Adventures to Penguinland and beyond ...: Winter Trip No 2

Inside the buildings.

We got up relatively early (come on, it is basically my holiday!)

(Photo: Steve)

and left around 9.30am for Carvajal.

Carvajal is an abandoned base. It used to belong to the British. When they sailed down to open up a base at Rothera, they were not able to get to it due to sea ice and decided to instead build the base further South (southern tip of Adelaide Island). However, Rothera was still a better location in the long run as a runway could be build for

Communal area with bar.

planes which was quite important. The station was given to Chile (I think for 1£). A couple of years ago the station was abandoned

Little shrine underneath
the stairs - ueber creepy.

and is only visited every now and then in the summer. It is a popular destination for winter trips as the station has been left as it was (included bottles on the bar) and everything is still there (minus all the stuff that has been taken by visitors). Slightly more information: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teniente_Luis_Carvajal_Villaroel_Antarctic_Base

laying in the sun (Photo: Steve)

It was a quite bumpy ride getting to it, but we made it (now we are only travelling with 2 skidoos and one sledge between them). The weather was just a little cloudy but no wind at all. We walked down an icy slope. Once we got there we walked around the whole station. We needed head torches in the main building which was a little creepy. Walking around there felt a little bit like walking around a graveyard (I was kind of expecting

Signing my name in the Base Commander
Office (Photo: Steve)

dead people like in a horror moving sitting in chairs etc). Everything had been left like it was (even things out on desks and bottles on the bar). Afterwards we sat in the sun and I listened to the sea – I had not realised that you actually cannot heat the sea in Rothera; and how much I missed this sound... It was really beautiful!

Walking up the slope from Carvajal
(Photo: Steve)

We left at around 2pm and warmed up in the tent once we got back. We left the tent again at around 4.30pm on skis this time and went to the mythical monster (smaller mountain – called nunatak – in front of the Myth). We skinned up and skied down on the other side again (I did quite terribly on the way down but hejho, I got to the bottom eventually).

Plane wreck (Photo: Steve)

We had curry and mulled wine for dinner. Tom (our Communications Manager) talked to us on scheds which nearly did not work (contacts on the radio got moist) and we would have had to use the Sat phone to reassure that we are all safe and well. This evening we had a beautiful clear sky with the full moon outside. It was really bright, looked quite weird; I don’t think I have ever experienced such bright light from the moon.