14 December: Sunshine in morning, cloudy and wind picked up in afternoon

We woke to sunshine on one of the peaks of the 7 sisters mountain range. Laura had an interview with the Guardian (bizarre to be interviewed while down here). Not sure which Saturday edition it will come out on. Jerome cooked French onion soup from dry onions. I reminisced about the time I made this soup at Signy and later the whole base levitated with resulting wind. Sure that this would not happen again as Jerome was cooking we tucked into a fine soup….. the same effect. You would not light a match down here but really don’t make French onion soup from dried onion it took a day to recover! We did a beach survey in the afternoon/evening. It is still difficult to access the west side of the island due to overhanging snow onto the shore but we found some plastic cabling and some red paint that had peeled off the windows of Bransfield House (the museum). This gets logged and we are hoping that some of the buildings that are looking quite tatty might get a lick of paint this season maybe when the carpenters arrive (should be Christmas Day). All was then quiet until the two yachts in the bay decided they would like us to do a shop on board. Two of the team went onboard a Russian ship (Aurora) followed by a French ship (Mon Coeur). It was quite bizarre and involved much sorting of requested stock, so they could purchase on board ship. It seems a strange thing to do and was finished around 10, but yachts tend to spend quite a bit so something like £3000 is spent on two yachts and we also got boxes of fresh fruit and vegetables so all was well.

15 December; cold, windy. Penguin count- 622 nests (746 eggs) on Goudier Island, 25 nests on Bills (35 eggs).

The morning was spent doing the full island count of penguin nests and eggs. Clickers, clipboards and a rather odd way we have to try and get to see the eggs. Back in the day when at Signy, we used to have a paint brush on the end of a stick and an orange paint pot so when you counted a nest you dabbed the nest with the paint. You would lift the penguin’s bottom and check how many eggs. All was over and done with quickly and you could leave the colony. Things change and you cannot touch the penguins. Instead, it is suggested you dangle a glove above them and try to get then to reach up to peck it enabling you to see the eggs. Well, this was pretty useless and seem to me to result in more stress than a quick lift of the bottom and away. The good news that after trudging through much guano over the rocks where the penguin nests were. Ee have counted about 100 more nests this year and if all remains well, we will hopefully have more chicks than last year too.

Afternoon was spent on a ship. Totally different feel to other ships. Felt authentic expedition type ship. Many Dutch passengers and crew, but then a lot of last minute deal backpackers on board who had hunted out a good last minute deal to get the trip. Met a Slovak man who had got drunk one Sunday evening , booked the trip and was flying on Wednesday heading for Ushuaia to pick up the ship. We did another fairly crazy shop, got a shower, got rid of all our rubbish and had six Gerry cans to fill up to replenish our water supply from the ship. Had my first gin and tonic since I have been down here and we left the ship at about 9pm. Good fun, lovely crew and passengers.

16 December: dingle day. Humpback whale day.

Well, what a morning… such a beautiful clear, sunny day. We were picked up at 8.30 after our breakfast and arrived on a brand new luxurious ship with a Exped leader called Scotty. Quite a cool US dude and staff could not make us more welcome. Breakfast number 2… OMG there was yogurt and most had full English! Feeling stuffed we sorted out the shop ready for passengers and Jerome and I did the presentation before the chaos of onboard shopping began. We had lunch there too then back to base to get two lots of stock ready for the two ships tomorrow and we are running out of the adopt a penguin offering. We have Adopt a Penguin parties which involves us playing loud music and compiling the bags with a cuddling penguin and information about your membership of UKAHT for the year with an official adopt a penguin certificate. So far in 6 weeks we have made over 450 penguin packs… more to arrive with the next cargo drop in the new year…. more parties.

The afternoon finished with a call that a humpback was in view, several beautiful sightings but no camera = no photo! Decided to go out again, take my SLR and spend some time in the calm late afternoon, watching penguins. Odd Adelie wandering with no intent and one Chinstrap. The colonies here are Gentoos, so seeing these is unusual. There were four Weddel seals on the outcrop called Bills too.

Got my blog for the UKAHT website done. We each have to take turns in writing each week and provide UKAHT with a few photos. Not sure when it will go up as lots of people are on holiday already for the Christmas break.

17 December 2023: a two ship day ….knackering

Oh my, a ship called The World arrived today. Zodiac out to it and it seemed such a a large hotel with many floors. It seems that the boat is owned by the guests. They buy apartments on the boats for mega money (many millions) and then an annual fee (100,000s). For this each has a right to suggest 3 years in advance, where the ship should travel to. If 50% of the occupants agree, that gets put in the itinerary. Quite bizarre and the only ship of its kind apparently. Needless to say, it seems they liked to shop. The manager wanted to treat us… 3 bottles of champagne and 6 bottles of wine for Christmas and a mega amount of Christmas treats…. they return in 10 days with another cruise so hoping for similar treats! We got back, had lunch and then back out to another ship for another presentation and more shop setting up and selling. It can be quite exhausting, keeping smiling in the scrum of passengers. Certain nationalities are very interested in stamps so spend ages fiddling and fussing about unimportant stamp related things…. patience is a virtue….

