We are now 5 days out of Cape Town, we’ve been travelling on a south easterly path and have travelled 1100 km’s(check our position from the site noted in my previous post).
The enormity of the southern ocean is really making an impression on me. When I first read the statistic that 71% of the earth surface is covered in water I was surprised at how high that level was – now I understand it!
Whichever way I look, and for as far as I can sea there is nothing but ocean swell after ocean swell and then I realise that there is water below us to a depth of 4.5km’s as well.
We are now approx. half of the way to Heard Island – the crew have estimated that we have another 6 days of travel at 10 knots before we make Heard Island!
Our daily routine is simple (and repetitive) –
7am – breakfast
midday- lunch
7pm – dinner
and between these fixed markers your time is your own, but there’s a limited opportunity when you are on a small boat in the southern ocean. I’ve become reasonably proficient at sudoku, caught up on sleep, and put more sleep in the sleep bank and read several novels from the library. For me this is a huge challenge, I like to be on the move doing “things”, here there ‘s limited new “things” to do.
But I can’t complain – we have now almost completed crossing the “Roaring 40’s” and I’m reliably told by the crew that it’s been a “calm crossing “, it will be interesting to see what the “Furious Fifties” throw at us…
So for the next week on the boat it’s more of the same, although I’m expecting the conversation will turn to plans for landing on Heard Island, establishing base camp and getting the work programmes underway as we get closer to the island.
By the time I arrived the two air beam tents had been erected and were already the subject of much discussion. They needed cleaning that was very obvious but how and by whom? Thankfully the decision was made to engage a commercial cleaning company. Looking back if we had tried to complete the full pressure wash and interior wipe down they completed for us we would never have achieved our planned departure day and time. As it was out team cleaned every metre of Velcro on the tents to make sure that there was no soil, or worse still seeds attached there.
onto the floor a warehouse floor at Victoria wharf. All of the cases were opened, contents checked and then ordered on the floor in the reverse order required on Heard Island. Everything is to be reverse loaded to the BraveHeart today.
And this has been going on to with the backdrop of the Cape Towns public Port area. If you live in NZ , think Viaduct area Auckland, if you are in Australia, think Pyrmont Sydney. My first day in the city was on the day of the Argus bike race, the biggest organised bike race in the world. There are so many people in the area.
So today it’s final preparation, all equipment loads to the Braveheart, we get final details of the immigration requirements that we need to complete tomorrow and then one last walk around the port area that we have come to call “home” for the past 5 days.
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