Macquarie Island (or Macca) lies in the southwest corner of the Pacific Ocean, about half-way between New Zealand and Antarctica, at 54°30S, 158°57E. Politically, it is part of Tasmania, Australia since 1900 and became a Tasmanian State Reserve in 1978. In 1997 it became a World Heritage Site. It was a part of Esperance Municipality until 1993, when the municipality was merged with other municipalities to Huon Valley. The island is home to the entire Royal Penguin population on earth during their annual nesting season. Ecologically, it is part of the Antipodes Subantarctic Islands tundra ecoregion.
Since 1948 the Australian Antarctic Division (AAD) has maintained a permanent base, the Macquarie Island Station, on the isthmus at the northern end of the island at the foot of Wireless Hill. The population of the base, the island's only human inhabitants, usually varies from 20 to 40 people over the year.
Read more about Macquarie Island: History, Geography, Climate, Flora and Fauna, Gallery
Famous quotes containing the word island:
“I should like to have seen a gallery of coronation beauties, at Westminster Abbey, confronted for a moment by this band of Island girls; their stiffness, formality, and affectation contrasted with the artless vivacity and unconcealed natural graces of these savage maidens. It would be the Venus de’ Medici placed beside a milliner’s doll.”
—Herman Melville (1819–1891)