Random Writings

Now that the sea ice has cleared out, the boating season is in full swing: Rothera has five inflatable boats which are mostly used to support diving and marine science, but on Saturday afternoons the boatmen (Andy and Bernard) do pleasure cruises to the Leonie Islands, which are a few km from Rothera.

Rosie and Bernard model the Rothera Nautical Collection

I was on one of these last Saturday, and enjoyed myself hugely. You start in the boatshed, and manoeuvre yourself into a big orange survival suit (orange clothing is de rigeur down here, you get used to it!) and then walk down the slipway to the boats. We spent a very pleasant afternoon whizzing around looking at icebergs, penguins, cormorants and other wildlife, and then headed over to Lagoon Island for a cup of tea. Lagoon is named for the shallow lagoon in the centre of the island, which is a popular spot for elephant seals – we saw a large number of juveniles dozing in the summer sun – and has a pleasant little wooden hut which is used for biosciences expeditions and jollies throughout the year.

Juvenile elephant seals – they grow a long snouty nose in adulthood

Lagoon Island Refuge

Andy and Layla have tea at Lagoon

Fortified by a cup of tea made on the Primus stove, we headed back to Rothera, but stopped to take pictures of a leopard seal lounging on a small berg. Leopard seals are the only really dangerous animal down here – a young biologist, Kirsty Brown, was drowned by one a few years back – and they eat penguins and (sometimes) other seals.

Leopard seal

In this case, the pictures really are worth a thousand words!

This entry was posted on Sunday, January 29th, 2006 at 12:25 pm and is filed under Antarctica.