A bit of a moan - 11 July to 17 July

A word of warning, I'm not in a good mood as I write this. Not at all. I was looking forward to three nights far away from Base and seeing the northern end of the island but that did not happen.

This was shaping up to be a good week and then it wasn't anymore. I had planned to visit the Giant Petrel colony on the west coast of the island to count the number of adult birds in the colony during winter. Since I needed to be there in the evening to get an accurate count this was going to mean a night out. I asked Michelle to come along because she is really the only person on the island who enjoys hiking for hiking's sake. She said she'd come in her next off duty period which happily coincided with a four day spell of reasonable weather. Since the weather was looking good we made tentative plans to hike further and maybe do a circuit of the northern end of the island which we have never seen.
All was going well until Robyn decided to invite herself along. Now the only reason she wants to come along is because she suffers from the Fear Of Missing Out or FOMO and not because she actually enjoys walking; in fact she has on several occasions told us how much she dislikes hiking. Anyway this was still OK because at least she is relatively fit. She would ask Prince to work a double shift and come along. That was until she decided at the very last minute that she would rather stay and let Prince come along "because it was his turn" (I really don't know where she got the idea we were taking turns). Now this was more of a problem because Prince is not fit but etiquette dictates that we can't just say he can't come along, so we set off on Saturday morning for Gonydale.
We arrived at the container, having taken four hours to cover five kilometers and Prince announced his legs were cramping and he would have to return. Prince is a very inexperienced hiker and we could not let him return to Base by himself and so we had to turn around and come back to Base with him. Seven hours in the drizzle and we had managed nothing.

Now this wouldn't bother me so much if it was just for fun and I didn't have work to do but I did and I was not able to do it because I had to play nurse-maid. For some reason people on this island feel that they are entitled to come along simply because they are on the island too. The others on the island have more free time on their hands than I do but, with the exception of Michelle, they are not prepared to even attempt to organize a trip further than a few hundred meters from Base. However, the moment I plan something, everyone and their dog feels that they are entitled to come along, like Remoras stuck to shark, even if the reason I am going is for field work. It would be OK if they were fit enough not to be a hindrance but they aren't. You can't sit in Base all day eating steak for breakfast and lunch and expect to be able to walk around the island. I am getting so tired of accommodating everyone for the sake of their feelings when they don't reciprocate at all. In the real world I would not invite my hypothetical non-hiking roommate for a four day hike in the Hex River mountains and he would not expect to be invited along and furthermore he would not be offended by it either. However come to an island and suddenly everything rational is suspended and the irrational prevails.

Gough Island is clearly not part of the real world and I am looking forward to returning to reality even if it means leaving this incredible, beautiful, unique, place of unparalleled wilderness behind.

Lastly, to those who have stuck it out through this week's tirade, I apologize for being so negative but it is difficult and would be duplicitous for me to pretend to be happy. Also, apologies for no pictures but I haven't taken any this week.

An ordinary week - 4 July to 10 July

Moonrise and sunset

The shenanigans of last week are behind us and everyone seems to be back on track. Spending such extended periods in close quarters doesn't make for amicable relationships and everyone was quite on edge and irritable. Thankfully, the better weather this last week has helped significantly with only a few miserable days here and there allowing us to get outside and enjoy the sunshine.

A lenticellular orographic cloud to the met staff, pretty to me

I have said goodbye to the last of my captured Moorhens, releasing the final seven from the large aviary on Friday. None of them seemed the worse for their ordeal although they had all lost about ten percent of their body weight in the six weeks since capture. This was not unexpected as they are not used to being confined in such large numbers in such a small area, rather like us! Anyway, they all survived and I have shown it is possible to keep Moorhens confined for six weeks. Which means that one further obstacle in the way of the plan to eradicate the mice has been removed.

The sunlight hours meter makes a interesting subject, I just wish I had a lens that could do this too.

John Cooper, one of my several bosses, has asked me to visit the Giant Petrel colony on the south west coast of the island to count the number of adult birds present during winter, to give them some idea of the numbers to expect during the mice eradication which is also planned for winter. He would of course ask this at the end of the longest spell of good weather we have had since April, just as the rain returns. Hopefully there will be a another break in the weather soon and I will be able to visit the colony and have something new to write about.

High cirrus cloud on a beautiful day

As the end draws nearer, both the feelings of anticipation of returning home and the reluctance to leave are increasing. It will be truly wonderful to come home and see everyone and everything but life here is (mostly) blissfully easy and stress free with no worries about anything really. Being on an island far removed form the hurly-burly of real life makes it easy to ignore things that used to be meaningful (but weren't really) and to have the freedom to concentrate on those things that really do matter. Maybe I'll stay, I quite like it here...
Just kidding I miss you all too much to stay here and life has to continue, doesn't it? It will be good to be home and no longer have to take vitamin supplements intended for pregnant women. I'm not sure what I am less of, pregnant or a woman, but scurvy is best avoided so eat them I will.

I wasn't kidding...

Emancipation and arguments - 27 June to 3 July

A Skua, sizing me up for dinner

First the emancipation: I got to free the moorhens from the little cages on Thursday, they had all survived their captivity relatively well, almost all had lost around 10% body weight, some more, some less. But survived they had. Judging from the squawking and flying feathers in the early hours of the mornings these past few days they have begun to return to their territories, only to find that they have been occupied in their absence and the new occupants are not over joyed with their return. I just hope that they will settle down soon because their favourite time to fight outside my window is at about 4 am just when you would rather be sleeping.

Red sky in the morning - Shepherds warning. Should have paid more attention... 

Next the argument: Leonie decided to really let her hair down on Wednesday night and got very drunk, which not a problem, we have all done it at some point. At some point in the evening she thought she saw John making some sign behind her back and at this point Mount Leonie erupted, spraying burning rage everywhere but principally at John. She threw the worst tantrum I have ever seen. Three year olds behave with more maturity when you take their toy away. I actually cannot believe that an adult can behave that way. John's parentage, his mothers fidelity, John himself, his leadership skills, everything was fair game. It mattered not one iota that Robyn, who had seen the whole thing, maintained that Leonie was misinterpreting what had happened. This continued for ages and eventually with no end in sight I went to bed. Unfortunately, walls here are thin and my bedroom is close to the bar so I was still able to hear the screaming. To John's credit he had apologized and was simply letting it all wash over him, doing nothing to provoke her further. Eventually, Leonie left the bar and went to her room and I managed to get some sleep. We did not see her until two evenings later at supper on Friday when she apologized to everyone and put an end to it.

Can I come home now, please?

Mid-Winter and first snows - 20 June to 26 June

A skua patrolling for stragglers.

This has been a good week, the weather has been good, the skies have been mostly free of clouds and there have only been two days that the weather has forced us inside for the entire day.

Swemgat filled with fresh snowmelt water.

Tuesday, the 21st, was the Winter Solstice or Mid-Winter's Day which, as it marks the start of longer days, is party time all across the Antarctic continent and its islands. The island's inbox has been overflowing with tongue-in-cheek invitations to attend Mid-Winter parties at all the bases scattered across the white south. Sadly due to slight issues with transport we were not able to attend any of the parties and had to be content with enjoying ourselves here. To celebrate we all went for a swim at Swemgat, a large pool in the river near base. The water was only two degrees above freezing and after our swim we all unanimously decided that it was a really stupid idea and something that we should never, ever repeat! To warm up we returned to base and had a fondue and a large pot of Glühwein.

A light dusting of snow on the Rowetts

We had our first snowfall on Monday night (or at least the first snow we have been able to see from base) and Michelle, Robyn and I went up South Peak on Wednesday to see it. I also used the chance to visit Gonydale and check the Tristan nests. Sadly, many have failed as the mice become more hungry and start attacking the nests. So far, about a quarter have failed and more will follow as winter continues. Words cannot convey how sad it is to see the damage that mice do to these magnificent birds. Chick carcasses lie next to the nests, consumed from the inside out. It is horrific.

An Albatross chick, rather the worse for wear because its nest was in a stream. Rather poor parenting.

The weather has been so kind to us that we even managed a fishing trip yesterday and caught several large Five finger all around three kilograms. The fishing here is marvelously easy, just bait your hook, cast and wait a couple of minute until the fish take. If you don't have something after about five minutes, your bait is gone. The fish made a magnificent sushi starter for last nights braai.

Otherwise, life continues in the usual fashion. Minor disputes lead to sulking and hiding in rooms but that is island life for you. Not all sweetness and light unfortunately. Hopefully they will get over themselves or at least pretend (for everyone else's sake, if not their own) that everything is ok.

Family interest: This is the Gough Scientific Survey team who spent a year on Gough from 1955 to 1956. My grandfather's cousin Roger Le Maitre is the second from the left in the middle row.

They said it would rain and boy were they right! - 13 June to 19 June

The weather has not really improved since my last post and well, it is really starting to rain on my parade, quite literally. I amazed that Gough has survived as long as it because with the amount of rain we are having at the moment I would have thought that it would have disappeared into the sea long, long ago. To put it in context, the recent floods in the Eastern Cape were caused by about 80mm of rain in about twenty hours. We had 80mm in two hours the other day, which is not unusual and somehow the island is still here and not a muddy streak with some plants floating in it in the middle of the south Atlantic ocean.

The weather today for instance, Gough Island is the tiny dot just to the left of the "G" of "Gough"

The mud is worse too, I've been doing some burrowscoping of Atlantic Petrel Burrows to recover GLS trackers deployed by the biologists last year and for every five minutes the burrowscope spends in a burrow, I spend about half an hour cleaning the lens. As you may have gathered, the burrowscope is not my favourite object and at the beginning of this week when it refused to operate, there was much celebration, I mean sadness. Unfortunately, it was just a loose connection and it recovered quickly and much to my disappointment it is now working perfectly again. Not that it really matters because the Atlantic Petrels are not back yet, even though according to the bird book they should be. I shall persevere with the burrowscoping next week and hope they turn up soon.

