Stir Crazy

Five and half days’ sailing, and everyone is getting a bit toey.  We want to land!  However, the current easterly wind pattern has prevented us from landing at any of the Ross Sea sites on the way down to Ross Island and the Ice shelf, but there is a very strong possibility we will catch them on the way back up.  

Temperatures have certainly dropped, both inside and outside the ship.  A consistent series of lectures and movies has kept everyone entertained.  The highlight for many (so I have been told) was a musical evening presented by Wiebke (pronounced Vebka) and Felicity on guitar, with those old standbies, sugar and lentil-in-a-bottle percussion.  All sorts of old favourites were brought out for a rendition, like Country Roads (with everyone), True Colours, Knights in White Satin, several of Wiebke’s excellent originals, and Flick channeling Joni Mitchell with Big Yellow Taxi, and Fleetwood Mac/Eva Cassidy with Songbird.  The chef turns out to be a drummer so was also assisting with the biscuit barrel drum.

The word is get as much sleep as you can, when you can, because time becomes nothing down here in the land of no night, so I will be expecting to be making several landings around 2am!

Several history lectures later, it has become very clear to be why Amundsen made it to the South Pole and returned successfully, and why Robert Falcon Scott didn’t!!