Yesterday in Drygalski Fjord we had the most incredibly calm conditions. Imagine a narrow inlet facing south, opening onto the Southern Ocean, in the path of some of the most ferocious low pressure systems on earth. And this inlet has many glaciers pouring down from the mountains above, glaciers which give birth to fierce katabatic winds that drive from high ground to low, gathering speed as they fall, sweeping along the inlet towards the sea. Winds roar through this fjord from every quarter.
Now imagine today: flags motionless. The calmest day. Sunny, warm, t-shirt weather.
And the craziest thing was that this calm weather gave rise to another somewhat unexpected phenomenon . . . birds. Thousands upon thousands of birds. Wilsons storm petrels in swarms, I’ve never seen anything like it. Their delicate dance across the water, a silent pizzicato symphony. And in between the darting feeding antics of these tiny birds, cape petrels were sitting like ducks in a London pond - again, never seen anything like it. The pure white of their wings, black bodies with feet pedalling underwater, I didn’t even recognise them - I’ve seen so many of them, but only ever flying! It took me ages to realise what they were. And there were snow petrels and giant petrels, all of them in amongst the ice, with fur seals and waterfalls and ancient stone rising out of the water. I wish you could have been there. You would have loved it.