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| Ardery Blizzards |
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| Ardery Blizzards |
Dear Caseyites and other readers,
Finally a good old-fashioned storm-day with winds of about 60 knots around
Ardery. Friday the 13th of December must have seemed an appropriate day to
the weather-gods to start compensating their slack behaviour. We've had
hardly any serious wind in almost four weeks, but yesterday afternoon it
suddenly blew up to remind us that this is still Antarctica and not 'Palm
Beach'. The boating trip that had been planned for today to get Jan off for
a Casey holiday is unlikely to come about, so again it's time to share with
you Ardery Islands' news and gossips as well as some Dutch history.
SINTERKLAAS
On the fifth of December the traditional Dutch 'Sinterklaas'-evening was
celebrated in our Dutch Ovens on Ardery Island. The Sinterklaas-tradition is
similar to Christmas celebrations elsewhere, but probably the very religious
community in Holland centuries ago considered it to be a pagan habit to
associate the Christmas event with too much earthly pleasure and found a
political way out by inventing Sinterklaas.
THE SINTERKLAAS LEGEND - 'Sinterklaas' is an 'immortal' old Saint, a
Catholic bishop who supposedly lives somewhere in Spain, but has a special
feeling for Dutch children. Each year, around mid-November, he arrives by
ship in Holland carrying presents for all that have been 'good' in the past
year. 'Bad' children get whipped with a bunch of twigs, or if you've been
really bad you will be deported to Spain in one of the empty gift bags. But
guess what: since centuries there have been no bad children in Holland!
Anyway, Sinterklaas, in his bright red bishop-dress travels through Holland
riding a beautiful white horse, assisted by his black helpers called 'Zwarte
Pieten'.
SHOES & CHIMNEYS - In the evenings children put their shoes in
front of the fire place with drawings or letters for Sinterklaas and some
food and water for the horse. If you're lucky, Sinterklaas has been riding
his horse over the roof of your house during the night, and a Zwarte Piet
has come down the chimney to exchange the contents of the shoes with gifts
from Sinterklaas. There are some complications with this story with current
central heating systems in most houses, but the kids don't worry.
FIFTH OF DECEMBER - The 'shoe' gifts may happen a few times, but the
real celebration is the evening of the fifth of December, just prior to the
Saints birthday on six December. Bags full of gifts are found by the kids,
containing lots of presents packed in weird ways and/or with funny,
sensitive or very personal poems. As older people like to get gifts too,
everyone in the family gets gifts, and it usually becomes a very long and
cosy night.
SINTERKLAAS ON ARDERY - He is a clever guy this Sinterklaas, because
in spite of his old age he apparently hopped over to Ardery Island on the
fifth of December. And not only that, he even knew that Jeroen had been
replaced on the island, because among the gifts with poems that were found,
there were some for Swivel (Casey chef Shane Procter) as well. Swivel,
although ignorant about even the existence of Sinterklaas, apparently has
been a good guy in the past year.
SWIVELMANIA
During his 5 day stay on the island in early December to replace Jeroen,
Swivel has been a hard working member of the Ardery community (probably
hoping to be awarded again by Sinterklaas next year). The birds which were
visited by him daily, became very fond of him. This is hard to understand
really, because Swivel's main experience with birds is chopping them up for
dinner! Whatever the reason, birds are clearly suffering from a Swivelmania
depression, no matter what we do. Willem and Jan are showing similar signs
of severe deprivation, but persist in saying that it has nothing to do with
the fact that there's no longer these heavenly rice-scallops and raspberry
sweets on the menu. As for Willem, he is trying to push out the memory by
replacing his initially rather careful cooking with more and more wildly
creative sweets especially. They're great!
KILLERS
Thanks to an announcement from Darryn on a boating party near Peterson
Island, a pod of at least 15 Killer Whales was seen far west of Ardery on 9
Dec. Although distant, the silhouettes of their backfins and the water
vapour in their blows were beautifully lighted against the late afternoon
sun. They apparently remained in the area, as a smaller group was swimming
closer to Ardery the next day. Occasionally the sounds of their blows could
be heard.
