ANTARCTICA 1958 | JOURNAL
Socializing Down South: Visiting the French in Antarctica
Morse code, France’s Dumont d’Urville station and hangovers
18th. January
Woke up as usual on the dot of breakfast time. Ian McLeod and I were slushies [kitchen hands — a rotating duty] today so we had quite a stack of dishes to collect and dry.
At 10:00 we had a class on Morse Code. I think I am picking it up all right. It is good to practise it during scrabble. After tea I visited Ivan Grove and got a crew cut. It is very comfortable but takes a bit of getting used to.
The ship had a pretty solid time today pushing through some fairly thick pack. However we are not as unfortunate as the Japanese who are unable to relieve their base due to their ship being stuck fast.
19th. January
As well as our Morse class we had a lesson on working and moving on ice. This included rope work and finished as a knot tying lesson.
20th. January
Very monotonous dull weather with the ship heading west towards the French base Dumont d’Urville. The morse class was conducted and I feel I am progressing okay. Due to a slight internal disturbance I missed my tea and went to bed. It was quite rough during the night and things slid all over the cabin.
21st. January
Much better this morning. The sea was much calmer but still overcast and snowing. We contacted Dumont d’Urville at 10:00 and arrived off the Norsel at 14:00. After following it thru some apparently tricky water we dropped anchor and all went about one mile to the shore on pontoon. The French helicopter hovered around taking photos. We were made very welcome by the French and language proved to be no barrier.
After looking around the camp and taking the odd photo we all toasted the IGY [International Geophysical Year] and both expeditions with some type of liquid dynamite (probably methanol). Then all but 10 of us took some 10 Frenchmen back to Thala Dan to entertain them while at the base the other Frenchmen entertained those Australians who had stayed. We turned on a mighty party, at least Thala Dan cooks did and the party on shore was excellent. We had plenty of singing and drinking (Kola ran out early ) and photographs taken. Everyone had a wonderful time.
The ship’s officers visited the Norsel [a Norwegian seal boat chartered by the French for their Antarctic expedition] just to complete the social visits and by about 2430 all was restored to peace and normality. One Frenchman is going to post a letter to Gordon for me. [Three letters in the scrapbook had French Antarctic stamps, the one to his brother Gordon at top cancelled at Terre Adelie, the French Antarctic claim, and two from March below cancelled at Archipel Kerguelen, islands that are north of Heard Island — not sure the ship visited them or if the Norsel or Nella Dan stopped there on the way back to Australia]. Our other mail goes to Hobart on the Norsel.
22nd. January
There were some bleary faces on deck this morning. No one came forward to do slushy duty so Alec Brown, Ian McLeod and I cleared things up. The weather was still pretty foul. Alec was laid up so I did his bird watch all afternoon and failed to identify only one bird but I guessed that one right. The sea was quite rough as we headed N.W. then S.W. but as we predicted it was calm in the shelter of the Dibble Glacier tongue which we reached during the night.
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