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

and West ends there are areas of low-lying tussock-covered land. Rounding
South Jason we now saw Flat, Grand and Steeple Jason Islands, blue on the
horizon, Steeple the most impressive with its knife-edge ridge. The coast of
Elephant Jason was wreathed in fine spray from the heavy swell and we were
sailing into the sun. But as we drew near we made out the main features of the
coast: it has high cliffs, caves and gullies, and off the Southwest point stretched
a number of small rocky islets. We passed around them to the north, retraced
our route and went up the south side. With great excitement I saw that the
most westerly, and smallest, of the islets was packed with fur seals - Johnny
Browning estimated about four thousand and I put it at more than three
thousand. The seals were lying on the Southeast shelving slopes and even on
the ledges of the steep cliffs of the northwest coast,. It was impossible to count
them, for they were closely-packed and many must have been out of sight in
gullies and depressions. It was impossible to land though, and after this
tantalizing glimpse we carried on up the south coast of Elephant Jason looking
for more accessible spots.
Several months earlier fires had been reported burning there and the
smoke had reached Stanley. ‘Cracker’ Davis was the only person to investigate
this, sailing from New Island in his small boat, via West Point where he picked
up a man to go with him. The peat fires were still burning high up on the
mountain. As we progressed along the North shore of the island, the cliffs
became lower and we found that the whole of the northern end was fairly flat
and tussock-covered, and with rocky beaches. We attempted to anchor in a
small bay, but the water was too deep, so we hove-to offshore and had
breakfast. The ship started rolling heavily, beam-on to the high sea and
everything came loose in the saloon - crockery, sugar, and condensed milk,
bread, mutton chops and God knows what else - all ended up on the floor. Ken
narrowly missed being swamped in the mess. I spent some time watching a
few hundred sea lions on the shore; the pups looked smaller than those on
Jack's Island.
We then made for North Fur Island and went in close, to North Fur Rocks,
but although the ground was suitable for fur seals we saw none. Flat Island
stretched along the western horizon ringed with heavy breakers; Eddy, who
had spent several weeks ashore there once, said that he had seen a lot of
driftwood on the beaches, but no fur seals. We came south again and at 10.10
am, were off the East Jason Rocks. We reckoned that the tide would turn in
about an hour’s time and as it was then setting from the east against the wind,
it was to be expected that the swell would decrease at slack tide and
afterwards. We hung around close to the rocks, getting very good views of the
seals and discussed ways and means of landing; we even seriously considered
putting out oil. But the sea from the Southwest swept up both sides of the
rocks and it was too risky to attempt a landing. Then a squall came up and so
we gave it up and left for New Island. (Then we had only a pram dinghy and
oars; many years later, with an inflatable rubber dinghy and powerful
outboard motor a landing might be possible in these conditions). Of course it
cleared again when we were headed southwards and we had very good views
of the Jasons - but the mainland remained obscured.
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