video from Antarctica

Penguins are funny creatures, especially when out for a walk or a run. Photo by Catharine Norton

Having just returned from an unforgettable Antarctica cruise aboard Hapag-Lloyd’s five-star expedition-style ship Hanseatic, I experienced first-hand the fact that penguins are very funny animals.

Penguins are ubiquitous in many parts of Antarctica and on the many islands of the Southern Ocean, including South Georgia, where we spent three amazing days gazing at penguins as far as the eye can see.

They walk funny, then talk funny (some of them sound just like braying donkeys), they even stand funny (especially the poor fellows who are molting and look totally morose because they can’t go in the water at that time).

And they’re particularly funny when they run, especially when the penguin chicks are chasing their parents for food.

It’s possible that this parent thinks it’s time junior went out on his own to sea to catch his own krill. After all, you can only regurgitate so much before it gets old. But junior still has down on his back and wouldn’t be able to swim yet, hence his frantic pursuit of mom (or dad).

A very talented young Dutch photographer we befriended on the cruise, Ruben Drenth, shot this video of an Adélie penguin chick in fast pursuit of its mother or father (hard to tell with penguins), as they engage in a race over the snow.

It’s set to the music of Dick Dale’s surf-rock version of Misirlou, which every Pulp Fiction fan will remember.

Hilarity ensues.

Here’s the video: