Ну вот и все, дружок...

Этот пост я пишу уже в аэропорту - у меня пересадка по дороге домой. В аэропорту все очень странное: куча людей куда-то спешат, все суетятся и толкаются. И все незнакомые!!!! А знакомого - никого. Ведь совсем недавно, меня окружали только знакомые, свои, родные уже лица:

 Фотография всех участников третьей "ноги" нашей экспедиции (с) Шариф Миршак.

После возвращения из экспедиции какое-то время находишься в таком странном "междумирье", когда того, рейсового мира уже больше нет, а в "реальный" ты вроде как вернулся немного другим человеком. Потом все сглаживается и забывается. Постепенно вписываешься в свой привычный мир, постепенно забываешь тот волшебный другой, как будто и не было его вовсе, так приснилось что-то. 

Кто-то из новых экспедиционных знакомых переходит в разряд друзей, к ним потом ездишь в гости и вспоминаешь "минувшие дни". Кого-то потом изредка встречаешь на конференциях, тогда внезапно накатывают воспоминания и становится тепло-тепло где-то глубоко внутри. А кого-то вообще уже никогда не увидишь. Это с одной стороны обидно, а с другой стороны мы ведь там случайным образом все собрались. Главное чтобы те, из первой категории, остались близкими - они самые главные и их будет жалко растерять. 

У меня, кстати, тут родилась идея поехать в Париж на свой следующий день рождения. Так как экспедиция у нас была в большой степени европейская, то многие поддержали это мое начинание :). Одна девочка лучше всего сказала на прощание - ты как хочешь, а я еду в Париж в сентябре праздновать твой день рождения %). Чувствуется пора, наконец, выучить французский.

На самом деле я хотела что-то более толковое написать, но как-то не получается. Скоро уже объявляют посадку на мой самолет. Не знаю получится ли еще писать что-то в этом блоге - его главная ценность была в том, что я записывала все в реальном времени. Воспоминания о "минувших днях" придают другой оттенок. Но может я зря так думаю, пока ничего не обещаю. Главное фотку выложила :) Здравствуй, привычный мир! Такой чужой и незнакомый, хотя вроде бы всю жизнь в нем прожила...

Pump watch

January 16

One of the most ridiculous activities we have to do on the ship is called "pump watch". I think I mentioned it before in passing, but since I do it every day I felt like it deserved a separate post.
A lot of oceanography sampling we make comes from inline water supply - there is a hole in the bottle of the ship, followed by a pump that brings water all the way to the main deck level and containers upstairs. Unfortunately, this inline water intake was not in the original design of the ship, so the crew had to improvise. The hole was made at 4.5 m below the water line, so in high roll situations the pump gets air, rather than water. This air can ruin some of the instruments we have connected to the line, but most importantly the air can destroy our precious pump. There is no alarm system, so all scientists literally sit in the lab and "watch the pump". If the water stops flowing, we simply stop the pump and restart it again.

Here is a picture of Tiger and Lily - Jenny's  son's stuffed animals on pump duty. You can see the two buttons on the wall - green and red. The red one stops the pump and the green one starts it up again.

We have been extremely lucky over the last few days to have non-marine groups come and volunteer their time for the pump watch. It really means a lot, makes us feel like we are working together, even though the task is a bit ridiculous. However, we will probably not have the luxury of other people's time during the beginnings of the upcoming legs - people will be busy sorting their own projects and solving their own problems. So unless we find a creative solution - we will be stuck with many more "pump watch" hours per person.

The most annoying shifts you can get are the 3 and 4 AM ones. In general night shifts are less desirable. I have one midnight shift every second day and a mid day shift on an alternating day. I have to say that the midnight one is much better than the 3 AM one, plus I get to check my messages after I am done watching the pump at 1 AM and I am more likely to get a text message trough than during the day. 

Before I finish this whiny post I want to send my cheers to the crew of Akademik Tryoshnikov. They did not design the ship to be so awkward, the hole for inline pump was put in later and without much thought. But the crew installed a new pump for us in Cape Town and there were kind enough to get a PVC hose from the pump to the lab. The hose is awkwardly laying around the corridors, but it works. Also, the crew were really accommodating to us when we decided to insulate the hose, disconnected it and connected back without any fuss. They also split the flow coming up with regulators on the fly, etc. etc.

Day off!

January 15

Today I took a day off. Well, half a day, but it was so amazing already. I woke up around 9:30 and went to translate for the doctor. "We" had quite a few patients lined up, so it took about two hours total. I guess people are feeling the stress of being on the ship, working non-stop and such. And just to reassure my friends and family - I am doing ok.
In the afternoon I went to the boot camp class. I wrote about it a few days ago, when I was jealously observing people on heli deck  doing exercise. The weather wasn't perfect, but manageable. It felt so great to be outside, run around the deck and do the circuit training in the hangar. I will probably pay for it tomorrow, but it was totally worth it! After the training was over I went to the ship's sauna. The sauna on Akademik Tryoshnikov is probably the best room of all. You almost forget you are on the ship while sweating in the sauna, but then the ship starts rocking and you remember :). There is also a cold water bucket one can drop on their head to cool off. What a great experience! Just what was needed to warm up and re-energize.
After the sauna and the tea, I went to see a girl we med-evaced from Marion island. Besides being in pain, she is on this foreign ship, doesn't know most of us and primarily stuck in bed. So we chatted and painted our nails - celebrating my first day off in over a month - a perfect girl's night in! I hope she will be all right soon.

Meanwhile the sun showed up and I went on heli deck to enjoy a few minutes of the sun and show off my freshly painted nails.

Showing off my nails

Masha, Holly and Pau relaxing in the afternoon sun on the helideck

I then rushed to the PI meeting, where we discussed our current and upcoming plans, realized how little we know about future customs procedures in Australia and the work mode got turned on again. I spent the rest of the night figuring out the details for the upcoming cargo shipment. My plan is to prepare everything in advance, so I can relax in Hobart. I hope the plan works!

I have a few busy days of writing report and organizing cargo ahead of me. Wish me luck :)

It is easy to forget how lucky I am

January 11

It was a really busy day for me today, we did a deep 1.5 km cast to calibrate the SOCCOM floats we launched in the afternoon. The oceanography work took old day and we all were really tired.
After that I spent half the night sorting our samples to prepare for future shipment. As our legs come to the final week, we are planning for the next leg, getting organized and reorganized. I am also hoping to do all cargo reshuffling while still at sea, so that I will enjoy my two days in Hobart with my friends, rather than working on the ship.
In any case, there have been only a few occasions I was able to go outside and enjoy being at sea. Fully comprehend how unique my experience is and how I should cherish these moments as they will pass by really fast.
So since I am up at night and I was able to sent a few pictures back home - you can enjoy with me:

Here's a picture of me on main deck passing by. We have a few journalists/photographers on board and I asked one of them to take a picture of me. I have to say this is my favorite picture from this cruise to day.

We are changing clocks rather frequently on this journey to keep up with the current time zone. In the next week we will advance forward one hour every second day. But this also means that we are somewhat in tune with the solar day. So every night after dinner (if not working, haha) you can go on helo deck and enjoy the sunset.

I also end up staying up through the night on more occasions than I probably should. So this is a picture of the rising sun I captured a few days ago.
Having little to no clouds have been such a bliss of the last couple of days! Amazing!

Физкульт-привет! / Heli deck boot camp

January 10
I can't believe how lucky we are to be sailing in this atypically nice weather. We have seen the sun for four days in a row (January 7 through 10), which is just amazing. And I am hoping tomorrow (January 11) will also be nice.
As we are steaming off to Hobart without any more island stops, many teams on the ship officially finished their field work for the leg. Some others are still collecting data from atmosphere and ocean. So with some spare time in hand and exceptional weather one of the BAS scientist started a boot camp on the heli deck (weather permitting). Unfortunately I haven't quite made it to a class yet, since there is always something for me to do in the middle of the day. But as I was attempting to sample the first hail event on the upper deck, I shot this picture of the boot campers exercising:

I also have to admit that hail sampling was unsuccessful, it was a fluke of an event that lasted a couple of minutes tops. By the time I got all my gear from the freezer, the hail stopped and the sun came back. It wasn't even that cold - you can see people exercising in shorts and t-shirts with an occasional sweater outside.

Exercising on a ship isn't easy. A lot of times there is too much to do. The gym has very limited equipment, and it becomes dangerous when the ship rolls. Heli deck is just about the only large flat space available. Many Russian crew members walk laps on heli deck, weather permitting. I have to applaud their patience and consistency. I personally try to do my yoga as regularly as possible. An occasional game of table tennis is the only add on I managed to do so far. I wish I was more organized about my fitness. Maybe I will manage to do the boot camp tomorrow, but once again too many things are planned for me...

Calm waters of the Southern Ocean

January 9

Today we had exceptionally good weather, the sun was shining, there was almost no wind and almost no swell. If we are lucky, we will continue to travel in this anticyclone for a while and enjoy this weather. However, we need to keep up the speed.

 Since the weather was so good, we spent a lot of hours doing oceanographic work - performed the first successful deep CTD and trace metal rosette cast, launched bongo nets to look for microplastics and identify new species of plankton.

I realize that I have pictures of many other people working and no pictures of me working, since I am too busy for the camera.
I recently learned how to clean the rosette, so today it was my job to tidy up after the casts and make sure we do not collect salt and rust on the frame and the delicate instruments. Draining the rosette is quite awkward as it is kept inside and I did not want to flood the room, so I drained niskin bottles into a bucket first. This is why the whole job takes longer than it should, but I have to say it was rather meditative to clean up.
Due to direct sunlight and low winds my atmospheric sensors on the uppermost deck recorded very warm temperatures. I am hoping that whenever it snows, the temperature will be more realistic. Otherwise, we might need to completely rethink the system and put the instruments somewhere else on the ship. This will be a job for Hobart, which I am hoping to outsource, since I want to take a much needed day off the ship. People, who are getting off after Leg 1 (at Hobart) are counting down the days, I have a lot to go, but I am looking forward to seeing my dear friends, who are flying to meet me in Hobart. Thank you so much!!! Can't wait to see you all ♡ !

Passing by Heard island

January 8

Today we got to yet another island Australian Heard Island of the McDonald Archipelago. However, we did not go ashore since we did not get the required permits from the Australian authority. So we steamed by Heard Island around 6-7 AM ship time. Jenny woke me up to see the island, otherwise I probably would have overslept.
The highest point of Heard Island is almost 3 km high, so there are glaciers forming up top and sliding all the way down to the sea level. A very unusual scene, we haven't seen glaciers from the ship so far:

I have to say this is my first cruise where we see land so often. Granted these are mostly small subantarctic islands, but nevertheless - excitement. All my previous Arctic cruisers provided a very different scenery - grey polar ocean, low cloud cover, maybe some ice every once in a while. Each day was just like the previous one, occasionally we saw some polar bears, walruses and seals
This Antarctic/subAntarctic cruise is rather scenic in comparison.

Yesterday we learned that there has been a lot of recent volcanic activity near Heard Island and that the new ocean floor has not been properly mapped yet. Hence, we did not go close to the island, just steamed by it, collecting some plankton and benthic specimens on the way. We have a big oceanographic day planned for tomorrow, with a deep CTD cast as soon as we get to deep waters. So I better go to sleep now.
I also need to tend to my atmospheric sensors tomorrow as one did not seem to record data and today I couldn't quite figure out why.
Wish me/us luck!

