Cold Comfort
I get seasick having a bath. The English Channel? Feels like the Furious Fifties to me. Only now, I’m in the Furious Fifties, the vicious maelstrom of winds that circulate around Cape Horn at South America’s toe.
To counteract the effect of the nine-metre waves that are battering the Polar Pioneer, the converted Finnish research vessel on which we’re sailing, I’m wearing a tan-coloured sticker behind my ear. The size of a ten pence piece, it looks for all the world like a circular Band-Aid. But it isn’t a plaster, it’s a Scopolamine patch. And right now, it’s the only thing standing between me and a 24/7 appointment with the bathroom sink. Not for the first time on this voyage, I give silent thanks to the pharmaceutical boffins.
In the bunk opposite me, Glenn Shaw busily adjusts his kayaking gear. Immune to the movement of the ship, he’s lying on his bed for a different reason. As someone born with osteogenesis imperfecta (also known as brittle-bone disease), Glenn knows that if he’s caught moving about in his wheelchair when the ship is slammed by a wave, he could be tossed out and hurled against a wall or floor.
Glenn’s bones snap as easily as a dry twig on a winter’s day. And the Southern Ocean is no place to be stuck with a serious medical condition. If Glenn is to achieve his ambition to kayak off the coast of Antarctica, he must tap into his vast reserve of patience and sit out the three-day crossing from the Argentine port of Ushuaia to the comparatively sheltered Antarctic bays in which the Polar Pioneer is scheduled to drop anchor.
The Winston Churchill Memorial Trust generously provided the bulk of the funds for Glenn and me to sail to Antarctica. Even so, we needed to travel in steerage. Tradition dictates that the less expensive berths are lower down on a vessel. Height equals better views and a quieter passage away from the engine room, which is why first class is up top.
But in heavy seas, the higher on the ship you find yourself, the more you’ll feel the roll. On the first night that a heavy sea was forecast, I spotted one of the old Antarctic hands clutching a pillow and heading towards the lecture room in the bowels of the Pioneer. ‘The lower you go, the sounder you’ll sleep,’ he advised me. For the rest of the voyage, whenever house-sized waves were expected, I slept on the floor of the auditorium.
Until the advent of commercial and scientific air bridges to Antarctica, every person who wished to visit the continent had to board a vessel. Even today, the majority of scientific stations are based on the coast and re-supplied by ship. And aside from a lucky few visitors able to afford a flight to the interior of Antarctica, the majority of the 30,000-plus tourists who visit the continent each year do so by boat.
But still, compared to sailors in the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration, we’re on easy street. In his 1909 account of the Nimrod expedition, Sir Ernest Shackleton wrote: ‘Suddenly, one enormous wave rushed at us, and it appeared as though nothing could prevent our decks being swept, but the ship rose to it, and missed the greater part, though to us it seemed as if the full weight of water had come on board. We clung tightly to the poop rails, and as soon as the water had passed over us we wiped the salt from our eyes and surveyed the scene. The sea has smashed in part of the starboard bulwarks and destroyed a small house on the upper deck, pieces of this house and the bulwarks floating out to the leeward; the port wash-port was torn from its hinges, so that water now surged on board and swept away at its own sweet will, and the stout wooden rails of the poop deck, to which we had been clinging, were cracked and displaced, but no vital damage was done.’
Water, water everywhere
As well as the power of the sea, a few other things have remained unchanged in 100 years of Antarctic exploration. One of these is the moisture that pervades the coast. It penetrates every supposedly impervious waterproof-clothing barrier presented to it. Thirty minutes of exposure to the elements was all that it took to reduce my state-of-the-art, synthetic-clothing system to something that resembled a sheet of kitchen towel.
No matter what garments I threw at the weather, the result was always the same: by the time I re-boarded the Pioneer, I felt as though I had taken a three-hour cold shower while fully dressed. Yet 30 minutes later, both my clothes and myself were always dry, thanks to the ship’s effective heating system.
Other items of gear didn’t recover quite as well. Noticing my plethora of photographic and video equipment, a fellow passenger asked if anything could be done for her £1,000 camcorder. Bought the week before departure, it had been destroyed in two minutes by the corrosive salt air and a single wave. I was staggered that so much money could have been spent on a product with no thought to its protection in one of the most technology-unfriendly environments on Earth. By contrast, the system I used for protecting electronic equipment – which polar photographer Martin Hartley taught me – was geared towards preventing moisture from reaching my machines, and removing that moisture if a device got wet.
My SLR camera and lens were stashed inside a waterproof roll-top bag that lived in my daysack, with other equipment in separate roll-top bags. That way, if a bag was open when a rogue wave washed over me, the contents of the others would be unaffected. I also never tried to film and photograph on the same day, allowing me to focus on one medium in order to achieve the best results. And if the rucksack went overboard, I would have a second medium on which to record the expedition.
