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

with the Sandefjord Twins behind it. Derek came up to meet us and we all made for
the knoll north of Coffer Island, which was a plane table station, getting some useful
intersections. The cairn there was built by Discovery Investigations. It was very cold,
so we returned to camp by 7 o’clock. Supper was bacon in hash, which was good;
again no luck with the radio. Derek checked the paraffin supply; we had used 5 11ths.
The temperature was -21°C, but had risen to -l9°C by 9 o’clock.
On 28 July there was a strong wind all through the night and I didn't sleep well.
The inside of the tent was quite heavily rimed, and the temperature was -16°C when
I looked out. Drift and low cloud reduced the visibility and survey was out of the
question. Also it was bitterly cold in the wind. We decided to lie-up until the weather
improved. I was glad to have finished my week's cooking and spent the morning in
my sleeping bag, but was very uncomfortable as there was a large wet patch, where
water had soaked through the old groundsheet.
We went out after lunch and examined the moraines on each side of The Divide.
A large chinstrap penguin rookery appeared to extend all over this area to a height of
300 ft. A sheathbill appeared pecking at tins and later a Dominican gull flew over.
We brought the radio indoors and thawed it out hearing Ralph clearly at 9 o’clock
calling a sledge-party and John on C/W, but weren't sure whether he heard us. It
seemed that the set would not work at low temperatures, which was very annoying
as we had to pull it and the lead-acid batteries, a considerable addition to our loads.
The wind continued all day so we remained in camp; there was no clearance in the
weather either.
The gale continued throughout the night with unabated force. There were loud
reports as gusts hit the tent, preceded by a rumbling as they approached. We were
camped on the sea ice - not good practice - and the tide-crack groaned at intervals as
it moved with the tide. Several more cracks formed near the tent, but none passed
through it as yet! I slept warmly, if not well, and it was very pleasant not to have to
prepare breakfast. Strong winds and drifting snow continued next day and the
temperature was -14°C - going down. There was no sign of the ice in the strait
breaking up, but our arc of visibility was limited. I thought the younger ice north of
the islands must have broken up. Powell and Laurie Islands were clear. At 1 o’clock
the wind appeared to abate slightly, although visibility was still very low. We made
our way south down the coast, crossing to the nearest of the Robertson Islands and
continuing around it and so back to The Divide by 6 o’clock. The rock of the island
we visited showed stages in the transition from conglomerate to schistose rocks and
the conglomerate was wind-sculpted. It was too windy to carry out any survey work,
but I kept an eye open for traces of penguins. It appeared that there were extensive
rookeries on all of these islands. The weather worsened and clouds poured over
Coronation Island, blotting out Signy. One got an interesting north-south crosssection
of the weather from our vantage point.
It was very hot in the tent during the night of 30 July (-10°C), despite a howling
gale which flapped the canvas. I found it so warm that I lay half out of my inner
sleeping bag and little sleep was possible because of the violence of the storm. Due to
melt beneath the floor it was sinking deeper and we must move the tent. The
temperature next morning was -11°C, with a variable wind and reasonable visibility.
The paraffin can had 3 inches left, that was 4 days at 3 4 inch a day. We moved the tent
about 20 yards onto a new site on wind slab snow. At about 1.30 pm we left camp
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