More than half way to Hobart

January 7

Эпиграф: на судне все идёт своим чередом.

While it feels like we are still just getting settled we have passed the half way point on leg one already. Today is January 7, Russian Orthodox Christmas Day, so Merry Christmas for those celebrating.
I am actually not sure if we crossed the half way distance point, but since we are not stopping at any islands anymore, we will arrive in Hobart in less than a two weeks. Hopefully.

Today was a rather productive day for the ocean-based teams, we did two CTDs (relatively deep and a shallow), trace metal rosette cast, bongo nets to look for phytoplankton, dredging to look for benthic creatures.

The weather has been rather nice, the wind and the swell were quite low, allowing us to do all this work. Yet, you can feel the high latitudes already, one needs a jacket and preferably a hat to go out on the deck even for a short while. It is hard to believe that we will be in summer clothes again soon.

As it is illegal to bring any fruit or veggies to Australia, I am eating an apple a day and sometimes two or three. That grocery trip on the last day in Cape Town was such a treat! And I have to say food on Tryoshnikov is better than in my previous cruises and Antarctic deployments. Alas, it is still getting quite repetitive. The crew meteorologist was joking with me how he can tell what day of the week it is by the soup we are having at lunch and dinner. Once again proving my point of a rather predictable life on a ship. Days of the week do not matter as much, you do your shift work or whatever the day brings, your meals are scheduled, you see the same people every day. It is very routine, but I have to say that I quite enjoy it.

A little adventure

January 5

Today we were lucky enough to get off the icebreaker on a little adventure. Jenny and I and a bunch of biologist loaded two Zodiacs to collect water samples in the bay of the Kerguelen island, where the ship is currently anchored. Jenny was teaching me to use the microcat, so I can continue supporting this little adventure into the next couple of legs.
It was a lot of fun to be so close to the water, to feel the salty spray on my face and to do some science while on it. Tryoshnikov looked so small from afar!

Jenny and Sam on Zodiac near Kerguelen island. Jenny is launching the microcat to take temperature and salinity measurements.

Later in the afternoon when I was safely on the ship and helping heard people off the Zodiacs, the wind picked up. It took some people a few tries to get off the Zodiac into a shaky gangway of Tryoshnikov. I am happy to report that everyone did make it back safely, we did not even loose any science samples.

Let's roll (and rock :)

January 3

We have left Crozet archipelago in the afternoon on January 1st. We started rolling again almost immediately after we left the protection of the island. I have to say a few people felt it again - it is amazing how a two-day stop anchored in a harbor (not even docked!) makes such a big effect on your body's vestibular system (balance).
Or maybe we were just adjusting after a rather festive New Years celebration :).
Nevertheless, the adjustment happens much faster and by dinnertime on January 1st everyone was basically back to walking sideways without even thinking twice, changing the angle of inclination depending on the roll of the ship.
This is a picture I took just as we were leaving Crozet islands, before the real rolling started. I am really proud that I was able to capture sea spray with my phone. We saw a lot of it already, but it is usually too far away to get resolved on a iPhone picture.

As I am writing this - I am looking out my cabin window. The view changes from very cloudy gloomy skies to waves splashing into it as if I was watching a washing machine. The rolling is pretty calming and I am happy that my body is adjusted to it without me making any extra efforts. According to the forecast a rather intense storm will catch up with us in a couple of days - we will see how my body will handle that one :). I am optimistic, I just wish we actually get more ocean science done before the sea conditions worsen.

