The end of the dream - 5 September to 11 September

For a long time after I arrived on Gough, it did not seem like it was real. It felt like a dream, at times a bad dream but mostly a wonderful one. After several months that dream ended and Gough was real, in all its beauty and uniqueness. It was the world outside of our tiny isolated island that ceased to be real and became a place of memories and voices on the far side of a telephone line. With takeover starting next Saturday (the 17th), the real world is invading Gough and taking away much of the "specialness" of our island. I don't resent that out time here as a small group is ending, in fact I look forward to new faces, stories and people to help with the work but I know that I will always miss the quietness and relaxed tempo of live before takeover.

A Yellow Nosed Albatross preparing its nest

I was not here for takeover last year but still the island is beginning to resemble the island on which I arrived in December 2010, the Yellow Nosed and Sooty Albatrosses, the Great Shearwaters, Broad Prions and even the Rockhopper Penguins have all begun to return. Every moment you spend outside in the daytime is filled with the KEEEEEaaaaHHHHH of the Sootys as they spin, turn and dive above the cliffs.

This has been a month of "lasts" for me, last visits to all the special places on this island, before the crowds arrive, to fix them in my memory forever. This will probably be my last post from Gough because I am sure that I am going to be worked to a standstill during takeover and will probably not have time to post updates. So for those you faithful readers who have developed a dependency and need your fix, it is cold turkey for you, good luck. I will write a final post about takeover and the voyage home on the Agulhas but that will be posted from home and not from Gough.

Gonydale