Antarctica

[keith]

As we sailed across the Southern Ocean we sat in the spa pools and watched the icebergs floating past.


Great big tabletop bergs


Ones with interresting holes and caverns as the wave action erodes them


As they age and break up the change shape with smaller - growler berg accompaning them


Some had passengers like this large flaock of birds resting



The 'arch' gets bigger and the berg gets weaker.


This lump of ice has turned over when an 'arch' broke through


And this one is in its final stages of destruction


And if the weather was too bad, we stayed inside and created things....

[keith]

Some days the wind was freezing - literally - the body was all warm in the rather efficient polar jackets, but the face suffered. Here Ashara and Keith are trying to get a view while staying out of the wind



We powered along at about 18 knots, until we came to the pack ice where we slowed to a rather slow 4 knots.


And the paint was scraped off the bow

The floating ice got thick very quickly.


The pilot steered the boat carefully to minimise the find the channels of weakest ice. So our path was not straight.


Leopard seals on the pack ice.


We frequently saw small groups of penguins resting or avoiding leopard seals.


Sometimes just the foot prints

[keith]

The people in the lower decks complained they could not sleep all night from the grinding and groaning as the boat pushed through the ice


In the morning we woke to find ourselves in a sea of ice in all directions, a rather bizzare and strange feeling.


As we passed through the ice closed up behind us.


After 36 hours of travelling through ice we broke through into the calm waters of the Ross Sea. Pack ice is floating frozen fresh water. Now we encountered our first Pancake ice which is frozen sea water.


We stopped and unloaded near Scotts hut.





These are the skeletons of the dogs Shackleton's group had to shoot as they left in such a hurry as the ice was closing in.


And this is the hay for Scott's ponies.

[keith]

Ashara had evil thoughts with a rocky snowball in her hands.


Compromise - make a snowman


Old carpet from the boat was put on the ice as it ws hard and slippery


Plenty of penguins being busy





Other resting or tabogganing (mostly resting in the sun)

[keith]

A short journey to Shakeltons Hut.


We walked across black rocks and over a hill to reach Shakeltons hut


These are samples collected by Shakelton's expedition and carried part the way to where the boats were moored, and them abandoned as they ran out of time.


Penquins warming up on the black rocks





By now the sun was not setting, it just skimmed across the horizon in an arc


The midnight sun




We now journied west to view the Ross Ice Shelf. Standing on the highest deck we could just see over the top.