December 11

So on in to December 11, in the second of my latest series of catch up blogs.  Looking back, December was a great month to be in South Georgia, and some exciting things were happening.

Firstly, the team here welcomed the arrival of Dr Jostein Bekke and his team of researchers from the Bjerkes Centre for Climate Research in Bergen.  The team had arrived with a considerable amount of equipment to take lake coring samples from some of the small lakes in the mountains of the Busen and Barff peninsulas.  The team had a vast amount of kit to transport to each location including an inflatable raft, lake coring equipment, drills, sample tubes, an outboard engine, a generator, aluminium cases full of sundry scientific instruments, and of course personal kit and supplies for up to a week in the field.  All of this equipment had to be stowed on the aft deck of the jetboat during passage to and from field locations, and this included strapping 20 foot long sections of drain pipe to the side decks!

Once again the Royal Navy dropped by to say hello.  The type 45 destroyer HMS Montrose rolled in to cumberland bay during her tour of the South Atlantic.

Another major highlight was the arrival of the Norwegian reindeer herders Karl Eric and Henrick.  Herick is a Sammi reindeer herder from the north of Norway, and is part of a traditional community of reindeer people in the region.  An unassuming, friendly and placid character, Henrick often belies his impressive strength, and agility as he hunts reindeer in the tradition method of lassoing the beast and wrestling the animal to the ground (including the large bucks!).  The process is very humane, and causes little pain to the animal as death is achieved quickly using a razor sharp blade and an intimate knowledge of which blood vessels are cut.  Henrick gave lassoing lessons, and showed us how to prepare the meat for cooking.  The meat itself is very tasty, though both Henrick and Karl Eric could discern a subtle difference in the flavour of the meat compared with the resident norwegian herds.  The team are here to begin planning for the eradication of reindeer from South Georgia, and there will be further updates on this.

Lastly, the outgoing winterers finally left the island after their year (or two) of adventure on South Georgia.  To mark the evolution of time, and in a way put closure on what was a fabulous year together, we took a fabulous overnight camping trek to Curlew Cave on the North coast of the Thatcher Peninsula.  Curlew Cave is a natural cave cut in to the rock, and features a lovely warm (ish) and dry sandy floor - perfect for bivvying out over night.  The weather was less than perfect on the walk over, which in the conditions took us around 4 hours and saw us navigating through thick cloud in the mountain passes.  however, once in the cave, with socks hung up to dry, and a blazing campfire permeating the frigid cold, we soon settled in to a few warming rums and some freeze dried beef curry!  As a consolatory gesture, the return journey the following morning was made in glorious sunshine and excellent views from the mountain pass.  Good bye (for now) and good luck to Rob, Matt, Ashley and Sam!

L-R: Ali, Me, Katie, Tommy,Matt H, Rob.

Update - November 11

Me and the SWMS - the entrance to Little Jason Lagoon is visible in the top right.

One of my infamous catch up blogs after not updating the site for an embarrassing number of months... The time which has elapsed since the RAF air drop can accumulate a lot of waffle in my world... I must remember to blog little and often.... little and often.... 

November saw the arrival of an exciting project being undertaken by BAS Scientists Gabbi Stowasser and Chester ‘Cheps’ Sands and a Biological masters student Jana Doemel from Germany.

The team wanted to undertake sampling of the seabed at various locations around the Cumberland Bay area to investigate the local benthic (meaning sea-floor) flora and fauna, and the project required a boat to carry out trawl work with a ‘Benthic sled’ and some accompanying work with a domersal trawl net . It was therefore up to me to convert one of our RIBs in to a suitable trawler work platform.  I decided the most suitable boat for the job would be ALERT with her dive rib layout and open aft deck.  So with some cunning modifications, she was transformed into perhaps the world’s first RIB trawler (!) making use of some now rarely used fishing tackle in the net store, including floating line, heavy trawl line, cheek blocks and swivel shackles. The makeshift system worked perfectly and boat proved very capable whilst accumulating around 13 hours of trawling.  The team were overwhelmed by the samples that were recovered and they will provide a significant contribution to the marine science being undertaken by many nations around the Scotia Arc.  The trawling was great fun, and we were very lucky with the weather.  The RIB actually coped incredibly well with bottom trawling, and with both engines in slow ahead, made a perfect 1.5 knots with the trawl sled fully deployed on the seabed.  It was fascinating to see the diversity of life that was bought up and put into sample buckets.  Jana’s particular area of interest is sea spiders, and we actually recovered many different species much to Jana’s delight.  In addition we found many varieties of copepod, isopod, amphipod, echinoderms (starfish!) and other bits and bobs. 

