We are now firmly in the ice zone so lookout duties have an added edge to them.  Hit a ‘growler’ at any speed and we are in a liferaft.  And rescue would be highly unlikely.

The vast Weddell Sea to the south of us has a clockwise current that spits out enormous icebergs into the Scotia Sea from it’s vast ice shelf.  They call it ‘the iceberg factory’.  I imagine it like one of those machines that fire tennis balls to the solo player at regular intervals.  Only these puppies are more sinister.  Another experience we share with Shackleton.  I only hope we don’t get stuck as he did.

We use 3 terms: ‘iceberg’, ‘growler’ and ‘bergy bits’.  ‘Icebergs’ range from big up to enormous and then some.    The scale is hard to relate.  They are easy to pick up on radar and big enough to dwarf small countries.  c60m in height, we can generally see and avoid them.  It’s like seeing the white cliffs of Dover or Old Harry Rocks  floating by every few minutes.  Our little ship is dwarfed.  ‘Growlers’ are the chunks that ‘calve’ off icebergs as they warm and break up, crashing into the sea.  They are our nemesis right now.  Klaas informs us if we see one the size of a car, ‘you can be sure there is a truck underneath’.  These would rip the ship apart.

A crew member sits atop the main mast in below zero temperatures to spot these, assisted by us land lubbers on deck.  Communication with the helm is by radio, to avoid delay.   Our eyes have never been so valuable nor so focused.  Sometimes the cry is ‘whale’, eerily imitating history.  ‘Bergy bits’ are the smaller chunks which look like the stuff you chip off the inside of the freezer, only scaled up by about 500.  They make a nasty grating against the hull if we catch them.  From time to time the sea is littered with ice and distinguishing these from the breaking wave crests takes concentration.  In the wheelhouse, nerves are taut.

For us, helming duties are suspended as we can’t be trusted to manoeuvre the vessel quickly or accurately enough.  This is entirely fair and gives more time to stare at the infinitely beautiful ice structures all around us.  As the bergs calve, the sea is littered with chunks of every size and conceivable shape, like a minestrone soup.  We play the cloud game – ‘ooh, look, a rabbit ‘, ‘ah, a church’ !!!  Every so often a couple of whales blow as they cruise past us.  Fins and humpbacks mainly.  A couple of lucky lookouts spotted a blue whale right alongside yesterday morning.  With only a few thousand left in the world, this is rare indeed.

I’m transported to paint charts again, with every cloud, wave and piece of ice morphing like chameleons as we pass.  Only the palette is restricted to greys, whites, greens and turquoise blues.  Even the birds are black, white and grey.  In the absence of any other natural colours, subtleties are rich and vivid.  I’m desperately redecorating in my mind, only I don’t have enough walls at home.  I’ll need another plan to capture this for posterity.

Photographs simply don’t do the scenery justice.  They just can’t capture enough shades of grey.