At the end of another reasonably hectic week of work, half a dozen of us bearded expeditioners, make that five, sorry Aaron, made our way over to Wilkes Hut for the night. Altogether there was myself, Matty, Andy (Search and Rescue Leader) and Ben in the first Hagg with the cage pallets full of wood for the heater, then Lee and Aaron came a bit later on with the food and other necessities.
While the others unloaded the wood from the Hagg, I started a roaring fire in the wood heater, which finally brought the temperature up from around negative eight when we first walked in to about a high of forty two degrees later in the night. After all the unpacking was done and our bodies thawed out with the help of Ben’s many varieties of tea, it was time to cook dinner. As you can see by the pictures, camping out is extremely hard down here.
After dinner it was time for a few nightcaps and lots of chatter and laughs, plus some tall stories especially from our SAR leader, and Matty who still today talks about how good his charcoal steak and his mashed potato was. Had a nice sleep in, then it’s time to get up, clean up and head back to station to unpack, more cleaning up and get ready for another week of work.
Mick W.