It would seem that internet on land is not, as I had hoped,
better than at sea and is in fact much, much worse. Continuing the blog may prove tricky, but I
may have found a way around the problem so I'll see how things go. Anyway, since my last mutterings much has
happened and, most importantly, I am no longer living on a big red ship. It was lucky that, thanks to my utter hatred
of packing, I was busy right up to the point of disembarking. If I'd had more time to think about leaving
my wonderful floating home and fairy-lit cabin I would probably have got terribly
emotional. Oddly enough I never really
wanted to work on the ship and, if I'm totally honest, before I left the UK I
was just thinking about how lovely it would be to get to South Georgia and
dreading the four months at sea that would precede it. Ha - how wrong I was! Sailing down all the way from the UK to the
Antarctic Peninsula, lying on the Monkey Island under the stars through the
tropics, crashing through sea ice, watching penguins on icebergs, sitting in
the bar listening to George's stories about when he first went to sea a good
few years ago (incredible but totally unrepeatable); these are not experiences
that are easy to come by! However,
opening a cupboard in rough weather and getting hit on the head by several
boxes of condoms is not something I will miss at all so I guess there are
definite advantages to being back on solid ground.
“JCR heading off
through the ice leaving me behind”
Also, if you do need something to take your mind off the
trauma of leaving a wonderful big red ship, then coming to live at King Edward
Point on South Georgia is about as good as it gets. I can't even begin to imagine how many
pictures I will have taken by the time I leave in a year. I've probably already taken about a hundred
out of the dining room window alone! The
actual day of arrival went by in a total blur as I'd had about 4 hours sleep
and been awake solidly for the 24 hours prior to that (thanks to a combination
of getting up to help with science work at 2am and then staying up a little too
late for leaving drinks). I remember
little of the handover I had with the outgoing doctor and was definitely
sporting a decidedly glazed expression in the bar that night. The next day was also a little surreal as it
was the day that had been set aside for weighing penguin chicks. Unsurprisingly I volunteered to help with
this task and set off with the others for Maiviken which is about an hour's
walk from the base. The chicks were
actually nearly fully grown and many had lots of proper feathers - a little disappointing as I'd pictured small,
cuddly bundles of fluff. They are also
surprisingly fast and, not at all surprisingly, distinctly unimpressed by being
herded into a makeshift pen and then put into a weighing bag before being sprayed
with orange paint. It was a messy and smelly process but fun nonetheless and the
walk over allowed me to get a glimpse of the delights that South Georgia has to
offer.
“Yeah.....so I live
here now – could be worse!”
“Many, many penguin and seal pictures to follow”
Apart from penguin weighing I have been learning how to
drive boats (I'm currently very much at the stage where the only possibility is
to get better) and clearing out freezers whilst wearing my ridiculous padded
boiler suit, freezer jacket, two pairs of gloves and a very thick woolly hat. Since the medical workload is somewhat
minimal, the doctor at KEP has the very dubious honour of being in charge of
food ordering and rationing. I'm not
entirely convinced I'm the best person for the job since I have absolutely no
interest in either buying food or cooking it, get terribly confused in
supermarkets and can quite happily eat the same thing for weeks on end when I'm
back home. However, I do like being able
to eat something and since people may be more than a little perturbed if I mess this up too much I suspect
this is a task I should just learn to love.
On the plus side it means I get to choose what fresh fruit and
vegetables we get so I'm rather excited about the 2kg of pineapple that should
be winging its way to us quite literally as I type (by' winging its way' I more
mean heading here slowly at a speed of no more than 10 knots on the Shackleton,
but the important thing is that it is coming).
It's probably best if I leave it there for now as there is
much more to talk about but it can wait for another day and Wuthering Heights
is calling me.
