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.