An Atlantic Petrel, the photo was taken by the '05-'06 Gough biologist team

The incessant rain means that opportunities for getting out and further than an hour away from base are limited. Which means that I spend more and more time in base with everyone else. For Leonie, John, Prince, Mornay and Robyn (though to a lesser extent) the weather hasn't changed their behaviour that much. They have always spent most of their time in or very near to the Base, irrespective of the weather. However for Michelle and I, who have spent most of every nice day outside it is a major change and not a particularly nice one. There is only so much work that I can do inside and when that is done I am left with watching movies, series or reading books. I really wish Gough was more like Marion Island, where there are huts all over the island, or even if there was just one hut on the northern end of the island it would be great because I could spend some time away from the base and the increasing feelings of confinement and cabin fever. Don't get me wrong, I'm not going to haul off and start killing people with an axe but some time away would be wonderful. I could go camping but the thought of being trapped in a tent for days on end is worse than staying here so that is out. It also means that I don't have any new photos to post this week but the internet has provided.

I just want to say thanks to all of those people who email, Facebook or call me. It is great to speak or write to you and to hear your news, especially as it is something new and different. It is not that it is unpleasant to speak to the rest of the team here but we are deprived of much in the way of new stimuli and therefore most conversations are reruns of earlier ones and you have a really good idea of what anyone's opinion on almost any topic will be before they open their mouth. So it is you, my dear friends, who keep me sane and give me something to talk about and that is priceless!

The 21st of June is the winter solstice and we shall be having a big party to celebrate as is the tradition at all the Antarctic scientific bases. It will be good to unwind and party a bit.

Have a good week.

Weather delays - 6 June to 12 June

Sorry that I have delayed your Monday morning fix today but it was due to factors well beyond my control. The weather has been, well, shocking of late and the satellite system really struggles when it is raining which means that our internet connection was either down or really slow last night. It is still raining today (so much for my schedule!) but the connection seems much better so here goes.

Bad weather has once again been the theme this week but that is pretty much par for the course on an island with 300 rain days a year. Additionally it seems that we have some catching up to do as the weather has really not been bad at all this year with plenty of stunning days to get out and explore this beautiful island.

It is simply wonderful to have workplace outdoors rather in, however it does mean that on the days when it is pouring and I have work I cannot postpone or delay, I have to suck it up and get soaked. I had thought that there could not be anything worse for raingear than fynbos but I was wrong. The bracken here has destroyed two pairs of really nice eVent rain pants and is slowly killing my jacket too. The only upside is that I didn't have to pay for the gear myself, which is nice :-)

The walrus-deer of Gough, very rare and seldom sighted

My moorhens in the small cages do not seem to be adapting well to captivity, they all have lost around 10% body mass which is really worrying especially since they are not under fed at all. I am waiting for advice from up the food chain as to whether I should release them early and write off the trial. The last thing I want to do is kill members of an endangered species!

It started out as a nice day...

As coming home nears, we are all becoming more and more apprehensive, worried that we will not find the opportunities that we are seeking, that friends and family will have changed or that we will have changed greatly. Living here is a wonderful stress free cocoon, free from the worries of the world. Everything seems to pass us by with little or no effects on us. Politics, disasters and crime, these are all things that happen to other people far, far away and not here. The thought of returning to a world where these things will be happening to us is rather unappealing  Maybe I should offer to do another year here... Just kidding! The positives of returning far outweigh the negatives, especially seeing friends and family again. You are what really matter and it is you who have gotten me this far and will get me the rest of the way until I can see Table Mountain again. That is going to be a very, very good day.

A wet week - 30 May to 5 June

Commuting to work on Gough is rather different to my old commute, less traffic, no road rage, bad drivers or insane taxis. It has different challenges, such as fording flooded rivers rivers after the island has had 60mm of rain in three hours... All that river crossing advice that I have (luckily) avoided ever having to use back in the mountains at home has proven very useful here. Any of those of you reading this who think that this island sounds like a kayaking paradise are sadly mistaken. All the rivers here are clogged with low trees. You would be trapped in a strainer so fast, you would never have a chance. Sea-kayaks, however would be wonderful. Even now in winter we have days that are flat calm and would be absolutely wonderful to explore the island from the sea. You'd just have to find some way to circumvent DEA's silly policy about no swimming in the sea...

The river in question. It was thigh-deep at the shallowest place I could find.

So as I said, it has rained rather a lot this week and is due to rain some more tonight. There is a big cold front passing just south of us at the moment. For those of you are interested in these things, the pressure has dropped 20 millibars since 6 a.m. and is still dropping. Should make for a fun night!

All this rain plays merry hell with my work schedule because the only thing you can predict about the weather on Gough is that you can't predict the weather on Gough. Weekends and weekdays have ceased to have any real meaning, work happens when it is not raining too hard. Otherwise I spend my time writing reports, which are something else the job description did not include: Requires ability to write endless reports that no one will ever read. That would surely have stopped me applying for this job.

One clear night to see the stars and moon

Other than the weather there has been nothing else momentous, or even notable to recount this week. Have a great week yourselves. Bundle up warm, I hear it is cold in the Cape.