The refrain from the museum team throughout November was ‘where did October go?!’, and it seems like November has now met the same fate!
November was a busy month for the museum team, with us welcoming 22 ships and 2570 passengers to Grytviken! Now, while we promise we don’t have favourites, one ship did cause particular excitement when it arrived in the bay. Bark Europa looks a little different from the ships we normally see as she’s a triple-masted sailing vessel originally built in 1911. Seeing her in the bay always calls to mind historic photos of Grytviken featuring the Endurance before she departed on her ill-fated expedition to Antarctica. It’s an impressive sight!
Bark Europa in the bay at Grytviken.
In between visit ships, we’ve been busy working behind the scenes to bring some exciting new displays to the museum. In November, Curatorial Intern Bodil installed a new exhibition in the Bonner Room about the discovery of South Georgia by Captain Cook in 1773. One of the exhibits in this display is a map of the island, rather confusingly illustrated upside down, so we won’t be using it to navigate by anytime soon!
Bodil proudly showing off her new exhibit in the Bonner Room.
To help our visitors navigate around the whaling station, we installed the interpretation signs around Grytviken in November. To withstand the weather (and the wildlife) these signs are very heavy, so we were grateful for assistance from the Government Build Team and their truck in order to ferry these signs to all four corners of the station!
Operations Assistant Livvie was also working hard behind the scenes, making sure all our shop stock rooms are organised and tidied before the busy Christmas and New Year period in December! Unfortunately, we forgot to take a ‘before’ picture but trust us when we say that the ‘after’ represents a big improvement!
One of our shop stock rooms looking neat and tidy thanks to Livvie’s handiwork!
In between our busy ship schedule, we were incredibly lucky to be presented with opportunities for some of our team members to join trips to other parts of the island on the small boats based at the British Antarctic Survey research station at King Edward Point. Livvie joined an outing that went all the way to St Andrews Bay – the location of one of the largest king penguin colonies in the world. This was a bit of a dream come true for penguin-mad Livvie!
Meanwhile, Bodil’s idea of a ‘dream trip’ was a little different to most folks! As our curatorial intern, and resident historian for Grytviken, she has always wanted to see some of the other whaling stations on South Georgia. As such, she was incredibly excited to join a trip which went north to the whaling stations of Leith, Stromness and Husvik. Unlike Grytviken, which had a number of structures removed during a clean-up operation in the early 2000s, these stations are still very much as they would have been during the whaling era, so Bodil found it a really fascinating day out!
Bodil in front of Stromness Whaling Station.
Because of the visiting ship schedule, sometimes our days off are mid-week, when the rest of the base community are working. This is a great chance to lend a hand around station, and see what other people’s jobs entail. During November, our wonderful Government Build Team have been hard at work renovating Maiviken Hut, a small shelter near to station which we can use for overnight trips. This has involved hand-carrying huge amounts of tools and materials over 5km from their workshop to the hut. So, on one of our days off this month, we thought we’d lend a hand where we could, and carried some of the waste timber from the renovation back from the hut for them. It turned out to be quite a windy day when we did this, which made walking with planks of wood strapped to your rucksack somewhat challenging!
Loaded up with planks of wood from the old Maiviken Hut.
Photo 5 – Loaded up with planks of wood from the old Maiviken Hut.
One of the most frequently asked questions by visitors to Grytviken is ‘where do you get your supplies from?’ For fresh fruit and vegetables, the answer is the Falkland Islands, via the trusty FPV Pharos! This month, she brought a bumper crop so we’ve really enjoyed tucking in to lots of fruit salads and roast vegetables over the last few weeks!
An excellent delivery of ‘freshies’ in the food store at King Edward Point.
November has also seen the arrival of the best thing that the island of South Georgia has to offer – fur seal pups! While some people have mixed feelings about their slightly aggressive parents, everyone on station agrees that fur seal pups are the cutest thing on the island and more than make up for the challenge of dealing with a grumpy adult!
Carrying on a tradition started by my predecessor, I have been undertaking daily ‘pup counts’ on the track between Grytviken and King Edward Point ever since the first pup was born on 16th November. By the end of the month, just two weeks later, there were already 38! Last year my count topped out at over 240 so, now that we’re heading in to December, I can’t wait to see just how many we end up with!
One of the new arrivals at Grytviken!