Beaver Lake, Saturday, 5th January 2002

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The katabatics were relentless, not ceasing for two days now, day or night. The open vents in the roof of the Apple huts tend to amplify the effect somehow. I rehabilitated the GPS apple fit for habitation again, for our impemding arrivals. Tom created a windsock for the local helipad and by the evening the weather started to brighten up a bit. We all decided to go for a much needed walk, heading north this time. The receding snow was revealing an amzing array of sedimentary strata around the place with layers of shale, siltstone and coal, all covered with a speckled layer of moraine brought down from now disappeared mountains, now under the ice sheet. The siltstone made some pretty interesting patterns, sort of like a slatey sandstone. I tried out the snow goggles for the first time, and the colours of the snow and ice became somewhat psychadelic, especially looking north towards the pressure ridges on Beaver Lake. We returned via the inside of the tide crack, close to the sometimes 10 metre high rafted ice ridges at the tide crack. The temperature was now -5 or so and the sun quite low and it was superb walking on the hard windcrust, Andy's and Margie's quad marks still clearly imprinted on them. Snow petrels were zipping past gliding in and out of the ice ridges quite nimbly. We noted an empty fuel drum in one of the ridges, blown some 1 km from the Beaver Lake camp.

Beaver Lake (BVLK) Technical Inspection

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

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