Claire of the Antarctic

And I shall leave you for now with a view of sailing into Rothera, so you may imagine what it may be like to visit. From this moment here it took another hour until we came alongside, docked and disembarked, patience is a virtue!

It was a super day and I cannot thank the crew of the Gould enough for their generous hospitality.

Ashley negotiated a climb up the mast… she is greatly missing the heady heights of race sailing!

Here Terri Souster, double wintering scientist and diver is discussing with Captain Joe the site for the water column sampling.

You may also notice in Terri’s hand a shrunken polystyrene cup; If one sends a cup to 500 metre the air in the polystyrene is compressed to such an extent that the cup shrinks!

The main reason for the day cruise was such that the BAS scientists could obtain water column samples from distances that would not normally be reachable from base by our inflatable boats.

This photograph shows the CTD rosette, a construction approximately 1metre in diameter an 1 metre tall, containing twenty individual containers which can be used at specific depths to collect water from those depths.

The collected water samples are subsequently analysed in order to gain understanding into the salinity, temperature and density of water at different depths in the water.

The rosette can descend to over 5Km; On our cruise the lowest depth from which water was retrieved was 500m.

Sian Henley, one of the scientists working on this, is in the bottom of this photograph.

And so I give you some shots of Antarctic science… Mountains through water sampling equipment.

Complete with yoghurt, cereal and fruit. By this point I had basically gone to heaven and life was pretty much perfect!

By midmorning we were all in need of caffeine and in keeping with the comparative luxury of the Gould we were not surprised to discover that freshly ground coffee beans and a Gaggia were available on board! Hurrah!

Richard Cook, Wharf groundsman, provided a foil for Ashley and myself!

Nathan Bowen, incoming Wintering electrician, poses pensively on the aft deck.

Here Paul Craske, outgoing generator mechanic, and Matt von Tersch, double wintering scientist and lab manager model Antarctic cruise wear for 2010!