Land ahoy!

Boating is an essential activity at Rothera; it supports the dive operations, marine biologists and various seawater salinity + depth + temp monitoring projects. It also provides the only access to the islands while the sea is still in it’s liquid state, and so is all-in-all is very important for the continuation of the science program over winter. It's also a mighty fine leisure activity to boot. But as is the way down south, only once all the training is complete, but this in itself provides an interesting way to while away many a winterers’ half day.

This is Jim Boat… the whacky naming convention of Rothera is that every boatman is called Boat after his/her name, hence JimBoat – like I said, whacky!

However, boating in the Antarctic seems to fall into two categories, and only two categories. Firstly there are the clear blue-sky days, with the sun gently warming your face, the light refracting off the icebergs producing beautiful rainbow effects and the gentle sounds of the waves lapping up against the RIBs. Peace and serenity out in Ryder Bay letting the stresses of the day wash away -- a delightful experience. Then there are the days like I had today. There is no in between.

For those of you at home you can re-create my boating experience of today. All you need is to find a very thick, heavy, skin tight, rubber suit that covers you from your toes right up to your neck (preferably one that becomes solid when frozen), a large industrial freezer in which to stand in, a very large and power fan capable of blowing 50mph winds directly into you face, a very large supply of buckets containing freezing salty water, and finally a few friends to continually throw the aforementioned buckets of water all over you. Non-stop continually that is. That’s it – that’s all you need to experience Rothera boating on a cack day.

Today Was Cold. Note the covering of ice on my goggles, my suit and my head. Oh how we laughed when we got back to the boatshed… what joy! But we’ll be back tomorrow to do it all over again.