13-Feb Mount Melbourne and Tera Nova Bay

13-Feb Mount Melbourne and Tera Nova Bay

On our port side Mt Melbourne 2733m stands out magnificently above Tera Nova Bay and Cape Washington. The mountain is conical and the most prominent mountain in the neighborhood. It is one of the very few volcanoes on Antarctica itself, (most other are on islands) and was named by Ross after the British prime minister in 1830 -40

Terra Nova bay – between Cape Washington and the Dryglaski Glacier. Named after Ross’s relief ship. A collection of blue and orange buildings here is Italy’s base, the Mario Zucchelli research station

The mountain range is called the Tran Antarctic mountains and tracks all the way from Cape Adare right to the Weddell Sea on the other side. It divides Antarctic into West and East Antarctica and is one of the longest mountain ranges in the world. This mountain range acts like dam and holds back the east Antarctic ice shelf.

A magnificent blue iceberg drifts past us while we are on station. Most icebergs are whitish because of their snow and bubble-filled ice. However, some ice can appear bright blue and different shades of green. This is because dense bubble-free ice absorbs only a small proportion of red light from the light spectrum entering it so appears blue. Some icebergs even appear to be layers of liqorire strips with white icing between. These are caused by moraine debris that the galcier has picked up on its way down the glacial path.

Toothfish today was raw with wasabi. And for dinner ‘Toothfish Ala Fencepost’ - smoked in wood shavings that Lindsay had specially shaved off using the lathe from an old fence post he had found in the workshop.

12-Feb Toothfish

12-Feb Toothfish

Fortunately, it is calm today but storms whip up very quickly down here. We are very far south in the bottom of the Ross Sea – almost as close as possible by sea to the South Pole.

We are steaming off to our next station at the moment. We should get there about 2000 hours then - nets over the side and we do it all again, multi corers taking bed samples and midwater trawl samples. All quite interesting stuff really with all sorts of samples of sea life coming on board. How the hell anything would want to live in these frigid conditions, I will never know or understand.
We caught a huge tooth fish, 32 kilograms, I think, and about 1.3 meters long. The scientists took it down to their lab and dissected it in order to find out how it prefers to dine. They found some nice sized squid and ice fish. Toothfish are also known as Antarctic Cod to Americans and is famous for producing antifreeze glycoprotein that allows it to survive in the ice-laden waters sourounding Antarctica. It has a heartbeat of once every six seconds and research may lead to advances in cardiac medicine involving conditions where human hearts beat slowly during certain medical procedures or fail to beat fast enough due to hypothermia.

The tooth fish has been carved up by the scientists in the fish lab and delivered to the galley. Bryan, the cook, gets all excited and starts thinking about how many different ways he can serve it up over the next few days or so.
On the menu today is TnT - (Toothfish smoked in Tealeaves). It is a very oily fish with a strong taste - very high in Omega 3 apparently so must be good – I try hard to like it.

11-Feb After the Storm & On With The Survey

11-Feb After the Storm & On With The Survey

We have just come through the worst of a short and sharp but fairly major storm that struck us without warning yesterday. Although the fury of the snow storm has now passed, we are still rolling around crazily in the storm swell. It is still snowing and the decks and machinery are now almost completely covered with snow. Regardless - the crew and scientists are back on deck, into swing of the survey and carrying on with what they are here for. Midwater sampling trawl goes out and then hauled back in again under the careful and orchestrated direction of the bosun. The crew work hard, they seem to be constantly at it during their 12 hour swings and out in all kinds of weather, rather them than me. I hope we don’t get too many of these storms, as it would account for a good deal of unproductive downtime - not good for our mission.

Boy is it cold outside, a few more repairs to be carried out on deck for Lindsay and I. I’d better get my long johns back on, I think. A busy day for us engineers today as well today - some equipment requiring repairs as a result of the rough weather and a few more breakdowns to attend to today - trawls and winches to fix

I am now the proud owner of my first piece of Antarctic real estate - my own prehistoric Antarctic rock. However it just looks like any other rock though.

We are about 30 miles off the Sub Antarctic Mountain range but can’t see a dicky bird yet. Hopefully in a day or two we will get a bit closer, I hope. I want to start painting the mountains and sea.

10-Feb Storm

10-Feb Storm

The day started with a furious storm - 50-knot winds and enormous seas, 8-metre high waves. This one sprung up out of nowhere. The snow doesn’t fall on our deck but blows horizontal looking for a vertical surface to stick to. Storms come through very fast in this part, the storm factory of the south. And this is supposed to be the more sheltered area of the Ross Sea, sheltered by the pack ice barrier. Not much vcan be done today by anybody and I wonder how many weather down times we might end up getting on this voyage.
I see a copy of the weather fax and see a whole string of cyclones on their way from the west en route to hit us - five in fact. What is interesting is that they are all small but very powerful. They can hit you suddenly and can often have passed over the next day. But yesterday was a good day. In fact we had the most sunshine hours this trip, probably about four hours, all at the end of the day.

9-Feb Heavy pack Ice

9-Feb Heavy pack Ice

We are trudging though the huge amounts of broken pack ice and it’s snowing again. But we are very nearly through to the open Ross Sea that we are trying to get to. To get into this open stretch of water in the Ross Sea, we had to punch through a huge ice dam on the inner edge of the pack ice barrier. This is where storms in the inner Ross Sea have packed up pack ice on top of each other. Apparently it has never been so big, it took us three days to work our way through.

