Friday 24 August 2012

Recreating Antarctic Spaces

Before heading south to the Antarctic in 2008, I was instructed in keeping a journal by a very knowledgeable and wise young woman:

"Describe what you can't see in a photo. The taste, smell, internal emotion. Record conversations, thoughts and feelings, looking back, it will help re-create the space you were in at the time".

These are words that I have always remembered. The woman who told me these very words is now writing her own book, an impressive feat! And I have kept journals on each of my journeys; Germany when I was 16, Sub Antarctic in 2008, the Antarctic, Arctic..... (I now have eight). Some are more detailed than others. Some are full of doodling art, meandering as I meandered through a plane flight. Others are full of self analysis! But I often go back and read through them, trying to find good words to describe a place or time, and relive my personal experience of that place.


Interested person - "Wow, you have been to the Antarctic?? I have always wondered - whats it like down there?"
Me - "Well, its hard to describe, but....
Here is a clip from Wednesday 18th December 2008, 745 am:
"Antarctica is HUGE. Had the most awesome view whilst on the toilet last night, the sun was waaay over in the west and it was reflecting on this mountainside in such a way I HAD to take a photo while still on the toilet".

The Toilet from which the photo was taken.



I am ALWAYS stumped by this: What words should I use to describe the places I have seen? I am yet to find a word that accurately conveys the right emotion, senses and description of the Antarctic. Each word I try undersells what I want to say, yet grander words are also unsatisfactory!





Interested person - "Was it cold?"
I bonded with my art.
Me - "Its cold in Antarctica, a dry, seeping cold that freezes your snot so your nasal passages bleed and your knees go stiff"

This excerpt, taken from my Antarctic Journal, 16th December 2008, (sometime around 10pm) suprised me. Reading it whilst sitting in the sun outside my flat in Christchurch (after the trip to the Ice), made it seem so unreal I could hardly remember writing it!

On one of our 'final' nights at Scott Base, we gave a short presentation (apparently tradition for PCAS students and Base staff), where we thanked everyone, then I got to claim my southernmost belly dancing performance, with a makeshift costume (christmas tinsel) and Mambo Number Five soundtrack... Good times, and such epic memories!
Camp PCAS at 11 pm on our first night in the field.



Wednesday 22 August 2012

All At Sea

Throughout my travels, I have met some wonderful people from a wide variety of backgrounds! The above link takes you to a short movie, made by Pascale Otis. This was filmed during the summer season of 2010, soon after our arrival in Perserverance Harbour of Campbell Island.

The Sub Antarctic Islands are very isolated! These storm-swept isles were home to many shipwreck survivors through recent history, where they would have to subsist on megaherbs (Stilbocarpa polaris reportedly tastes similar to celery!) and albatross.
I have travelled across the Southern Ocean in between Campbell Island and New Zealand in three different ships:
  • Heritage Expeditions on the Spirit of Enderby (72 m, ice strengthened, can travel up to 12 knots)
  • The Tiama (15.15 m, retractable keel and rudder, built by Henk Haazen)
  • The HMNZS Otago (New Zealand Royal Navy, 85 m, top speed of 22 knots)
View from the Tiama on the second day at sea....
First view of Campbell Island! It appears, a dark shape, hazy in the distance
Each of these boats have their pros and cons. I did enjoy the three days spent bobbing up, and down... up... and down... with the Tiama and her crew. It seemed a fitting way to arrive into the harbour, relieved that the sea was no longer heaving beneath us, watching for albatross in the sky and sealions in the water. Well worth the trip.



Such calm sea after three days fighting to keep lunch down! Incredibly relieving, and worth the 'perserverance'. You can just make out the old Met Service buildings, to the left of Beeman Hill.

52 Degrees South

Looking out towards Northwest Bay, from Col Lyall saddle, Campbell Island. Silvery Pleurophyllum hookeri leaves can be seen lying in rosettes, with the odd Bulbinella rossii with yellow brush-shaped flowers.


Campbell Island is one of the southernmost subantarctic islands of New Zealand. Its climate is constantly cool, often cloudy, and during two weeks in November/December, almost every type of weather was encountered! Horizontal rain, vertical rain, low fog and cloud, high winds and fog, snow and even some sunshine and blue skies.

In 2008, I was a lucky recipient of an Enderby Trust Scholarship - with Heritage Expeditions, I got to spend 8 days onboard the Spirit of Enderby, visiting the "Forgotten Islands of the South Pacific" (the title of our cruise). We visited Campbell Island, Auckland and Enderby Island, and did a boating trip around the Snares Islands.

Campbell Island was the most impressive in my opinion.
Megaherb field in 'Belinda's Garden', on Col Lyall, Campbell Island
 Not simply for being the southernmost, or home to the Southern Royal Albatross (and others!), or because sealions (Phocarctos hookeri) wait hidden in the tussocks far from the coast.
It was because this island, which seems so windswept, isolated and wild, was farmed for many years in the 20th Century. Sheep were the main livestock, and they ran rampant over the island - however since their removal in the late 80's, the megaherb flora, tussock grasses and small forbs have made an impressive comeback!

The last of the sheep were taken to Invercargill for research into back wool (can read more about them here: http://www.rarebreeds.co.nz/campbell.html).

Campbell Island is also the worlds largest island to have had rats completely eradicated! Once again, helping the unique flora regenerate simultaneously with insect fauna and birdlife.

As a botanist, once and always the best part of this island are the plants. Megaherbs are large, herbaceous, flowering plants which when compared to mainland relatives are simply HUGE! Imagine your lawn daisy, but its so huge it reaches your kneecaps. That is the awesome scale of our megaherbs.
From Left to Right: Anisotome latifolia, Pleurophyllum speciosum, Stilbocarpa polaris and Bulbinella rossii.




So it begins...

So it begins, this record and journal of botanical exploration in the polar regions of our world. Plants are often overlooked in the grand scheme, but these biological wonders help shape our world as we know it. And plants that are specifically adapted to live, grow and reproduce in the polar regions are stunning - often easily coping with conditions that, as humans, we would find impossible to endure.

Welcome to Plants and Ice: A story of Botanical Exploration