Beaver Lake, Friday, 28th December 2001
The morning was heralded by a strong SW breeze, possibly katabatic blowing snow all around the place. Comms were still poor and Anya and I stayed in our huts till the afternoon when the weather started to improve with blue sky overhead. The small kerosene stove raised the temeprature inside my apple hut (or satellite igloo) from -2 to 20 degrees (at head level) in ten minutes, which made any indoor tasks such as mapping a bit more of a pleasant task. The existing topo map of Beaver Lake was of woeful quality with 350 metres of error in the coordinates and contours showing water and ice going uphill in Pagodroma Gorge ! The 7pm sked proved to be a success with contact finally made between all the field parties. We discovered that Charlton and Tom had returned to Davis for a hot shower, leaving Druzhnaya abandoned once again, pikers !! After a dinner of tasty NZ freeze dried lamb casserole, Anya and I decided to go for another walk as the weather was perfectly clear after 9 pm, with a 25 knot wind persisting from the SW blowing drifts of snow over us. I was interested in reconnoitoring a walking route through the thick snow to the GPS site. The walk turned out to be thoroughly enjoyable. The view from the escarpment above the camp was terrific with the low sun from the SW drenching the whole area in bright light with very good contrast, especially the spires of pressure ridges above the tide crack. Watching sheets of wind driven snow cascading over the snow covered peaks and benches of the PCMs was an incredible sight, possibly a sight never seen by humans before this season. Snow petrels glided by very confidently, their wing-tips grazing the snow surface almost like they were at sea. More than 200km from their open sea feeding grounds, they still nest in Pagodroma Gorge (derived from the latin name for the snow petrel) and the PCMs. Pagodroma Gorge looked spectacular in these conditions, a deep canyon through which a mighty river once flowed between Radok Lake and the sea. In the distance the strengthening gale off the ice-cap was spawning clouds and snow storms in a turbulent fashion off McLaren Ridge and nearby peaks. Anya remarked that the scene reminded her strongly of the Cairngorms in Scotland, one of her favourite haunts. We walked two kms (about half way) to the GPS site, before returning, the 30 knot wind blowing strongly behind our backs. It was quite an incredible feeling, being in one of the most remote and beautiful regions of Antarctica. It's quite hard to take it all in. We returned to the Apples after midnight, with driving snow almost obscuring the apples despite the strong midnight sun. The temperature had dropped to -5, but the chill factor would be quite severe. As soon as the wind drop down below 15 knots we'll try and walk all the way to the GPS site, excavate it and the antenna from it's snow grave and resuscitate the GPS. Hopefully we would soon get a chopper load of electronics to complete the task fully before too long.

Beaver Lake, Base Camp S 70°48'11" E 68°10'46"

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