From the Ice

We had another local foot excursion yesterday to a small area of ice seracs to the west of camp. A four hour outing which got us amongst some impressive scenery. Grins all round. If you look very closely you can just see camp right of centre – a small dark spot out on the plateau. Gives a great idea of the scale of this place. More pics on Flickr (as always!)…

Having spent four months holed up inside at one of the most inhospitable camp sites in the world, the Ice Team did not need much persuading to get their walking boots on… Check out this and dozens of other images taken over the last few weeks on our Flickr site here.

  Photo by Brian…

Today We were extremely fortunate to have had such good conditions yesterday and to have taken full advantage of them. Whilst the weather wasn’t bad today, the visibility has been quite limited and it would have been hard to do a meaningful reconnaissance of the route ahead . With that already done and some of the loads already moved through this tricky section, as we did yesterday, we had good…

Ian’s latest video from Antarctica was shot over a few days as the team were finally able to move camp. Having spent the last four months overwintering in the same spot, there was much to do before the Ice Team could finally get under way. This video encapsulates Ian’s good mood at getting back on the road and heading homeward at last. Treacherous crevasses and blue ice fields await them…

by Brian Newham Visibility wasn’t great this morning but it looked to be improving so we made a move. All four loads made it 5km to our old summer depot site. The edge of the mountains are now tantalisingly close and as the conditions improved they were a feast for the eyes. Soon we will be back amongst them. This afternoon we broke the loads down from four to seven in readiness for the tricky…

by Brian Newham A bright and sunny day but a wind gusting well over 60 knots (70 mph) added a bit more of a challenge. Surprisingly, despite the high wind there was very little drifting snow in the air and visibility was quite good, so we made a move. The two loads of fuel scoots went first and were dropped at 5km. Cabooses next and they then leap-frogged the scoots to a point just under 10km.

An almost cloudless start to the day but it quickly invaded from the east. The wind came and went and with it the drift, but overall it was a good day for travel. The first couple of kilometres were across blue ice, so for the most part we had to double-head with both Cats pulling each of the four loads. Once we were past that and got onto a firm snow surface the Cats could move independently…

1 What was your favourite subject at school? My favourite subject at school was science, more so Chemistry and Physics.  I enjoyed the precise working out of the blends of chemicals to obtain the correct outcome from the experiments.  But on the same note – the experiments when the teacher said ‘make sure you do not add more than the specified amount because….. “. These were taken into…

Good conditions today and we winched the cabooses up and over the hill followed by the remaining fuel scoots. All somewhat relieved to be beyond this obstacle and to have done so without any serious drama. We are now camped just to the north of the hill and are busy this evening reconfiguring the loads ready for the next section. Ahead of us lies a few kilometres of blue ice where traction could…