A Trip of a LifeTime (Part 3)

-Pramod Aryal

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I browse through the clothing kit that was given to us by BAS. It was like Christmas/Dashain. There were a lot of things from socks to warm jackets. I put some of them on and went for site visit. It turned out that I was a bit overdressed. Boots that I was wearing was about 5kg. I wore five layers on top and three layers on bottom. After all that, I was just about ready to roll than walk. I was walking like astronauts in their space suit. I was not taking chances of being cold again after what I experienced on my arrival. The radar site was in the North beach. There was strong Northerly wind which was bringing the iceberg from the ocean towards beach. It was amazing view with all these icebergs everywhere. I had trouble walking forward because of my excessive dress up and the strong wind. Just out of curiosity I started to walk backward. I could almost lie back and would not fall over. The wind was that strong.

The site was in picturesque location. All the antenna locations and base to make antenna were already setup by Peter. The cables were layed out. We could just about to start to work on Antenna. Radar hut was small and congested. It already had radar in there. We had to share the space. Outside there was beach on one side and a small hill on other. After observing site, we started to work on the system straight way.

The view from the antenna field

In the evening Neil and I took a walk around the point. We walked along the beach. There was the small stone hill on our right. It was windy, fairly cold and I was overdressed. It was difficult to put steps in right spot due to stones, boots and the wind. There was no set path to walk. We had to make our way through the stones going up and down. The view was breath taking. There was some wave in Ocean and icebergs were slowly getting drifted by the wind. During the walk, I encountered my first Weddle Seal. It was perfectly camouflaged in the stones. It did not seem to be bothered by our presence and kept on sun bathing. Neil mentioned that Weddle Seals don’t get bothered but if it is fur Seal, it will try to scare you off. Fur Seals are very territorial. Further down the track there were 3 penguins. I went close to them but they were also not bothered by my presence. Then I realised with their sense of defence, how would they made so far in hostile evolution. Perhaps they didn’t have powerful predators.

Socialising Penguins

During the Siberian huskey era for the Antarctic exploration, Seals were shot down for the feast for the dog right there in North beach of Rothera. The bones of the seals were still there on the beach. It might have been so easy to shoot them and too easy for dog to catch them judging from their sense of defence. Now dogs are banned in the Antarctic and strong rules are in place to protect the unspoiled natural wonder of the Antarctic. Those seals drowsing lazily on the beach are now safe and had nothing to worry about.

Relaxing Seal

After the walk it was dinner time. All the personnel gathered in cafeteria for the meal. It was very social environment. Everybody seemed relaxed and chatting with each other about the things they did that day. There were two chefs and maximum of about eighty people. Some people were out in the field. In summer time number in the base goes up to one hundred but in winter it drops to only 25. There were people in the base who had been there for two years continuous. It must have been very difficult thing to do being in middle of nowhere for such a long time. No grass, No trees no sweaty hot days…only 25 people regardless of whether you get along or not. For few minutes, I imagined being that situation but then realised that I could not have done it. Even though it was truly amazing place but living away in isolation from everything else did not appeal me.

At night! When I went to bed it was a weirdest feeling. It was 11:00pm but it was still bright outside. No sun but still bright. I could still see the glacier in front of me. My room mate was already sleeping. I could not meet him that day. I made up my bed and went to sleep. I could hear the cold wind blowing fiercely outside but I was too tired to be disturbed. I slept straight way.

Next day when I woke up, my room mate was already gone. I still didn’t get to meet him. That day I was wondering whole day who that might be. I looked around during the breakfast and lunch time to identify who that might be but no success. For the next few days, I spent most of my time installing radar. Someday weather will favour us but sometime we would get blizzard, horizontal snow blowing at our face. It would hit me so hard that it felt like being poked by needle. We worked through this condition to finish up work early so that we could relax later and be certain that system would run smoothly. Every time I walked to the North beach for the work, I always got stunned by the beauty of icebergs glowing in greenish colour and seals making iceberg their bed and just drowsing off. Not to mention the wall of glacier on the opposite side of where we were working. The beauty of that was embedded in my mind forever.

Working hard at work (in red coat) and relaxing on an iceberg afterwards. The sizes of the icebergs are seen in perspective.

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