Midwinters Day

Mmidwinters day or the winter solstice is a bit of a celebration down in Antarctica. Every station has a big celebration.

At Davis we started the day with a fabulous brunch prepared by Kim.

Straight after brunch we chopped a hole in the sea ice to make a swimming pool and it was time for a quick (very) dip. The outside temperature was about –20 an the water was –2 so there was no hanging about.

A few of the guys built a large outdoor spa from a quarter height shipping container and straight after the spa we all went and sat in it looking over the icebergs.

After the spa it was time to get formal.

 

Then it was on the the feast. The table had been set, the room decorated in flags off all the nations present in Antarctica.

One by one the courses came, all seven of them. The meal went for nearly four hours all up.

 

Lobster Bisque and a warm roll

Quail filled with spinach and prosciutto, port jus

Salmon spring roll with scallop mouse and wakami

Duck confit with baby Persian figs and burnt orange glaze

Lemon sorbet refresher

Tournedos Rossini with red wine and garlic sauce

Date and Kahlua crème brulee with chocolate ice cream and orange glaze

Cheese plate with quince paste and warm walnut bread

During the diner we had a few speeches and Andy Bal presented everybody with a miniature ice axe that he had made.

After dinner it was time for some plays. These were very funny (partly due to alcohol and partly as they were well done). One was a roman murder story and the other about life in an Antarctic bar.

 

During the plays Matty Wells thought he would try and shaving cream some people which appears to have backfired on him.

After the plays had finished a few people jumped back in the spa, including Frank who could not even wait to get his suit off.

The night wrapped up with a screening of The Thing, another midwinter's tradition.

Pub Night

They all say it is the little things that count. Who they are I am not sure, but apparently they say it anyway.

In order to try not to feel so isolated we try to do little things down here to make us feel more like we are back at home. Tonight we had a pub night where we moved the tables into the lounge area and set them the area up like a pub bistro, where you order your pub meal and it is brought out to you. It was a pretty fun evening.

SAR Training

With the traverse coming up I thought it would be a good idea to practice our rope rescue skills, so on friday morning we headed out to a snow cliff on anchorage island in practiced lowering and raising a stretcher over the cliff. It was something the SAR team all knew how to do well, so the practice went pretty smoothly.

The moon

We had a very clear day with the moon showing up well, so I took a couple of quick shots.

Trip to Woop Woop then Bandits

At the end of June a group of 12 of us are going to rive the 400 approx km across the plateau to the Larsmann Hills. This is the location of a Chinese and Russian  base that we will visit along with an emperor penguin coloy that we will be surveying.

In order to be comfortable doing the trip there is a fair amount of training and practice that we need to do. Part of this training is at Woop Woop (aka the Davis Domestic Terminal). Woop Woop is an ice runway approx 20km from the station as the crow flies or 40km drive. It sits approx 10km inland on the plateau. During summer planes land here and helicopters are used to ferry people and supplies from Woop Woop to the station.

So anyway, we were driving up to Woop Woop for some training on the ice plateau.

Unfortunately during the drive up from the sea ice onto the plateau one of the Hagglund over snow vehicles slipped a track. Not to worry though, given a hour or so and some winching to get it back in place we were on our way again.

Finally we were up on the plateau, and at Woop Woop.

After our trip to Woop Woop most of the party were heading back to Davis, However Wellsy, Ash, Nige and myself had organised to take a Hagg straight to Bandits for the weekend.

One of the thigs that struck me this weekend was that without the sun, and only twilight on the rocks and snow everything looks very black and white.

 

After spending two nights at Bandits we took the ‘Coast Road’ Home and saw some seals and jade-bergs. Jade-bergs are icebergs that have frozen clear and not white.