World Tour of East Antarctica

There is an experiment that is run by the AAD at the Chinese station Zhong Shan. Zhong Shan is located in another bit of Antarctica that is not covered by ice and now - the Larsmann Hills. Luckily, I am the one tasked with keeping the experiment running, so it means I got on the first helicopter trip down to the Zhong Shan base. This first trip meant a little bit of work for me at Zhong Shan, but there was a lot of diplomatic stuff to do too. The Larsemann Hills is a very popular little area for putting bases. There are a lot of freshwater lakes, and a reasonable, relatively close, ice runway. Unfortunately there is a lot of multi-year sea-ice there, so it is very difficult to re-supply by boat. Anyway, India have started looking at setting up a base there (they have semi-permanently erected shelters known as “melons” and “apples”) on an island south of the other bases in the Larsemann's. The other bases are all within 1km of each other and include Law/Racovita base (joint Australian/Romanian), Zhong Shan (Chinese) and Progress II (Russian). There is also a former Russian base (Progress I) a little further inland. Anyway, we got to see all of them in one day thanks to the Davis Helicopters (the other bases don't have Helicopters - I wonder how they get anything done...).
Anyway, here is a picture of our first stop - the new Indian base. I guess you can see why they are called melons! The circular ones are called apples for similar reasons. After finding no-one was home at the Indian Base (no-one seemed to know when or if they were planning to be there this summer), we headed on to the Law Base.We had a quick stop at Law. One of the apples there had been completely destroyed, and had been blow throughout the surrounding hills. We did our best to clean up the mess, but we were running relatively short on time as we had to get to Zhong Shan at a reasonable hour (I think they are on Beijing time!). It is a bit nerve-racking rocking up in Helicopters to a foreign base (at that stage they had no re-supply, so we were the first visitors they had (apart from the occasional Russian) since the Australians visited on a winter traverse. They all seemed very happy - I guess they must have had a good winter. After the obligatory cup of Chinese tea, I got on with my geeky work stuff, while everyone else got a tour of the station. After the completion of our work we were treated to some very good food and were plied with some of their beer, (called REEB - they get it for free as the brewery basically sponsors Chinese Antartic Research Expeditions - CHINARE). I had a couple of beers, but figured it was best to keep well and truly sober, so when offered more I attempted to explain the great Australian tradition of “one for the road”. They laughed as I tucked a can into my jacket and headed off (on foot) to Progress II, so I think they got it. Here's a picture of Ray and myself with our Chinese counterparts at Zhong Shan). Finally we got to he Russian base. We were vary wary walking in, as we had received no response to our fax (the only method of communication we have with the Russians) so had no idea if they knew we were coming or not. The Russian station was very quiet, but the workers (busy completing an impressive workshop come power-house). We were finally approached by a magnetometer scientist who spoke quite good English. He as very apologetic and informed us that the Russian Station leader was still in bed unwell. We offered our doctor from Davis who had come with us, but were informed that they had two doctors already at Progress and that the illness was simply due to it having been the Station Leader's birthday the previous day!Anyway, we were shown around by the Russian's, who were remarkably good natured about us rocking up out of the blue! They keen to tell us about their station and their lives back in Russia, which was really quite amazing. Eventually the Station Leader joined us and we had a Russian beer and a bit of vodka (some had more than others) before completing our tour and hopping back in the helicopters ready for home. It seemed to me that our arrival may have marked the end of what was probably a fairly emotional winter at the Russian base, after one of their communications technicians died of heart failure during the year. There seemed to be a lot more smiles as we waved goodbye than there had been when we arrived. Perhaps they were just happy to get rid of us meddling Australians...As we returned to station, the pilots buzzed the station buildings at the Station Leaders request and we walked into the bar with a couple of slabs of REEB much to the delight of some of the summer tradies, who finished it all at lightning pace! It was a phenomenal day. I have to stop and think sometimes about just how incredibly lucky I am to be here experiencing all this!