Chinese Visit

The Chinese visited twice in their snazzy Dauphin chopper with the enclosed tail rotor. Each time was to get a second opinion on the medical condition of the leader of their upcoming 70-odd-day traverse to Dome A, the point of highest altitude in Antarctica. The expedition leader was suffering from a bladder infection, which our doc confirmed. Each time a chopperful of Chinese came along for the jolly.

About half of the visitors spoke a bit of English. A game of pool started up, we made them tea and fixed them up with desserts, and they all took photos of each other standing in front of the Aussie flag that's on the wall. The conversations in the lounge were funny to listen to. One of the glaciologists here was talking in slow clear small-word English to a Chinese scientist who was working on the same sort of thing as him: "So ... what are you ... uh ... researching, what are you looking at, on the big ice shelf? BIG ... ICE ... SHELF? [hand gestures here, presumably trying to mime 'big ice shelf']" The Chinese guy would nod uncertainly and reply in heavily accented English, "Uh, we using modified ultrasensitive global positioning system to satellite track movement of loose-tooth section of Amery Shelf together with seismic recordings to sound thickness of ice and seabed. Yes, big ... ice ... shelf!" This would be followed by a very uncertain silence as our geologists would quickly rewire the foreign- person-communication centres of their brains.

Gardiner Island

A few of us went on a walk over the sea ice to Gardiner Island on the night of Tuesday the 7th. The island is the site of a large penguin rookery. From the stripey hills we had an amazing view over the icebergs out to sea, streaked gold in the low sun. We walked back in angled sunrays that brought up the streaky textures in the ice surface.

Adam and Joel on opposite ends of a igneous-intrusion stripe.

Bergfulview

The 40-minute walk back to base.

Field Training

As part of our field training I did an overnight hike in the Vestfold Hills with four others and a Field Training Officer - six hours out to Brooke's Hut, including navigation and survival training; then an overnight bivvy out on the cold hard ground (despite the fact that the hut was enticingly warm and had six comfy bunks with big down sleeping bags inside); and then some training in ice travel techniques and the walk back the next day.

When we left Davis on the first day the wind speed was technically gale force. Being hardened expeditioners we ploughed on regardless (i.e. we whinged but the FTO made us go anyway). When we got to the hut we had a few cups of tea and a game of scrabble we found on a shelf (written on the side of the box was: "All pieces checked and present - 12 Nov 1977") and cooked dinner. A group who had been out quad training joined us at the hut - they'd been aiming for a hut further inland but the sea ice was dodgey so they had to track back to Brooke's. We packed in and yakked on until about 11 pm when we went outside to get into our bivvy bags for the night. We did this despite the fact we could see snow blowing horizontally past the hut windows and we could hear the howling gale whistling around the hut. This is because we are tough (i. e. the FTOs kicked us out despite procrastination and grumbling).

Once we'd each found a rock to lie behind and out of the wind it actually wasn't too bad. The weather calmed down pretty quickly too. The only problems for me were (a) being too hot with all my clothes on inside the sleeping bag, and (b) realising only after I'd closed my eyes that no one was going to turn the lights off until some time in February, so I'd better work out some way to get to sleep in the glaring light. For Volker there was a problem (c): he got attacked repeatedly by a giant scavenging bird called a skua who would rush up at him and try and eat his ears and foam mat. So he got up in the middle of the night and relocated to the hut.

We hiked back via Deep Lake. The Vestfolds are very difficult to describe or depict. In photos they tend to come across as bland, low, brown, dry hills with stripes. The photos know bugger-all! To walk through the Vestfolds is to walk over silty soil, shaped like a beach-edge by meltwater and wind, and strewn all over with the most amazing and varied rocks. Some are layered and twisted like knotted timber; next to those will lie rocks which shimmer with rose and jade and purple quartz crystals; near those will be smoothed dolorite lumps. It's the sort of environment that makes you gnash your teeth for want of a geologist who will explain what the hell is going on. The stones strewn over the ground are crystalline and shiny; the more you watch them sparkle as they go past your feet, the more they contrast to the dry landscape around you, until it seems you are walking through a valley of precious gems.

The other remarkable thing about the Vestfolds is their lack of human history. You cannot see the landscape through the filters of ancient culture or civilisation or art; there has been none. When you look at a photo of Chinese trees and hills, for example, they tend to look 'typically Chinese' - you see the features that Chinese art has accentuated through the years: the tall lines of the bamboo, the purple shadows of vertical cliffs and so on. The Vestfolds are devoid of these overtones; you have to see them as they really are. They do not appear on postcards; unlike the Eiffel Tower or Uluru you cannot have cultural saturation of their images until you are actually there, walking amongst them. As a result, exploring the Vestfolds felt something like I was the first to walk on the moon.

D is for Davis

Saturday was the D-is-for-Davis party. The rules: dress up as something beginning with D. We all raided the dress-up cellar. I picked through the floral dresses with a thumb and forefinger and imagined all the big bearded guys who had worn them in past years. I settled for deer antlers and a tail made from plaited climbing rope from the field store. Clare and I: Deux Deer, Dasher and Dancer. Among the others were Daisy the Dairy Cow, Drag Queens (surprise surprise), Diana Ross, doctors, the real doc came as a diesiologist, Merrick came with a cardboard donga (=sleeping cabin!) on his head, there was a daffodil, Chris was a dog but got asked several times "What are you... a cat?" so that didn't quite work so brilliantly, um, there was a rather brilliant Derro complete with the Big Issue, a devil, a dentist, a tribute to Delta...

Clare reapplies Angus', uh, Dido's lippy.

The next afternoon, after everyone recovered, a few of us made some Christmas decorations in preparation for the upcoming celebrations. I taught some origami spikey geometric stars and stuff. A good, lazy Sunday.