The ice and snow is back. Winter is on the way and summer is well and truely over. We woke up 3 days ago to find the bay in front of station iced over. Didn't last but it won't be long before it starts to cover the whole coast. The next morning everything was covered in snow where there had been none when we went to bed that night. The snow has created a very sudden change to how the station feels and how we work and get around. After the relatively barren rocky landscape of summer it once again looks like Antarctica out there.

Diving is in full swing and with only a few weeks to go before we leave we're diving every day we can. Sunsets like this are a nice way to end a long day on, and under, the water. The solar pillar visible in one of these photos lasted for about 10 minutes. Don't know the physics behind why it happens but it's a spectacular sight.

Some more Elephant Seals and a sleeping Weddell Seal from hte beach in front of the station. Soon enough they'll be heading back out to sea before the bay ices over for the winter.

Last week we got to fly down the coast to the Chinese station to attend a BBQ to celebrate the 21st anniversary of the station. We flew over glaciers and the edge of the plateau that rises from the coast and just keeps on going to the other side of Antarctica 4000+ kilometres away.

Yours truely doing some Antarctic diver and driver type things.

Some images from the last week or so. The scale of some of the bergs near station is pretty impressive. If you look closely at the bottom of this whopper you can see the one of the IRBs (inflatable rubber boats) we use to get around and do our work from. The very next berg over had some black spots on it. As we suspected, they were Adelie penguins. What they were doing parked up there together is any ones guess. The big Elephant seal is one of the largest of the group on the beach in front of the station. Even at 3 metres long he's only a littlun though. The Ele's we get here are all juvenile males. When full grown they get much bigger, up to 4 or 5 metres and can weigh in at over 3 tonnes.

The phytoplankton bloom greatly reduces the underwater visibility during summer. Unlike diving under the ice at Casey station where we regularly get 20 - 30+ metre visibility, here at Davis we've been lucky to see 3 metres on a good day. At least you can see some of the gear we wear to dive here. The funky Aga masks we wear have communications built in so we can talk to the surface and to each other while underwater. Makes doing our work a lot easier and safer. The photos are from Chris Gillies, the other set of eyes peering out of the mask.

Panorama shots of the station and the bay. We're slowly heading back towards having dark nights after summers constant sunshine.

Haven't taken too many photos lately as we've been underwater a lot diving for samples. Just a few shots of some interesting clouds and our Australia Day swim. It's a bit of a tradition and despite the chilly winds that day a fair crowd took the plunge. Most didn't last long though as the water is below 0 degrees. I opted to act as the lifeguard in a full dry suit so I was warm as toast.

This little fella joined us in the boat while we were snorkeling and hung around on the bow for several minutes. The other shot is of Simon after snorkeling. For reasons unknown, the cold water makes some peoples lips puff up. Simon's stayed like this for the next hour.

bergs & boats

more bergs and boats. Enjoy.

bergs!

Last night we cruised around the ice bergs just off station. Spectacular! As always a great variety of shapes and sizes to fasinate and keep the cameras clicking. The highlight was this berg with a jade section. According to the glaciologist on board, the jade ice forms from seawater at high pressures under ice shelfs. Not something you come across everyday.

Ele's at war

The Aurora Australis pulled in to the bay late last night. To greet them two of the locals put on a show of biting and headbutting each other. They soon got tired though and returned to the beach to continue their usual pastimes of farting and sleeping.

boat thief

Tired of swimming for himself this little fella thought he'd steal a boat instead. He crashed on to the floor of the boat after bouncing off the pontoons, inspected the engine and fuel tanks then gave up and jumped overboard.

air adelie

This litte fella mistook us for an ice bergs and suddenly landed in our boat in a rather confused state. A quick look around at the rather large orange clad penguins in the boat and he was off.

Sterechinus newmayeri - the urchin that has been the main focus of our collecting so far.

More images from the last week of boating. Jake snorkeling and the crew cruising near the Sorsdal Glacier.

water & ice

The sea ice has broken up and is now floating around the coast in a miriade of weird shapes and sizes. We've been out boating a lot this week and have been fascinated by the diversity and, in particular, by the many varied subtle shades of blue formed by the underwater sections of the ice. Enjoy.