The majority of my reportage-style photography was taken with a compact waterproof camera. The limitations imposed on creativity by a lack of manual override were more than outweighed by the ability to capture the action as it happened without a giving second thought to salt spray. And make no mistake, it’s salt more than water that wrecks electronics.
When I returned to the cabin, I rinsed my waterproof camera under the tap and then dried everything near the radiator. After wiping off excess condensation, I put the items inside an airtight bag with a fresh sachet of silica gel to help draw out any remaining moisture. I had been concerned about running out of silica gel, but Martin said not to worry: a handful of uncooked rice from the galley is an adequate substitute.
Feet first
Somewhat naively, I had assumed that a decent pair of leather hiking boots would be sufficient for the shore landings. I was wrong. Transferring between the Zodiac and the shore usually meant wading through shin-deep surf. And if the salt hadn’t been sufficient to destroy a leather upper, the guano smothering the penguin colonies would have finished the material off.
The solution? An item of kit that, until now, hasn’t appeared in Essential gear: the humble Wellington boot. Invulnerable to penguin poo and saltwater, the Wellington was the least expensive and most effective item of kit I used on the peninsula. Worn with a pair of fibre-pile booties, the Wellington kept my feet warm, dry and comfortable. Guano and salt were hosed off quickly and easily upon return to the Pioneer.
Aside from a pair of trainers for use inside the boat, my only other footwear was a pair of Sorel boots, which I wore while helping Glenn to prepare his kayak on the stern of the Pioneer. During the voyage, Glenn completed five kayaking excursions, including a circumnavigation of Enterprise Island. He also made a Zodiac landing on the Antarctic mainland at Portal Point. And safely returned to Britain with no bones broken.
Paul Deegan travelled to Antarctica with the late Glenn Shaw on the latter’s Winston Churchill Memorial Award expedition to kayak off the coast of the continent. www.glennshaw.com
Ten of the best
The extreme conditions presented by travel to and on the Antarctic continent require a range of specialist and hardy kit, although the humble Wellington boot also has its place. The biggest challenges Paul faced during his expedition involved keeping out the all-pervasive cold, moisture and salt. Here are ten of the items that he found to be most useful
Don’t forget…
…a tub of sushi-style ginger. Some people have found that ginger helps to reduce the effects of seasickness. And if the crew catches some fresh fish, you’ll be all set
October 2011
To counteract the effect of the nine-metre waves that are battering the Polar Pioneer, the converted Finnish research vessel on which we’re sailing, I’m wearing a tan-coloured sticker behind my ear. The size of a ten pence piece, it looks for all the world like a circular Band-Aid. But it isn’t a plaster, it’s a Scopolamine patch. And right now, it’s the only thing standing between me and a 24/7 appointment with the bathroom sink. Not for the first time on this voyage, I give silent thanks to the pharmaceutical boffins.
In the bunk opposite me, Glenn Shaw busily adjusts his kayaking gear. Immune to the movement of the ship, he’s lying on his bed for a different reason. As someone born with osteogenesis imperfecta (also known as brittle-bone disease), Glenn knows that if he’s caught moving about in his wheelchair when the ship is slammed by a wave, he could be tossed out and hurled against a wall or floor.
Glenn’s bones snap as easily as a dry twig on a winter’s day. And the Southern Ocean is no place to be stuck with a serious medical condition. If Glenn is to achieve his ambition to kayak off the coast of Antarctica, he must tap into his vast reserve of patience and sit out the three-day crossing from the Argentine port of Ushuaia to the comparatively sheltered Antarctic bays in which the Polar Pioneer is scheduled to drop anchor.
The Winston Churchill Memorial Trust generously provided the bulk of the funds for Glenn and me to sail to Antarctica. Even so, we needed to travel in steerage. Tradition dictates that the less expensive berths are lower down on a vessel. Height equals better views and a quieter passage away from the engine room, which is why first class is up top.
But in heavy seas, the higher on the ship you find yourself, the more you’ll feel the roll. On the first night that a heavy sea was forecast, I spotted one of the old Antarctic hands clutching a pillow and heading towards the lecture room in the bowels of the Pioneer. ‘The lower you go, the sounder you’ll sleep,’ he advised me. For the rest of the voyage, whenever house-sized waves were expected, I slept on the floor of the auditorium.
Until the advent of commercial and scientific air bridges to Antarctica, every person who wished to visit the continent had to board a vessel. Even today, the majority of scientific stations are based on the coast and re-supplied by ship. And aside from a lucky few visitors able to afford a flight to the interior of Antarctica, the majority of the 30,000-plus tourists who visit the continent each year do so by boat.
