Laters...

Certain events bring home the reality that the end of the season is nigh. It started last week with the departure of the last planes from Rothera. Having lived with the regular sounds and activities that come with living by a runway, after the Dash 7’s fly-by everything suddenly seemed very quiet. The last two Otters and the Dash head north back to Canada where they will chill out and get ridiculously pampered and massaged for the entire northern hemispheres summer.

Today was a pretty heavy day also… we said goodbye to the majority of the 2006 winterers, some of whom seem like they’ve been at Rothera for 100 years!!! And oh what wags they were!!! One thing I was previously unaware of is that on the eve before departure, it is standard practice for the departing winterers to basically booby trap the entire base, and generally cause mayhem for the new guys. So, after returning from the ship’s bar in the wee hours of the morning, my room is locked and the only way in is to release the safety catch by a long ski pole while standing in the back of a gator and getting someone to give you a leg up. Not ideal in –10 C after a larger shandy or two! By morning the full extend of the ‘pranks’ was becoming more apparent. Ever eaten you cereal with a folk? I did this morning – no spoons! Today we listened exclusively Russian radio. Rice in boots! Our lab literally tied up with rope, the list does go on! With a guaranteed hangover via the generosity of the ship, it’s just how everyone wants to start the day! And you know it… we’ll do just the same to the next mob! Full circle.

But it was sad to say goodbye to so many people that I have lived, worked and played with continually for the last four months. We all gathered at the wharf to wave off the troops heading back to the real world.

The gangplank is raised. This is it; ladies and gentlemen: The Shackleton has left the station. Cheers and tears begin, as do the flares and explosives for the less emotional amongst us. And the even less emotional and complete total nutters take to the chasing the ship in a Rib! Cool effect though guys!

It is strange though how long we did stand there and watch it. There is something very powerful about watching your link to the outside world getting smaller and smaller. I really wonder now how we will all react in three weeks when the RSS JCR departs.

That will leave the 22 staying for the winter behind, and signaling our last physical contact with the outside world until the sea ice breaks up at the start of next summer!

Training Day

In the good ole days training use to generally consist of anything from a half day to five days sitting in an air conditioned room, listening to ladies and gentleman of varying degrees of teaching skill and subject matter knowledge, instill the latest trend within my brain. IT, H&S, Risk Assessment, Managing People Effectively, Fire Extinguishers!!!… I’ve had ‘em all, and generally quite enjoy training, often something amusing will happen over the duration of the course, and most of the time you do come out a finer educated individual. But in well over a decade in Corporate America never did the words ‘crevasse’ and ‘training’ ever get put together.

But in all fareness I suppose the chance of falling through a thin snow crust into a cathedral like underground chasm doesn’t generally concern your average Cambridge MA/UK or New York citizen. Many things do concern those aforementioned folk, just not crevasses.

The entrance is, well – a hole in the snow.

With the aid of only a rope and my (lethal) 16-spike boot crampons the journey down begins.

My initial mental image was drippy and dark. So wrong, so so wrong. The layer covering some of the vertical shafts is literally only a few cm’s thick; thin enough for copious amounts of sunlight to stream down into the ice tunnels, with it’s remarkable blue luminosity.

The pictures help describe the scene below the surface, but the ambiance is harder to capture. It feels like something from a magical fantasyland.

Blimey, isn't nature very clever...

... and very beautiful :)

The Mars Bar Liberation Front

Every now and then something on base can occur, or is seen, that makes me smile. Maybe it’s the lack of new stimuli to kindle the mind; therefore the brain grasps onto everyday occurrences that really aren’t very funny, and twists it around in your psyche and suddenly it’s funny. Like a natural self-preservation mechanism to stop you going insane in an isolated environment.

There are only two things that are kept under lock and key on base. One is alcohol – fair enough, a sensible precaution. The other is chocolate. BAS employs some of the greatest minds on the planet, the very best in their field, and yet with all this natural high IQ swirling around the base, as mature adults we are still not trusted not to eat an entire seasons supply of chocolate in one session.

BAS has a lot of experience in managing bases in Antarctica, they’ve been doing it for over 60 years, and apparently it is a mathematical certainty that should this chocolate be left unguarded then we would suddenly and without any warning, revert into a child like state of chocolate fiends, with the strongest and fittest returning from the food bays with faces covered in melted Mars bar, dribbling, leaving in their wake a trail of smaller and weaker colleagues fighting for survival. Darwin would have been proud.

You have a 'Point'

It struck me earlier this week that I hadn’t wandered around ‘The Point’ for a while. This was something I did a lot upon arriving, and enjoyed. A lovely evening was budding, so on with the boots, my timeless fluorescent orange BAS jacket; black shades; orange hat; black gloves… check check check. Go Go Go.

The evening was indeed wonderful, and it seemed that the local wildlife also agreed that it was a good night to chill out soaking in the last of the suns rays. But to be honest, every evening is ideal for the local Point residents to take it easy and relax.

I truly love penguins. They are wonderful birds. They are the only creatures I know that can be both comical and graceful simultaneously. And they really do have such different characters. There are the bold ones who will come right up to you in such a rush, the sleepy ones and the chatty “Quarking” ones. Wing flappers, self-centered constant groomers and finally the all day sleepers.

The huge variety of seals were also taking the night off, many of whom were showing off their brand new shinny coats after spending a few weeks looking very sorry for themselves, as they left massive amounts of seal fur everywhere as part of their annual molting exercise!

A Brief History of Rothera Point is as follows. John Biscoe, Master of the Tula, first sighted Adelaide Island as he was completing a circumnavigation of the continent in February 1832. However, it was not until the British Graham Land Expedition of 1934-37 that Adelaide could be confirmed as an island. Biscoe named the island after Queen Adelaide.

John Rothera and Peter Gibbs first surveyed the Point in the austral winter of 1957, and in true Antarctic style is named after the first person to set foot there. During the 1960-61 season an attempt to establish a base on the point was foiled by ice conditions in Marguerite Bay and as a compromise Adelaide station was built. In 1975, due to rapidly deteriorating surfaces at Adelaide skyway all flying operations were eventually transferred to the Rothera skyway.

By February 1976 a small hut had been built allowing four people to over winter on Rothera Point (now the ‘Chippy shop’). In 1977 the main building was constructed and an extra phase added during 1978-79. Further expansion of the base has been undertaken ever since to cater for the increase in the number of science projects and the necessary increase in personnel to accomplish them.

BAS operations at Adelaide station came to an end in 1977. Between 1977 and 1984 this station was closed but visited by BAS personnel at regular intervals. I will be making a six-day ski-doo trip down to visit the base in early April. Very excited! Anyway during the 1983-84 season the station was informally handed over to the Chilean Air Force. The Chileans formally took possession of the former Adelaide station on 14th August 1984 and renamed it Teniente Luis Carvajal.

But back to today, I steal a quick glance over my shoulder as I round the point and head back to my pit. And there’s Jenny – looking particularly radiant this evening!