Bob, the ice pilot, mentions that he has never known it to be so bad as it is this year. He also mentioned that the current is opposite to what it should be - maybe due to do with global warming. Well, that's partly what we are here doing a study for anyway - not “us” actually, but rather the scientists on board. We are just the “bus drivers”.
It’s hard to believe that it’s summer, except that night never seems to come. On top of it all, we had an eclipse this afternoon. One could just make it out when there was a break in the clouds. I missed most of it though as I was in the engine room at the time.

The days are actually so very long that you actually have to force yourself to turn in at night. Last night when the sun was out, it just seemed to duck below the horizon and then bob back up again, a few kilometers to the east from where it ducked down, and then another long day began. Fortunately the part of my cabin where my bunk is has no porthole so I can still get a decent sleep.

SQ got lost overboard today, well we presumed she was. I searched everywhere for her and thought she fell overboard from out of my back pocket whilst I was working on the aft deck incubator units. I am sure some of the crew thought it was a conspiracy so that I wouldn’t have to continue with the “SQ sails home” story.

8-Feb Sculptured Icebergs

8-Feb Sculptured Icebergs

We are making slow progress, finding our way through the pack ice and progressing in a zigzag pattern at a slow 2 knots. Down below, the noise is amazing as chunks of ice clunk against the ship’s hull. The ship momentarily stops as we come up against a big one. It gradually gives way and lets us through, or else the ship managed to slice through it.

More icebergs - the sight is amazing - one can stare at these ice islands for ages. The ice blocks come in all forms, shapes and sizes - thousands of exciting sculptured shapes. The Ross Sea is in fact like a huge Henry Moore sculpture garden. I am enjoying the shapes of them and inspired by their varied colours and lighting. They come in brilliant shades of white, grey, blue and turquoise. The cabin studio is in full swing each evening now. The long light means that I can paint late into the evening.

I have fun plans to take the watercolours outside to try to paint, but I know this will be futile, as I know my palette will instantly freeze up on me.
More penguins and seals. I query Bob about the turquoise stains underneath the pack ice. He tells me that this is algae, part of the diet of krill - the source of life for all baleen whales, most penguins and seabirds.
Antarctic krill are shrimp-like invertebrates (fish without back bone). They can grow to a length of 6 cm, weigh up to 2 grams and live in large schools, called swarms, sometimes reaching densities of 10,000–30,000/m3. They are actually designed wrong in that they weigh more than seawater and spend their lives swimming upward. They feed directly on the minute phytoplankton in the top layer of seawater. A year of light ice means more sunlight reaches the sea, more photosynthetic diatoms, and more krill and hence more whale and penguins etc. Krill are the key species in the Antarctic ecosystem. They can live up to 6 years and the female lays about 1000 eggs a year. They are supposedly the world's most abundant life form.
I have taken a few photos of our l’il penguin in the engine room giving us a hand. Actually I just saw a genuine penguin standing on an ice island, looking all confused - head bobbing from side to side as he watched us slip past. Someone yelled out “Whale”. But by the time I got there it had sounded.

7-Feb Adelie Penguins & Snow Petrels

7-Feb Adelie Penguins & Snow Petrels

It is hard to believe that we are now actually in the Antarctic. I had another three ‘firsts’ in my life over the last few days. On February 5, my first iceberg, February 6, when I knew we really were in the Antarctic, it had just hit home, and today, February 7, the first time I ever wore long Johns. Yes, it is bitterly cold down here at the moment and we have memelink history in the making.
Tonight I found an exciting new way to combat the problems of painting in watercolours in this completely dry atmosphere. My new method is to first draw the outline on the cotton paper, then soak the paper both sides. After letting the excess water drip off and dissipate, it leaves a beautiful damp surface to paint on.

Penguins appear on the ice islands we pass, but these ones don’t have the orange nicotine stain under their necks as I was expecting them to have, like the little film stars do in ‘March of The Penguins’. These are pure black and white with little white rings around their eyes.. I am informed that these are actually Adelie penguins not Emperor Penguins as I was expecting. Reading up about them later in my guide – it appears Adelie penguins were named after the wife of French explorer Dumont dUrville. Though I think they should actually be re‑named Butler penguins, they have a habit of standing around on a piece of ice in their white suites and little black dinner jackets. They look up at us like bewildered butlers ready to announce that dinner is served and with their arms flapping behind them as if they are freshening their armpits. Some of the penguins look like they have dipped themselves in syrup and then dived into a vacuum cleaner dust bag; they are half covered in grey fluff. I guess these must be the young ones. This breed of penguins actually have a special claim to fame - they are the breed that feature in Bluebird Chips ads.

Adults also like to play a harsh sort of chasing game with the kids, They prefer the kids to chase them for the food that they bring home for them, this way food is not wasted on any weak or unhealthy kids.

Around lunchtime we passed a lazy sea leopard on his blood soaked piece of pack ice – he looked like he was having an after lunch nap – he probably one of the “butler” penguins I think.

Saw a beautiful pure white seabird flying alongside the ship this afternoon and discover that they are called snow petrels. Beautiful white plumage with a black beak and black feet. Later I saw a few more gliding over the pack ice and blending in gracefully and adding to the calm. One of the scientists on board, Chazz Marriott, is a brilliant photographer and has so far uploaded some magnificent photos of seabirds onto the ships shared digital photo album. One is of a snow petrel flying low over an iceberg ,the soft shadow it casts over the snowy surface makes for a prize winning photograph.

It has been snowing all day and I discovered the design of a snowflake today. The forward portholes of my cabin are sloping. I watch the snowflakes land on the window and grab my glasses and discover that it is all true; each snowflake has amazing and different geometric designs.