But still, compared to sailors in the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration, we’re on easy street. In his 1909 account of the Nimrod expedition, Sir Ernest Shackleton wrote: ‘Suddenly, one enormous wave rushed at us, and it appeared as though nothing could prevent our decks being swept, but the ship rose to it, and missed the greater part, though to us it seemed as if the full weight of water had come on board. We clung tightly to the poop rails, and as soon as the water had passed over us we wiped the salt from our eyes and surveyed the scene. The sea has smashed in part of the starboard bulwarks and destroyed a small house on the upper deck, pieces of this house and the bulwarks floating out to the leeward; the port wash-port was torn from its hinges, so that water now surged on board and swept away at its own sweet will, and the stout wooden rails of the poop deck, to which we had been clinging, were cracked and displaced, but no vital damage was done.’
Water, water everywhere
As well as the power of the sea, a few other things have remained unchanged in 100 years of Antarctic exploration. One of these is the moisture that pervades the coast. It penetrates every supposedly impervious waterproof-clothing barrier presented to it. Thirty minutes of exposure to the elements was all that it took to reduce my state-of-the-art, synthetic-clothing system to something that resembled a sheet of kitchen towel.
No matter what garments I threw at the weather, the result was always the same: by the time I re-boarded the Pioneer, I felt as though I had taken a three-hour cold shower while fully dressed. Yet 30 minutes later, both my clothes and myself were always dry, thanks to the ship’s effective heating system.
Other items of gear didn’t recover quite as well. Noticing my plethora of photographic and video equipment, a fellow passenger asked if anything could be done for her £1,000 camcorder. Bought the week before departure, it had been destroyed in two minutes by the corrosive salt air and a single wave. I was staggered that so much money could have been spent on a product with no thought to its protection in one of the most technology-unfriendly environments on Earth. By contrast, the system I used for protecting electronic equipment – which polar photographer Martin Hartley taught me – was geared towards preventing moisture from reaching my machines, and removing that moisture if a device got wet.
My SLR camera and lens were stashed inside a waterproof roll-top bag that lived in my daysack, with other equipment in separate roll-top bags. That way, if a bag was open when a rogue wave washed over me, the contents of the others would be unaffected. I also never tried to film and photograph on the same day, allowing me to focus on one medium in order to achieve the best results. And if the rucksack went overboard, I would have a second medium on which to record the expedition.
The majority of my reportage-style photography was taken with a compact waterproof camera. The limitations imposed on creativity by a lack of manual override were more than outweighed by the ability to capture the action as it happened without a giving second thought to salt spray. And make no mistake, it’s salt more than water that wrecks electronics.
When I returned to the cabin, I rinsed my waterproof camera under the tap and then dried everything near the radiator. After wiping off excess condensation, I put the items inside an airtight bag with a fresh sachet of silica gel to help draw out any remaining moisture. I had been concerned about running out of silica gel, but Martin said not to worry: a handful of uncooked rice from the galley is an adequate substitute.
Feet first
Somewhat naively, I had assumed that a decent pair of leather hiking boots would be sufficient for the shore landings. I was wrong. Transferring between the Zodiac and the shore usually meant wading through shin-deep surf. And if the salt hadn’t been sufficient to destroy a leather upper, the guano smothering the penguin colonies would have finished the material off.
The solution? An item of kit that, until now, hasn’t appeared in Essential gear: the humble Wellington boot. Invulnerable to penguin poo and saltwater, the Wellington was the least expensive and most effective item of kit I used on the peninsula. Worn with a pair of fibre-pile booties, the Wellington kept my feet warm, dry and comfortable. Guano and salt were hosed off quickly and easily upon return to the Pioneer.
Aside from a pair of trainers for use inside the boat, my only other footwear was a pair of Sorel boots, which I wore while helping Glenn to prepare his kayak on the stern of the Pioneer. During the voyage, Glenn completed five kayaking excursions, including a circumnavigation of Enterprise Island. He also made a Zodiac landing on the Antarctic mainland at Portal Point. And safely returned to Britain with no bones broken.
Paul Deegan travelled to Antarctica with the late Glenn Shaw on the latter’s Winston Churchill Memorial Award expedition to kayak off the coast of the continent. www.glennshaw.com
Ten of the best
The extreme conditions presented by travel to and on the Antarctic continent require a range of specialist and hardy kit, although the humble Wellington boot also has its place. The biggest challenges Paul faced during his expedition involved keeping out the all-pervasive cold, moisture and salt. Here are ten of the items that he found to be most useful
Start the slideshow (10 pictures)
Don’t forget…
…a tub of sushi-style ginger. Some people have found that ginger helps to reduce the effects of seasickness. And if the crew catches some fresh fish, you’ll be all set
October 2011
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