We shall not cease from exploration,
And the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.
T.S. Eliot, ‘Little Gidding’
The sky grew lighter. The wind, although warm, sent a shiver of chill right through me. Or was it the excitement? As my hands clutched the rusty metal hand rails I steadied myself as the ship rolled over to port in its steady and rhythmic movement. It was 6.45am and I had risen early to catch the sunrise as we ploughed through the waves on our course through the Atlantic, currently several hundred miles off Sierra Leone. The few clouds in the sky caught fire as the sun crawled upwards beyond the horizon. I have seen sunrises at sea before but nothing like the offerings of the tropical Atlantic. From the pastel chalks of predawn to the bold colour palette of a surrealist painter found in the few seconds before sunrise, sunrises here had it all. And the best bit? I still had another two weeks’ worth of sunrises to go.
I have recently returned from a long voyage at sea. I boarded the Akademik Tryoshnikov, a Russian icebreaker, in Bremerhaven Germany and stepped off in Cape Town South Africa. My reason for doing so was to take part in a Maritime University taking place during Leg zero of the Swiss Polar Institutes Antarctic Circumpolar Expedition (ACE). This University course, under the auspices of the Russian Geographical Society, taught oceanography and ocean sampling techniques to 49 students from 14 different nationalities and to say it was the trip of a lifetime was an understatement.
The course was excellent, covering a huge and varied curriculum from CTD deployment to atmospheric circulation, from Antarctic winds to ocean gliders. It was run and taught, most amazingly, by three conveners whom all did a fabulous job. Equally as intellectually stimulating as the course however was the interactions with my fellow students. Coming from diverse academic backgrounds and from all over the world I learnt so much from our discussion over meals, our lively scheduled debates or the daily student lectures. What’s more than this I also gained 49 friends.
It is hard to describe the experiences of such an incredible journey so I’m going to enlist the help of my new friends to help me. Please check out some of their great blog articles from below:
http://annacresswell.wixsite.com/photography/voyage
http://spi-ace-expedition.ch/a-students-perspective-jordan-hollarsmiths-journal/
Dr. Daniel M Moore 