Of particular interest to me was the requirement for the boats to go and explore some lesser frequented spots around the coast.  We spend a fair whack of time cruising in to beautiful spots like Sandebugten cove, Moraine Fjord and even little Jason lagoon.  Little Jason is a tidal lake in Jason harbour on the Busen peninsula, and is only accessible by RIB on spring high water.  As there is usually no reason to make the journey in to LJ lagoon it is almost certainly the case that no boat has been inside since HMS endurance made some soundings of the lake in the early 1990s.  Crossing the bar was exciting, as fur seals leaped from the water across our bows and the last of the late flood poured in through the entrance making rapids on the shallower eastern channel.

The trawls inside the lagoon were somewhat disappointing, as it was hoped that because the lagoon is protected from ice scouring, the benthic marine life could be abundant.  In reality, what was recovered was a large amount of pungent smelling sludge.  It is my (non-scientific) opinion that the shallow ledge at the entrance, the small change of water each tide, and the abundance of fur seals around the lake have eradicated much of any marine life in the cove.  Due to tidal constraints we only had time for one trawl however.  Before leaving, I drove the boat around the perimeter of the lagoon and photographed the beach for the seal biologist.  On returning to base I counted around 750 fur seals on the beach.

RAF Airdrop

The Royal Air Force has finally succeeded in delivering some supplied for the OTEP project currently underway on the Barff and Busen peninsulas (blog update to follow)

The much thwarted drop arrived on time from MPA which in a Hurcules transport aircraft takes a round trip of 6 hours, and requires an in-flight refuel from a VC-10.

Ashley marked the drop zone with an orange smoke float and once the package had parachuted safely in to the sea, was picked up by Tom, Pat and I on the RIB.  The chute and other sundry bits of gear will be returned to the RAF via an HM Warship which we are expecting sometime in the next month or two.

Catch up 2 - October

In this, the second of my "catch up" reports, I will be looking back on a very busy month. In many ways it was October that really put the blogging behind schedule as it was this month that saw the RRS JAMES CLARKE ROSS arrive on "first call" and with it the arrival of our new wintering team. It was still quite cold at the beginning of the month despite spring being upon us.

The cold weather still apparent.  This is LUNA's re-righting cylinder after an hour at sea.

The incumbents are: Ernie Duston - Replacing Matt Holmes as the Facilities Engineer, James Wake, replacing Rob Webster as the Base Commander and John Weissman replacing Sam Crimmin as the base Doctor.

The short period after the activities the month previous, and the arrival of the JCR allowed enough time for me to take a short break away from base. The government officer, Robert Patterson, Heritage Trust curatorial assistant, Katie Murray and myself took a short break to the Greene Peninsular. The Greene sits adjacent to the base, between the thatcher and barff peninsulas and is segrogated from the mainland by two Glaciers - The Nordenskjold and the Harker. The peninsula itself is fairly steep with lowlands skirting its perimeter. There are a couple of peaks to climb including a very easy walk up Eosin Hill, where a moderate traverse can be made to the South to climb the un named peak further along the ridge. This peak gives spectacular views over the Glaciers.

Katie on the ridge 

After being dropped off by RIB on the beach, we set up camp by the old survival hut situated on the North West side of the Greene. It is a good place to camp as there is a fresh water stream next door which provides tasty drinking water, the hut is well equipped with stove, lantern, food and supplies and view is spectacular across Cumberland East bay. We spent the afternoon of day 1 setting up camp and collecting fire wood from the beach. There are no trees on South Georgia, and natural driftwood is very rare. However some years ago there was a severe storm which wrecked two fishing vessels on the Moraine Fjord bar situated at the north west end of Greene which over the years have deposited some timber on the beaches around the Fjord. This makes great fire wood to keep warm on fridged evenings.

Day two took us up on the mountainous spine of the peninsula as we climbed Eosin hill and then made north along the ridge. We stopped for a lunch of chocolate, biscuit browns and dried fruit, then doubled back and came down the steep north face of Eosin on the the beach near Mcmahon rock. From there it was a steady coastal walk back to the vicinity of the hut which was perhaps 2 or 3 miles. That evening we made a fire and had ration packs and wine for dinner.

The Harker glacier to the left - Hamburg Glacier to the right.

The third day we started early and hiked the length of the West coast up to the Glacier. En route we came across a number of Elle Harems and also witnessed a violent fight between two Bulls. This was Katies first real encounter with South Georgia's elephant seal population, and she commented on our own fragile mortality stood on a beach watching the equivalent of 2 transit vans scrapping only perhaps 50 feet away! After doing our fair share of sneaking and fast walking however, we eventually arrived at the foot of the Harker Glacier. The Harker is an impressive glacier, which with its shear spikes and icy minarettes resembles something conjured from Tolkien's Middle Earth. We set up a mini camp and cooked a lunch of Chilli Con Carne over the optimus stove washed down with fresh coffee. While we sat and watched we witnessed quite a large calving from the ice face, and literally thousands of tons of Ice plummeted into the sea. I also happened to have my camera ready at the time, so check out the video below.