Весело-весело встретим Новый год / New year celebrations generations apart

January 2

3 января 1960 г.
Близ станции Сиова (Syowa JARE). 
Ходко пошли мы от Лазарева, как только вышли на чистую воду. Теперь опять как в море, никакого льда нет в помине. Тепло (относительно, конечно). Передали мне новогодние поздравления – штук 10 (!) телеграмм.
В океане на пути в Мирный в точке с географическими координатами 66° 27 ‘ Южной широты, 40° 07 ‘ восточной долготы очень весело встретили новый год. Славно потрудились для его хорошей встречи – все было по-настоящему хорошо. Выпустили отличную стенгазету, долго турхались над новогодним номером радиогазеты (я превзошёл себя – писал стихи и пел песни по радио! Шуточные конечно), зато получился отличный выпуск, не стыдно даже по всесоюзному радио пропустить.
Собрались в кают-компании. Ёлка. Скромная выпивка с отличной и разнообразной закусью. По-морскому пышные тосты. (За тех, кто нас помнит и любит! За матерей, жён и невест! За нашу надежду – любимых детей наших!)
Как-то незаметно, в результате скромной (по пол литра столичной и бутылке шампанского на четверых) выпивки, оказалось много веселья, танцев и песен, что запечатлено многочисленными фотографиями (здесь фотографов больше чем людей!)
Легли в шестом часу. Я повторяю, что это не ночь и не утро, а такой же день.
Не впервые встречать мне праздники вне дома, вдалеке от близких. Бывало уже это в Сибири и на Кавказе, на Украине и в средней Азии, в тайге и в горах, в пустыне и в степи. Но в море пока не приходилось. Да ещё в каком море, да ещё какой праздник. Ведь новый год – любимый и по сути единственный из настоящих праздников моих. Новый год 1960-й сулит много поистине нового. Да будет он счастливым!

Translation:
January 3rd, 1960
Near Syowa station (Japanese Antarctic Research Expedition, JARE)
/*Side Note from Masha in 2017*/
So interesting for me to learn that my grandfather visited Syowa station. During my visit to the Japanese National Institute of Polar Research in 2015 I talked about that station a lot, visited JARE museum and obtained some meteorological data collected at Syowa for my research project.
/*end side note*/
After we left Lazarev station and got out of the sea ice, the ship gained a lot of speed. Once again we are at sea, as if we haven't even seen any sea ice. It is warm (relatively, of course). I got new year telegrams - 10 (!) at a time.
We celebrated the New Year in the Southern Ocean on our way to Mirny station at a point of 66° 27' South and 40° 07' East. We put a lot of effort into this celebration and we did it well. We put out a special issue of the stengazeta/press news and we worked long hours on our celebratory radio program. (I outdid myself, I wrote poems and sang song on the radio. As a joke of course).  But our radio program was really good, I would have not be ashamed to broadcast it over the national radio.
For New Years, we all gathered around in the mess. We even had a new year tree there. We had a few drinks with various chasers. People were saying long elaborate "marine" toast: for those who remembers and loves us; for our mothers, wives and fiancée; for our hope - our children.
We only had 1/2 liter of vodka and a bottle of champagne to share between the four of us at the table, but the party became rather rowdy, with lots of jokes, dances and songs. We have a lot of photos to prove that too (it seems like we have more photographers than people).
We went to bed a little after 5 AM. Once again, we are in the polar day, so there is no darkness at night, it's basically the same daylight. It wasn't my first holiday far away from home and family, I have been celebrating in Siberia, in the Caucus mountains, in Ukraine, in Asia, in taiga and in the mountains, in a dessert and in a steppe. But this was my first New Years at sea. As new year is my favorite holiday. New 1960 is promising to be a rather novel year. Let it be a happy one!

As I was reading and translating this journal entry by my grandfather, I realized that Soviet reality aside, I could have written the same entry. We have been working most of December 31st, so we did not make a lot of elaborate preparations, such as a special radio program. We did however had a really nice buffet style dinner in the mess, where our Christmas tree is still standing.

