By Rachel Davies, Operations Assistant
By the time this blog is published, the museum team will have left the island, and they will be homeward bound! The team had an incredibly busy season, and March was no exception. They saw a total of 15 ships and 2,255 visitors. This brought the season total to 104 ships and 14 yachts! During that time, they did 158 whaling station tours, 51 presentations and inspired 16,216 visitors. In this blog, Rachel (Operations Assistant) tells us about the final month on South Georgia.
So, how did the final month on island go?
At the start of March, we said goodbye to Helen (Assistant Curator) as she began her journey home. She left alongside nine others, leaving the island feeling much quieter. It certainly felt like the beginning of the end for our time on island. Early on in the month we celebrated International Women’s Day on island. I spoke to the wonderful women that work for SGHT on island and wrote a blog, and we did an organised run for people on base to mark the occasion. It is great to see so many women working on island.
International Women’s Day run
Mid-month we were treated to a day of snow and we all appreciated seeing Grytviken turn white for one last time. It is always a pleasure to see the seals and penguins playing in the snow.
As the month drew to a close, we were busy seeing our last ships and finishing projects for the museum. Livvie and I carried out a survey on the cemetery, assessing each grave and writing recommendations for preservation work. It was fascinating to spend some time looking at the graves and pondering the lives of the people buried on island.
A stand-out monthly highlight!
Picture of Rachel’s favourite photo in the museum collection.
Early on this month, we had a request for a copy of a photo from the museum collection. Whilst searching through the collections store for it, I found my favourite photo of the season- an image of people climbing an iceberg from back in 1988! It was certainly an unexpected item to find, and it adds to the story of those who lived on this island before us.
As we came to the end of our time on island there was lots of work to be done to prepare Grytviken for winter. Our final days were spent winterising the museum and Drukken (our island home), before closing Grytviken for the season- leaving just the BAS wintering team at King Edward Point. Winterising the museum involved moving objects into storage for the winter months, doing a stock take of shop stock, cleaning the museum and doing a final waste run.
Livvie conducting the cemetery survey.
We spent our last few weeks going on our final hut nights, enjoying our final hikes and fitting in some well-deserved sauna time. This island is a special place, and we’ve all left with fond memories and some unique experiences to cherish.
We’ll certainly miss our summer home, and our furry neighbours!
Seal sat on whale skull.