So, I am back in the Nissen hut having converted some food given us into a Rogan Gosh (2 bottles of) curry and a pear crumble…… we had been given so many pears and apples by several ships now, that we are on a mission to find ways to get through them. Another two ship day tomorrow then we are hoping to get a ship free day the next. First ship tomorrow has 300 passengers…. full of Germans. They have requested if we have a German scientist on the base. Laura is German and worked at the science museum as a museum curator but don’t think that’s what they want but we will see… we will see. We have to get off by 12 so there is absolutely no way we can get through all those passengers. There is going to be a scrum and staff will need to manage the crowds…….. deep joy. Update tomorrow… groan!

18 December: raining… what??

I am at 64 degrees south and it is raining?? I find that really quite worrying. It rained for most of the morning. We were up and out to be picked up by the German vessel at 8.30. We tried to make conversation with the 4 guys in the Zodiac but we established they were Russian then they decided they were Ukrainian but there was certainly a language issue. They also seemed to drive the zodiac so slowly even though it was bitter rain. Arrived drenched at the German vessel and as predicted the whole morning was a disaster. A boat full of Germans, all with credit cards that as they are European seem to have extra security on them so transactions will not get through unless two way authentication… then passengers have to pay for WiFi and most do not. Long queues of Germans very frustrated and poor Laura could understand all their swearing at the ship and of course they considered it our fault their bank wanted this from them. Decided was not worth getting upset with them and just did the British thing and smiled, said very sorry and endured 2 hours of this. We had predicted it would not work for 300 passengers and it did not….. we got home drenched and licked our wounds…. Have said to the ship that unless the internet is available for passengers then we cannot come back… which would be a shame as they kindly gave us pastries and 6 bottles of wine for our troubles…. our wine store is starting to look healthier for Christmas!

Out again at two, for another ship…. Was quite poorly organised so business was not busy and managed to use the ships internet well! Back home and we were all knackered. The rain had changed to snow in the afternoon. Few of us prepared the bags with merchandise for the shop tomorrow. We are back on a huge ship called the Nansen tomorrow so expecting more chaos… I might get to port this too.

19 December: dicing with death….? Ok maybe a little dramatic…

We woke to a wild island. Nissen hut was whistling and there were wavs in the bay… not a great sign. Yacht to be visited in the morning and a large passenger ship of 250+ passengers. Plan to split the team, 2 to the French yacht (logically Jerome, fluent in French) goes there this time with Bridie and the rest of us head out to the passenger ship to be joined by the other two when they are finished. Some dobt if we should be on zodiacs but the passenger ship said they were getting their most experience zodiac driver to assess the waters and the yacht was in marginally calmer waters in the bay. Radioed through that the driver thought it would be Ok but not at our usual landing site so we had the boat sed landing site so had to carry every bag, no resting bag in snow because of penguin guano. Got everything in the zodiac, bouncing up and down clambered in then holding on for a 5min journey. Wild, holding on to all the merchandised bags and frenched as waves over the boat and us. An interesting embarkation but we got there and then peeled ourselves out of our drench not so water proofs… there are limits to Gortex. It was always going to be a big shop but passenger’s zodiac cruises had been cancelled as it was too rough (ummmm…) so bored passengers= shoppers. Craziness and there are only so many purchases we can manage in 3 hours. Hardly came up for air and certainly no break…. General practice memories?  

Passengers turned away as we had to leave and get off as they were moving around to another bay and it was too dangerous to get a zodiac back to the island from around the other bay. Packed up again, disembarked into the wilds and got back to the island….. so wet and knackered, carrying everything back to the museum and the hut. So cold, and the hut at 10 degrees was not much better. Wrapped up in puffer jacket, thermals, handwarmers, hats and blankets. Eventually the gas fire worked wonders and we were up to 15 degrees… tropical.

We did a lot of tidying up, sorting out and one amazing thing was a huge cheesecake from the French yacht and take away chips and burger from the passenger ship… they do look after us… also did our clothes washing in the 3 hours we were there (and dried… not possible in the hut)! Have completed Jerome’s request to embroider a penguin on a serviette… a happy customer! So we hope for a better day tomorrow.. although currently another 2 ship shop day….

Hope everyone’s Christmas madness is OK and you are getting all the jobs done for this festive time.

If I do not get a chance to do this before the 25th Happy Christmas all those who have been reading this… you poor things! xx