We had a visit from our ship's captain to read us all the telegrams from Russian Antarctic stations and research vessels and the Arctic and Antarctic Research Institute (AARI) - the organizations that our ship belongs to. It sounded really formal, but it was nice to hear. We did not have too many elaborate "marine" toasts, but our chief scientist went upstairs (with me as a translator) to congratulate the Russian officers and crew members. Soon we all ended up gathering in the crew's (officer's) mess (кают-компания) upstairs and the dancing started. Considering that we had dinner at our usual time of 19:30, I was impressed that we kept dancing till about four in the morning. We did have an abundant supply of food and alcohol, so that probably helped us to cnotinue well into the night.

I was really happy to see us, scientists, mingle with the crew members. Aside from an obvious language barrier, we have a big cultural barrier and many people don't know how to approach each other. Yet, the crew members have been extremely helpful and I personally asked for a lot of favors from them to accommodate various science projects. So it was great to relax a little bit, let louse, dance, enjoy just celebrating a holiday rather than stressing about the limitations of the ship, of the cruise time and other things I have been stressing too much about.

Just as my grandfather said - New Years is my favorite holiday after all.
After the dancing finished I went for a walk outside - the sun was just rising and it was a gorgeous and wonderfully warm morning. I posted a couple of pictures from it in the previous post. I did not experience a polar day during this New Years celebrations, but it was my first time celebrating on the ship.
And just as my grandfather - I am wishing everyone a very happy 2017!

December 21, 2016

We finally left Cape Town just a little short of midnight today, so officially marked our 24 hour at sea point.
It has been rather rocky ever since we left, becoming worse throughout the day. I will not lie to you, I felt sick most of the day. I think it was mainly due to my general exhaustion of the last week of port call. I needed that break honestly.
Once again both the crew and my fellow colleagues have been wonderful, helping me out with the tasks I needed to complete today and were not physically able to do. What would I have done without them? Alas, I have been helping out everyone a lot too. What a great group of people and I am lucky to be a part of it.

Science wise we did manage to do a test CTD cast today at 2 PM ship time (12 PM UTC). We only went to 200m, it was rather dangerous and rocky. The swell was up to 8 m when we pulled the rosette up - the crew thought that all scientists are a little crazy :).

One thing that I absolutely needed to get up for today was a boat drill. Happy to inform all of you that I "survived", emergency gear is ok and aside from a terrible smell inside the rescue boats they are ok, equipped with water, dry rations, satellite emergency finders etc.

The boat drill and the CTD cast (where I have to admit I was mainly observing) wiped me out and I went back to bed. I did try to help out with translating different minor and not so minor issues on the way, but I decided that my own personal wellbeing should come first. So I had the best nap before dinner and woke up feeling much better.

The weather is predicted to get worse tomorrow, so we are not doing another cast. I am planning to sleep it off and get more adjusted to the rocky seas cause there is more to come. Just to give my observant readers a point of reference - my cabin is one deck below the main deck - the row of windows in the orange: section 

 This is a picture of Tryoshnikov docked in Cape Town for your reference of how high the swell is. 

So today we had water splashing into our cabin window pretty much throughout all day. I wonder what "tomorrow will be worse" mean for our veto out of the window. I mean it changes, sometimes it water,and sometimes it is all clouds. Cool stuff when you are not sick because of it :).

We are also changing clock during the night tomorrow - we will go one hour ahead. Oh, and internet is very limited, so I no pictures so far. It might get a little better or it might get worse, hard to predict...
Till later,
Masha

P.S. That’s how the storm looked before midnight: the snapshot from Global winds map :

Off to sea

After a rather long and much needed stop at customs we are off to sea. Local time is 23:45 and we started rocking about 15 minutes ago. Luckily just as I secured everything in my cabin after securing all my cargo. Actually the crew helped me with cargo so much! I can't even describe how grateful I am.
I am losing signal, so good bye South Africa, good bye online friends.
Oh, one more thing - CBS news called me on board for an interview today. So look for it on their website, it should come out in a few days.
Off to bed, the light rocking of the ship is so calming...

Good night and till later,
Masha