The Trip Down

Well, the trip down to Antarctica has been one of the most interesting and yet most boring three weeks of my life.


How can that be, you might be wondering, aren’t those two oxy-morons. If you have been on any substantial boat trips you would understand.

Well, first let me tell you about the interesting bits, or show you, and there have been a lot.

The Interesting

Your last view of land for three weeks and Australia for a year.

Then there was all the wildlife and nature that you get to see;

Dolphins

Smashing through waves

The excitement of seeing your first iceberg

Getting your first picture taken with an iceberg

First view of a penguin

First view of an emperor penguin

First view of a Seal

First view of a whale (unfortunately I did not get any whale photos)

Watch a Video

Leaning over the bow of a 9000 ton ship and watching it smash through a meter of ice.

Great sunset over the ice

Birds, Birds and More Birds

And More Birds

The Boring

Right now you are probably thinking 'how could that possibly be boring'. Well it all of that was amazing, and to be truthful the whole trip was amazing, however bear in mind that there was days on end of nothingness. Yes complete nothingness, just sailing along through well, nothing of interest anyway.

At least my other shipmates were good company. We ended up playing a lot of chess, poker and 500. There was also quite a good cinema on the ship, and this received quite a work out.

When the sea is rough it is awesome to stand up in the bridge and watch the ship pound through the ways, however this does bring some problems, especially when it happens for days on end. One day try sleeping for where your bed rocks 40 degrees head to toe or try working when all of a sudden you find your chair sliding to the other side of the room.

Also while penguins, seals and icebergs are interesting, you do get to see an awful lot of them by then of the trip (don’t worry they are still awesome to look at). It is also pretty cool to watch a bunch of penguins slide past seemingly effortless as the ship is trying to smash through ice, or come and play in the wake of the propeller.

Some different icebergs and types of ice

The Aurora Australis leaving a trail in the ice

Getting excited by something

Keeping warm at the engine exhaust vents

Snow on the ship

Hanging out on the monkey (top) deck of the ship

Luke our onboard bird expert is excited by some birds

More Penguins

A hard chess game

Some of the comms team hanging out after a saftey drill

The Antics/Activities

Well, what good voyage is a good voyage without some antics and activates.

I ran a trivia night one night which was quite fun fall all, although I was surprised that not everybody on the ship knew that Antarctica had the biggest glacier in the world.

We played a game called murder where you have to get people out by being in a room alone with them. Unfortunately I was lured into a room under the pretence of having to fix a computer.

Melbourne cup fell while we were on the voyage and as the Comms team it was our duty to ensure all the punters on the ship could get their fix of horse racing. We managed to convince everyone that we were getting a video feed of the race; however this was not really possible. Instead we made a movie of paper horses stuck on skewers. At least it good a good laugh.

Of course we had a visit from King Neptune when we crossed the 60 degrees south line. This was quite fun although did involve having vegemite rubbed in your hair and having to kiss a fish.

The crew of the Aurora Australia also raises money for camp quality and we had an evening where people would shave their heads to raise money. Of course being the group of people the crew is, nobody ended up with a normal hair cut. I am not sure of the exact amount we raised, but it was a lot.

Melbourne Cup hats

King Neptune and his entourage

Karaoke

Getting my head shaved

The crazy head shave gang

Of course if you have a crazy hair cut and stand on the bridge of a ship using a sextant it makes you look like you belong in Mad Max

The Food

The food on the ship was so amazing that no writings or tales shall be possible to go from this day forward without mentioning it.

Smoked salmon, oysters, mussels, prawns, amazing salads, fantastic soups. You name it they pretty much served it. Not only did they have massive desert selections after dinner but also after lunch.

The problem was not eating too much, if you were like me and took just a little of everything to sample, you would end up with a massive plate of food.

Yummy yumy desert tray

Arriving in Antarctica

Well, the problem was actually arriving, you see the sea ice was thicker than anticipated, and this meant the ship had to go slow, painfully slow.

It was not at all uncommon to wake up in the morning to find the ship had traveled only 10 miles over night. When we finally got within sight of land it still took us three days to travel the 6 kilometers to be close enough to the station to park.

First sight of land

First sight of Davis Station, my new home