The downside of having a bath

Well since the last blog update (many moons ago, due in part to me being rubbish, and in part to the internet being rubbish), I am happy to report that I continue to have a most enjoyable time aboard the red floating palace.  Unfortunately, all illusions that the Falklands are a sundrenched wonderland were cruelly dashed during the few days we spent in Stanley at the start of the month.  Our first port of call was Mare Harbour as we needed to take on a ridiculously large quantity of fuel, having now been floating around at sea for some considerable time burning it up.  In the few days prior to coming alongside, as I became increasingly twitchy, I had been starting to suspect that I may not be entirely suited to life on a small ship after all.  I headed off at the first opportunity for a run along the coast in search of penguins, turquoise water and a clear head.  The beach along from Mare Harbour is not mined, so it was possible to run along soft white sand with crystal clear water lapping up gently next to me.  After surviving a particularly vicious dive bomb attack by some extremely territorial Antarctic terns, I eventually made it to the penguins and all was good in the world again.  After a fair bit of splashing, twirling and cartwheeling in the shallow water (me, not the penguins), it was time for the bracing run home, straight into a biting head wind and some very chilly rain.  The presence of brightly coloured waterproof jackets moving towards me alerted me to the fact I was no longer alone on my beautiful deserted beach and, more importantly, that the twirling may have been witnessed by others.  I hope this was not the case as it was neither graceful nor well choreographed and, if I’m totally honest, not really appropriate behaviour for someone of my age.

An extremely bright and colourful refuelling boat

Another highlight from the time ashore was a most agreeable evening walk to Gypsy Cove, complete with dramatic sunset, bottle of beer, Twix bar and enough penguins to satisfy even my obsession with them.  Sadly penguins are not the brightest of creatures and, as we wandered home along the cliff path, we somehow ended up herding about 20 of them along in front of us.  Needless to say this did not please me greatly as they kept tripping over their own feet and falling onto their bellies and, at one point, looked like they may leap off a cliff onto the rocks below.  There was little to be done other than walk incredibly slowly and accept the fact that we would arrive back at the ship in the dark.  I also made it back out to the lighthouse, again forgetting to pick up the key from the museum which would allow me to climb to the top of it.......maybe next time.  It was a little damper than when I pottered out there last time, but was made considerably more enjoyable by the availability of mince pies and jaffa cakes (addiction is a strong word but it may be getting to that stage).  The sea lions we came across on the way home ensured that it was in absolutely no way an unpleasant excursion and, since I was totally soaked anyway, there was no need to faff around rolling up trousers to go paddling, also good.  The only slight downside to the day was the mild case of trench foot that I gave myself, which lasted for a couple of days and was really most unpleasant.  As it turns out, trench foot does not (as I thought for many years) refer to horrible fungal feet that develop over a long period of having wet feet, but is in fact something that happens if you warm up cold, wet feet too quickly.  For example, this might occur if you were to fill up the the bath that lives in the ship’s surgery (and is meant to be used to treat people who are suffering from hypothermia) with lovely warm and bubbly water and then get into it with very cold, damp and already white and wrinkly feet.  I won’t pretend that the bath was a spur of the moment event - I bought bubble bath that morning in anticipation of this momentous occasion.  However, when I woke up the next morning and nearly vomited with the pain coming from my feet and then had to hobble around like an old lady because it felt like someone was attacking my feet with several red hot pokers, I suspected that someone, somewhere was telling me that I was not meant to be using the hypothermia bath for my own personal enjoyment.  Having said that, it would be a shame to let the rest of the bubble bath go to waste.....



Pictures above and below courtesy of Andy Smith



I really need to learn how to use photoshop to straighten horizons, but this is a sea lion 

The time in Stanley soon came to an end though and, after we exchanged scientists, cargo and got rid of a lot of waste, it was time to head off South again, down to Rothera and proper Antarctica.