Conditions: Brilliantly fine and sunny
Air Temp: 15 deg C
Sea Temp: 0.5 deg C
Wind: Light westerly
Sea State: Smooth
Visibility: Fantastic - can see forever
Barometer: 988 and steady
Latitude: 64 deg 49 mins South
Longitude: 63 deg 29 mins West
Saturday January 27th, 2001
It’s 4:30 pm. We are anchored behind a couple of tiny islets in Port Lockroy – a small British base of just 2 persons.
I’m sitting in the cockpit with my socks and shoes off in just an Icebreaker top and a pair of trousers. I have applied heaps of sunscreen lotion to avoid getting burnt in the powerful afternoon sun.
There is the lightest of breezes ruffling the surface of the bay. The water is a deep blue, flecked everywhere with white of lumps of floating ice. These melting lumps are fizzing like champagne in the sunshine as the bubbles trapped tens of thousands of years ago are released.
The noise of the gentoo penguins is ever present. As the breeze is blowing from the direction of one of the rookeries, the strong whiff of ammonia comes in waves on the wind. There is a small iceberg aground in the narrow channel immediately ahead. We are protected from the bigger ones in this anchorage by its shallower depths.
To port are the bleaching bones of a whale, ashore amongst the rocks. Behind, to port and to starboard, are ice cliffs, crumbling ice bits almost continuously into the bay.
There is a 1000-metre-high mountain right astern. Light clouds wisp off the upper ridges, clean against the clear blue untarnished Antarctic sky. In the distance there are mountains all around.
Also to starboard is an ice-and-snow ridge, perfectly smooth and white, which leads from down near the sea at the bay’s entrance, and gradually rises towards the mountains behind. As I look at this ridge, there are four tiny figures to be seen, roped together, heading upwards along the crest: I have just returned from dropping Janot, Alistair, Don and Jacqueline ashore. This is another practice session, in climbing kit with full survival packs (tents, sleeping bags, stove, fuel, ice-picks, crampons, etc). But it also offers the chance to get higher up for a glorious view beyond the immediate area. The huge William glacier feeds into the sea to the north; the Neumeyer Channel that we motored down early this morning with its 1200-metre peaks on each side is northeast of here; the Lemaire Channel is south – another passage formed by enormous pressures between continental plates.
Ollie, Marc and Andy are away in the black zodiac filming seals on the other side of the island where the British base is perched. Andy and Marc are in the water to film the penguins as they leave the island to fish – but have to run the ever-present gauntlet of the leopard seals first. It’s our divers’ first encounter with leopard seals and initial reports back show that the seals are not the least concerned by the divers. I am not sure if the reverse is true.
As we head south, the ice and snow on the land is thickening up. There is more of it. But the general thinking is that there is not as much as there used to be – that there is more exposed rock than ever before.
Global warming is having an effect. There is no longer any doubt about it.
Will it be enough of an effect to cause the oceans to rise? The latest thinking is Yes.
Antarctica has a hugely beneficial and generally unrealised influence on the rest of the world: on weather, on ocean currents, on life in the southern seas that needs the Antarctic ice to survive and thrive. We humans need the Antarctic to stay as it is – if it doesn’t, the consequences don’t bear thinking about. But it is changing – and definitely at a rate that is alarming…
Sir Peter Blake
"Having vision is not enough. Change comes through realising the vision and turning it into a reality. It is easy to espouse worthy goals, values and policies; the hard part is implementation."
Learn about Sir Peter Blake and his journeys around the globe