Sunday morning, up bright and early for matins and assignments. My wife Jane is on her way here, a wonderful long chat with my faithful friend Nic McClean via Messenger (thank you for helping to keep me sane up here – love you so much brother).
My cabin in the snow. It has always been a dream of mine to just get my head down in a cold climate, retreat and study with no distractions (except perhaps for the coffee shop Cafe Lina next door…). This time really is a dream come true.
How different my experience is to that of Captain Robert Falcon Scott, writing all those years ago in the Antarctic. The photo above is of him at his Cape Evans hut on 7th October 1911. He was doing pretty much what I am now, pens and pencils, keeping his journal. Only for him, unlike me, it would be many years before anyone back home could read his thoughts. I am so blessed.
Ernest Shackleton’s team had similar thoughts too when they were on the ice in 1915. This entry in Shackleton’s journal was contributed by one of his crew, Thomas Orde-Lees:
That is eerily prescient; he was imagining what a mobile phone and video messaging (“wireless telescopes“?) might be like in 2015. We take so much for granted today.
Now, to finish an assignment before the end of the day, take a walk with Bottomly, and maybe coffee late afternoon with my supervisor here Dr Gulnara and her husband Hasan. They love walking in the snow on Sunday afternoons…
I love it too.
The Rockweather Collaboration 