The Blog

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The doctor and I made our way back to our seats. I was close to passing out for real. My legs were like jelly. Technically, as the winner of our round, I should have moved on to the next heat but Londiwe was very sweet and said that I had done enough. The winners were engineer cadet, Kwasi Ampomah, jointly with deck cadet, Mzamoyakhe Mngoma, for the men and deck cadet, Priscilla Afful, for t…

So, what about Christmas? Well, the temperature was around 24°C. We were a little over three hundred miles to the west of northern Namibia and the sea was pretty calm although there was a freshening breeze from the south which made us pitch slightly more than we have recently experienced. Having said that, it certainly didn’t dampen the celebrations which were conducted with great energy and…

Christmas Day on SA Agulhas   It has been a long day, but what a day! Breakfast at 7.30 was a simple affair but included homemade bread and cakes. My admiration for the catering team under chef, Mogamat Khan, and chief steward, Clint van Rooy, is boundless. They have performed miracles every day and today they surpassed themselves. Before I go into a description of the day’s activities, it…

Merry Christmas everyone! Just had the treat of hearing Anton Bowring speak live from the ship on Radio 5 Live with Colin Murray. He did very well, but sadly the comms went down after about 5 mins just as he was about to mention the website and Seeing is Believing. It’s 25C and sunny where they are today, 300 miles west of Namibia. Due to arrive in Cape Town later in the week. Anton may b…

We are well south of the Equator now at a latitude of 7°S. They say that, in the northern hemisphere, water draining from a basin rotates in a clockwise direction as it goes down the plug. In the southern hemisphere it rotates in a counter clockwise direction. So what happens at the Equator? Well, I can tell you that it can go in either direction. Admittedly I didn’t try it on this voyage but on…

A big thank you to the management and staff at The Barn Hotel in Ruislip for their generous hospitality the psst two nights. We’re coming to the end of our two-day film and edit training at Panasonic’s offices at Pinewood Studios. The three… Ice Team members are a little over-whelmed at the prospect of having to do so much documentary filming work (on top of their education, science and sponsor…

Second blog from Anton Bowring aboard the SA Agulhas: It’s Sunday and we have now been at sea for 10 days. The weather has been very good. We are now in the trade winds which blow pretty constantly and provide the north easterly air flow that enabled the sailing ships such as Cutty Sark to run before the wind, sometimes at great speed. For us in our motor ship the trade winds are less important…

All, You may be interested in the following link which shows the current sea ice conditions around the Antarctic continent. Unfortunately there has been a recent satellite failure which is preventing us getting the normally available high resolution pictures – so this is the best at the moment. http://www.polarview.aq/images/25_SSMIS/latest/antarctic.gif For those that are interested, it’s wort…

Spencer Smirl is the Ice Team’s lead mechanic (and a proud Canadian). He will be flying out to Cape Town later this month: “Enjoyed an interesting day of medical examinations on Tuesday in London. We spent the day participating in a variety of tests to provide a base measurement for the human studies we will be completing in Antarctica. The eye tests were the most interesting. We had very…