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Saturday 19th March
Hello everybody, today was a clear, sunny day, blue skies, flat seas and big white icebergs crouched on the horizon. The ship stopped at mid-morning to retrieve an ARP ( Acoustic Recording Package ) from the bottom of the ocean, three kilometres down. It's an underwater microphone, and had been dropped in a year ago to listen for whales. Today the technicians sent sonar pings which ran a current through and melted the wires holding it down, and it floated to the top. It took 90 minutes and we were all looking way out to sea for it when it popped up beside the ship.

After lunch it was still sunny and even though the temperature was -4 degrees, it felt pretty warm, so we borrowed Katrina's ( she's one of the cooks ) green deck chairs and took photos of people pretending to sunbake in front of an iceberg. There was about 6 people lolling about in shorts or bikinis while I was taking the photos, and we were all laughing our heads off, it looked so funny. Kristian had his t-shirt tied on his head, as though he was really hot. After we'd finished, Keith noticed a huge ice berg coming so we got the chairs out and did it all again. I'll send you some photo when we get to Macquarie Island, with best wishes, Alison

Sunday 20th March
Hi everyone, sorry this is a bit late, but you’ll understand by the end of the email. This morning the sea was very rough, pitching and rolling, and I made the mistake of sitting at my computer in my windowless studio to do some work. Before I knew it I was feeling a bit queasy, so I took a sea sickness pill, went to bed and slept like a baby until mid-afternoon. It was still very rough and wild but I managed to get some work done by hanging on to the edge of the desk with one hand, and my water container with the other every time a big roll came.

There weren’t too many at dinner, but it was Pepe’s birthday and I got to carry out the cake, candles blazing, on a big silver tray, pretty tricky with the floor going uphill and downhill all the time.
Later I went to watch a video in the little video room, and while I was setting it up, a few monster swells hit. I was flung against the TV cupboard hard and before I could hang on to anything flung the other way, got caught up in chairs flying all over the place, fell over, got up again ( big mistake ) then shot the length of the room and bashed my head against the door. Boy, did I see stars, but I finally managed to sit down and hang on to a bench that wasn’t moving, until the worst of it passed. Keith ( the ranger for Macquarie Island ) appeared and helped me to my cabin, and Helen the doctor came and checked me out, and nothing too bad had happened. I slept like somebody who’d been hit over the head, and this morning feel fine, just sore bits everywhere. They told me on the bridge this morning that the biggest roll was 40 degrees. Gotta go, breakfast to get to, cheers, Alison

Monday 21st March
Hi everybody, not much to report today other than that I have got bruises EVERYWHERE. I feel as though I've been bucked off a horse. I found out this morning too, that the really big roll was 50 degrees, not 40, so no wonder I was flying around like Astroboy. I got up early and saw the sun rise, a big yellow ball in the east over confused seas. I love that term, it seems like the sea can't work something out. It really means waves coming from all directions. We had a muster at 10.30am, everybody up on the helideck in freezer suits and life jackets and then I worked for the rest of the day in my windowless studio, painting and editing photographs. There were three birthdays today, so three cards to be made, three songs to sing, and three cakes to be eaten. No more ice bergs today, I think our sunbaking one must have nearly been the last, good luck to you, Alison