Hi Everyone,
Today was a very exciting day. The previous night there had been rumours that we might leave Rosita Bay via Salisbury plain, a famous king penguin colony, but the last word on it was that it would not be happening. Nevertheless, I woke up around 5am just in case, and was rewarded by a group whatsapp message saying that it definitely wasn’t happening but there were nice views anyway. Undaunted, I got up and went on deck. This was a good decision as we did of course go via the penguin colony. Lots of them came up to visit us and with a good lens we could make out the thousands of penguins huddled together on the shore, which was very cool. The group of penguins was huge and even at a significant distance was a visible brown area on the shoreline.
Most of the workplan for the day involved the methane sampling work around South Georgia’s various bays and harbours. This was to study previously observed methane seeps as well as to look for new ones. For me, this involved helping out with CTD casts and capturing bags of air for the methane sampling. For your reference and visualisation, the methane sampling involves someone working in the lab looking for methane seeps in the acoustic plots. When these are observed they would radio someone (often me) on deck to sample the air. The person on deck would be sitting with an electric pump, an empty bag and a pipe and would then dangle the pipe from the front of the ship as close to the surface of the sea as possible while filling the bag with air from the pump. This had the positive result of giving a good excuse for staying on the deck for hours enjoying the scenery. It had the negative result of staying on the deck for hours in freezing weather, snow and brutal wind. So we won some and lost some.
Happily, for most of the day we were blessed with incredible scenery, pleasant weather and good lighting allowing some great photos. A personal highlight was the visit to Stromness bay, where we saw the Leith harbour, Stromness and and Husvik whaling stations. These stations are no longer in use but gave a good sense of what it would have been like to work here on this frozen outpost of civilisation. For those of you with a historical interest in Antarctic exploration, stromness was the endpoint of Shackleton’s epic journey from the Weddell sea and the wreck of his ship, the Endurance, across the Antarctic peninsula, the incredibly rough seas of Drake passage and the mountains of South Georgia. I have recently been enjoying an audiobook of his journey and I can highly recommend it to anyone who hasn’t read it, the journey is absolutely incredible, most of the sailing done in a relatively small 20 foot long wooden boat after the main ship was lost.
The bays have also been taken over by seals and other wildlife so we had some pleasant and entertaining company as we explored the bay. The geology and folds here were likewise incredible, definitely some of my favourite scenery of the trip! The weather also began to close in as we left, with some of the heaviest snow and wind we have seen so far. Sat on the front deck for a few hours in this weather taking methane samples really made you appreciate the fortitude and endurance of the whalers and polar explorers who routinely had to go through much more severe conditions for far longer. Thankfully, our generous supply of BAS clothing and equipment kept us warm throughout the process (though our hands were rather cold and struggling with the equipment by the end).
We are also hoping to visit King Edward Point in the next couple of days (the BAS base on South Georgia) though this is by no means guaranteed and will depend on a number of factors.
Today has been a fantastic day and certainly a highlight of the trip. I feel like my description here has not done it justice but I hope to send some pictures, which I suspect may also fall short but give you a sense of the awesome majesty and beauty of the islands.
05/01/23
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