Leopards, Aliens and everything in between

On Monday we said ‘au revoir’ to Daniel as he set out once again on a fishing vessel as an observer. The vessel that he went on, Antarctic Bay, is one of the smallest in the fleet and was so small that when Rod drove towards her as she was moored up to another vessel he thought there was only one ship there. He will return soon we hope but it all depends on how the fishing goes before the longline season ends on August 31^st.

After dropping Daniel Hazel and I launched one of the RIBs in order to help Nik set his traps. Unfortunately this involved anchoring buoys in the kelp which is a pain. We then ran a line from the buoy to the shore on which he will attach his traps so that he can pull them in and out without needing a boat. The only trouble has been that the floats of the buoys get caught in ice which means that he can’t pull them in. We are going to try and fix this by reducing the floatation and increasing the weight so that the float sits further under the surface and therefore the ice. The traps so far haven’t caught any fish larvae which is their purpose but they are catching other organisms. Since it is not quite the season for fish larvae yet Nik is not worried and is just pleased that the traps do work. We will now just have to play with the floatation and then put more traps out soon.

Once we had put the two traps down Hazel and I landed the RIB. Just as I had got out of the water and into the JCB to pull it out Hazel noticed the Leopard seal in the water right next to the RIB. It came up very close and seemed to be having a real look round, not only at the boat but at both Hazel (who was still in the RIB) and me in the JCB. We put out an ‘all stations’ call on the radio to alert everyone that he was there and everyone came down. It was incredibly worth it. He played around the jetty, going from one side to the other for about 45 mins/an hour. We got some amazing photos and film. Rod even got him nuzzling the lens of his camera on the end of a tripod in the water. It really was incredible and a wonderful privilege. 

A visitor

Our leopard seal (photo: Sue Gregory)

The rest of the week passed mostly quietly after that. On Wednesday I gave a lesson in towing to everyone on base. It was a good session and everyone got to feel the differences in how boats handle under different towing conditions. I always forget how much I like teaching until it comes to things like this and people go away with (I hope) an understanding of what I was trying to teach them. 

Teaching the alongside tow (photo: Sue Gregory)

 The two main events of this week happened this weekend. Paula left us on Saturday. She was employed as a boaty for 8 months under a new trial of having boaties here for different amounts of time. Her presence on base will be really missed by everyone and it will be a different base for the rest of the winter.

The other event is the Antarctic 48 hour film festival. We have 48 hours in which to come up with a concept for a film, shoot, it, edit it and upload it to a dedicated website. Once that is done all the bases taking part across Antarctica download the films and in a few weeks we will all sit down, watch them and vote on the winner. 

The winner sets the five elements that have to be included in next year’s film. The elements this time are: A gingerbread man, a ping pong ball, a bath tub, the sound of an authentic sneeze, and the phrase “voulez-vous couchez avec moi ce  soir?”. We have decided to do a spoof of ‘Alien’ and it has been great fun. We started on Friday with my setting smoke and parachute flares off (with the correct warning for all vessels in the vicinity of course). After seeing Paula off on Saturday morning we then set down to the serious business of filming. It is going to be an excellent film. Hazel and I were in charge of the props and special effects and really, who needs CGI? We made a lot of fake blood and a LOT of mess and had a great amount of fun. My heart beat has a starring role in the hospital scene. Due to Nik’s costume we couldn’t have the heart rate monitor on him so I lay under the bed with the leads attached to me, trying to make sure I kept my heart rate steady and trying not to be seen by the camera. Unfortunately the oxygen saturation monitor kept malfunctioning (at least I hope it was malfunctioning) and the alarm kept going off, usually in the middle of  a scene, but we got it all done in the end. I don’t yet know the website address but when I do I will put it up. The quality of all the films from all the various bases are usually varying but they are always good to watch.

Today Rod, Sue and Joe are all in Rod’s office editing and adding sound effects and music. Hazel and I were summoned to create a spaceship landing scene which involved a lot of flour, a ping pong ball, syringes and plastic tubing and as usual a fair amount of mess. As well as being prop master extraordinaire Hazel took it upon herself to be the stills photographer and as ever she did a fantastic job. She took something like 350 photos so I am adding only a very few but I thought you might like to see something of life ‘on set’.

So for this week “That’s a wrap”.  

Prepping a scene . . . (photo: Hazel Woodland)

 

. . .  and another (in -10 degrees) (photo: Hazel Woodland)

Killing off Joe (photo: Hazel Woodland)

My starring role (photo: Hazel Woodland)

Special effects department (photo: Hazel Woodland)

Who needs CGI? (photo: Hazel Woodland)

The strain of filming takes its toll (yes, I was actually asleep) (photo: Hazel Woodland)