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It's the Aurora Australis versus the pack ice at the moment as we relentlessly plough our way forward, and sometimes backwards, through the pack ice in search of the leads we can see on the satellite imagery. Once we get to them, these leads will then take us through to the edge of the fast ice off Mawson. At times we encounter heavy bands of pack ice that requires the vessel to be "rammed" into the ice time after time to gain our passage through. This ramming involves driving the vessel up onto the ice as far as it will go, then reversing, the doing it again, before reversing and doing it again... and again... and again. Sometimes we'll gain a ship length or so, sometime half a ship length. Once through these heavier bands we generally have a good run for some time through thinner, newer ice before encountering another heavier band. Keep the faith readers... we'll get there!
Our passage today through the pack ice has had plenty of spectators which has resulted in a fair few people braving the outside air temperatures in search of a great photo. We've seen plenty of Emperor Penguins, Snow Petrels, seals and even some Minke whales, who seem to be enjoying the fact that we are creating some "pools" in the pack ice for them to use as breathing holes.
A briefing was held onboard last night where one of the items on the agenda was to finalise the winning voyage t-shirt design. It was a closely fought affair with 7 entries received, all of which, strangely it would seem, had received 11 votes before ballots were closed. So it was down to a good old fashioned show of hands to decide the winner. Before the voting could commence SL Steve lodged a protest, claiming his design had actually received over 5,000 votes. His protest was dismissed and his design thrown out of contention, literally. Good try though mate. Congratulations go to Rocket for his winning design - a great drawing it is too!
Cheers,
Deepy and Brett
Map
A map showing Australia and Antarctica. The map shows the journey of one voyage that has occured in the season, with each route highlighted in a distinct colour.