Part I: Seals teeth and whales ears - Scott Polar Research Institute ...

to my bosom, while Derek fiddled with the set - but no joy. A Dominican gull flew
overhead and I decided that carrier pigeons would provide more reliable
communications - or sheathbills?
I took the planetable onto the crest of the low ridge behind the camp, fixed our
position and drew in a number of rays. It was bitterly cold; the temperature about -
24°C with a wind. This campsite was very fine. The tent stood at the mouth of a bay
shaped like a ‘U’, the two arms comprising our peninsula and on the other side a
wall of rock, which rose sheer for about 1,000 feet. The rounded part of the ‘U’ was
formed by two glaciers, which ended in ice cliffs of from 80 ft to l50 ft high. The
largest of these glaciers ran down from a beautiful triangular peak, which was in
shadow - all but the summit picked out in sunlight and looking very remote and
serene. Derek had been collecting some rocks and Charlie walking about to keep
warm. It darkened early, but we turned in feeling much warmer.
The temperature was up to -14.5°C next morning and everything felt very damp.
We had a lot of trouble with the primus, which refused to go until I refilled it with
new paraffin. By the time I had finished cooking breakfast and cocoa for lunch I was
quite groggy from the fumes and came out for air, just as a gentoo penguin was
passing, its tail dragging in the snow. We started about 2 o’clock and I felt very
unwell as we hauled the first sledge to a peninsula east of the two large crags. It was
laborious; we sank into the snow and on the return trip wore skis, which made
pulling easier, though uncomfortable. It was a longer pull than the previous day, but
still very short - perhaps 3 miles. We pulled through floes with drift snow in patches
and had relayed the second sledge by 6 o’clock. By then the weather was
deteriorating and we were in a thick snowstorm. The next headland looked too far
away for us to reach that day and so we stopped and camped in a less than ideal
situation at the foot of some crags. Derek geologised and found the rock was little
different from that on Signy Island. Again we had no success with the radio. It
couldn't be the batteries, as they were quite warm after hanging at the apex of the
tent for an hour. A snow petrel flew over. By this time I was beginning to feel really
hungry. But Charlie was a bit like the Dormouse at the Mad Hatter's tea party; he
had a struggle to eat all his pemmican, and then feeling full he sank back in his
sleeping bag and disappeared from sight.
We made an earlier start next day! Breakfast was finished by 11 o’clock and we
departed about 1 o’clock; but we were still taking too long over striking camp. That
day we managed to take the first sledge to The Divide in one pull. Derek's binding
broke at the same point as mine and he preferred to pull on foot. The temperature
that morning was -10.5°C and at night it was -12°C. It was so warm pulling that we
removed our anoraks. We made our way under the colossal precipices of the Divide
Range - the crags rose sheer from sea level for over 2,000 ft, seamed with avalanche
chutes and the upper part heavily iced. The rock here changed from the usual schists
of the rest of the island, to a massive conglomerate rock, which overlaid the schist.
An occasional snow petrel flew across the black crags and once we saw a pair of
shags against the sky far up.
We passed three promontories and on to the surprise of The Divide itself. To the
north was a twisted mass of ice with complicated icefalls and isolated small crags,
while to the south rose a small peak reminiscent of the Riffelhorn or Matterhorn. The
Divide itself was a narrow rift in the rock barrier, only about 6 ft wide and a few feet
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