Christmas and the Amery Ice Shelf

It's been a while since I've found the motivation to write in my blog, but here I am again to tell you who are interested what I've been up to for the last month.

A lot has happened and as is usually the case it feels like the time has gone extremely fast, while at the same time giving the impression that much more time has passed than actually has. Perhaps that doesn't make sense, but I've always found this particular sensation hard to explain.

Christmas day was amazing. We had a visit from a short and skinny santa claus, who would deal out gifts to each and every one of us provided we sit on his lap, and his loyal elves who I think were all at least 2 metres tall. It was a twisted christmas scene. I'm not sure, but I think santa was getting a little 'handsy' with some of the females.

From my secret santa I received a survival kit for the then up-and-coming trip to the Amery Ice Shelf. This comprised a bottle of wine, some lollies for sanity and energy, and some delicious swiss chocolate with almonds. Too good! A little touch of civilisation to lift weary spirits when contending with the desolation of a flat, endless plane of ice. For lunch we dined on turkey, lobster, prawns, oysters and delicious creme brulee. So amazing. I hadn't tried lobster before and it was novel that the first time was in Antarctica.

We had some of the expeditioners from the Russian base visiting for christmas as well and a couple of them got completely fucking smashed. One skinny guy was dancing around, feet flying everywhere and managed to hurt my mate's ankle and knock over a bottle of red wine on separate occasions. I also have a good photo of an older Russian dude who ended up dancing a little too close for comfort with Amy, one of our met forecasters.

We spent some time that night out in the smokers' hut. The smokers' hut is the dingiest and most rank-smelling place on station, but it's always where the best conversation flows and it ended up being where most of the Russians spent most of the day and night. At one stage we were all blown away when Amy's friend grabbed the dodgy station guitar that lives in the room and belted out an incredible rendition of House of the Rising Sun, in Russian. There are few things that sound cooler than that did. I'll try to remember to put up a video of it when I get it off Belinda, one of our comms officers.

It was a few days comprised of work and recovery and then I was off to the Amery Ice Shelf in order to help out with the AMISOR project (AMery Ice Shelf Oceanographic Research) . This was my first ride in a chopper! Yes! Finally! I'd been waiting for a while to get a ride in a chopper. It was starting to seem like I was the only dude on station who hadn't been out on one yet. I was pretty keen to get in. I said goodbye to Bianca, got in and we were off. Flying in a chopper is such a great way to see a place because you fly fairly low and there are windows through which you can look directly down beneath you. We flew over some amazing glaciers, icebergs, islands, penguin colonies and crevasses.

It took us about 3 hours and one fuel stop but we finally made it out to the Amery. I left the chopper, at about 17:30, had a quick chat to Al, the group leader and electronics engineer with the project, had a chance for a nap and then was put to work from 10pm to 8am. For the next 5 or 6 days, while the hole was being drilled, it was shift work for 12 hours between 8pm and 8am, alternating with the other half of the group. If you stop drilling, the hole starts to freeze in, so we had to keep plugging away. Somewhat unfortunately, my second night of shift work was new years eve. We spent the moment around midnight watching a depth gauge slowly creeping up as the drilling was gently lowered further into the hole. Conversation kept us going, but I was distracted thinking about what was going on back at station. It was a quietest new years I've ever had. I did pass around some nice laphroaig scotch to my fellow workers so that we could have something to signify the coming of the new year.

Life at the Amery was simple. Work, eat, read, sleep, eat work, etc. The guys out there had been working on the shelf for 6 weeks when I got there already, and were a lively, friendly, tight bunch of people. It was fun to live and work with them for a while, joking about wild chairs, the haunting Gillock Mist, and the detrimental effects of a 'big sister' christmas pudding. We baked bread in Elvis (the shakin' breadmaker), got our hot water from Urnie, and got our electricity from Mr. Hatz the generator. It seemed to me that the isolation had caused the Amery team to make new friends out of inanimate objects. That the kind of surreal shit that I love. Why can't everyone be driven crazy by isolation?!

For me, it was a good thing that progress on the project was must faster than initially anticipated, and I ended up spending a total of about 9 days out there. I think that was enough to take in the starkness of the scene and to get a feeling of life out in what, I think, will end up being the most remote place that I ever go to. Time enough, that is, to miss the station and head back right when I felt ready.

I made it back to station on Friday the 8th of Jan, and was greeted by a shit-fight of dramas with rumours abounding, and some feeling quite unsettled. This was furthered by the imminent arrival of the second voyage, deploying 18 new expeditioners to the shores of our mostly peaceful community. What would arise from all of this

I'll write more later.