PERSONAL HYGIENE (continued)
With summer in full swing, the melt-lake close to the cabin
has actually changed to a lake rather than an skating-track. This has
boosted the hygiene on the island, as Jan has been spotted twice last week
having a stark-naked early morning wash, while balancing on rocks above the
water. Not the most elegant thing in this otherwise unspoiled landscape, but
Fred does not mind. 'Fred' is the Skua breeding close to the cabin. He has a
high appreciation for hygiene as he takes several bathings each day in the
lake (which is therefore called Fred's Lake). In previous years, Fred had a
rather peculiar perception of hygiene, as after each wash he used to have a
really good emptying of the bowels at the same spot before flying off,
leaving a large milky cloud of shit in the lake. This year he seems to have
abandoned that habit, which explains why early morning washes are a bit more
attractive.
BATHTUB BLOWN AWAY
Fred's (and our) bathtub nearly blew away in the storm last night. Normally
a tiny creek of water seeps downhill from the lake, but yesterdays storm not
only blew off clouds of water but also pushed up the water in the direction
of the runoff. In less than an hour half Fred's Lake was emptied by a wild
river running downhill. As maximum temperatures for today are predicted to
be an incredible 3 degrees we assume Fred will have water again in not too
long a time.
Not too much else blew off during the storm: two aluminium boxes blew off as
if being pieces of paper, but we could recover them -somewhat damaged - from
the sheltered snowdrift further down.
RAIN
Believe it or not, it has been raining on Ardery. Just a few drops, but
nevertheless. Times are changing. Jan always said he would immediately leave
Antarctica if it would start to rain on Ardery, but he has a slight problem
because Aurora refuses to come and get him.
ANTARCTIC PETRELS PHLEGMATIC UNDER DISASTER SEASON
The visits of Giant Petrels to the Antarctic Petrel colony seem to have
largely stopped and the birds have become much more relaxed. Being rather
nervous earlier this season, the Antarctic Petrels have now regained their
usual easy-going character. During remarking of nestnumbers the other day,
it was hard to move around the curious birds. One landed on Jeroen's back
and sat there for a while inspecting our activities. These birds don't have
to stay on the nests when we are around, because most have lost their eggs
due to the combination of Giant Petrel disturbance and Skua predation. Only
a few eggs remain in our study area. The situation in other parts of the
colony, which we never enter but scan with binoculars, seems not much
better. Carcasses of Giant Petrel victims are scattered between the few
remaining breeders. 
The Antarctics seem less worried by a 'lost' season than we are,
and they are probably right. Being very long-lived, disaster seasons are a
normal fact of life that can be overcome. Nevertheless we hope that in the
Fulmar colony - they are at the peak of egg laying now - breeding will be
more successful this year. At the moment there are 3 Fulmars with eggs on
our artificial nests. Giant Petrels have been observed causing panic in the
colony twice there as well.... we'll keep you posted.
That it for issue 6 of the 'Ardery Blizzard'. We hope the next issue will
be soon, but not too soon (continued bad weather), but as they say: you
never know your luck in a big city. We're not sure what this means on a
small isolated Antarctic island. Future will tell, cheers
Jan, Jeroen and Willem
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THE 'ARDERY BLIZZARD' IS BROUGHT TO YOU
BY YOUR SOMEWHAT CLEANER BIRD-TEAM
IN THE DUTCH OVEN DEPARTMENT
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Dear Caseyites and other readers,
Continuous beautiful weather could be used as an excuse for not having
published a timely 'Christmas Special' of the Ardery Blizzard. The real
reason however, is that Willem and especially Jan have been knocked flat-out
by the Casey Jolly-virus, leaving them no time to do anything useful. Jeroen
meanwhile has to work like crazy to keep the Ardery Island show running;
luckily he gets lots of support from Casey volunteers. So, too late for a
'merry Christmas', but well in time to wish you all a very peaceful, happy
and successful 1997!
CHAMPAGNE
As if preparing itself for Christmas and New-Years Eve, the beer on Ardery
lately seems to undergo a miraculous change into some sort of bubbling
Champagne. No matter how carefully the cans are handled, after opening, an
uncontrollable flow of foaming beer runs out. If this had occurred at Casey,
one would be pretty sure that Jane had been secretly shaking the cans, but
so far we've managed to keep her well away from Ardery, so that can't be it.
Anyway, it still tastes like good beer so we don't worry too much. It just
means you've got to drink it fast at the start. We can live with that...
GIANTS (continued)
The dramatic effects of Giant Petrels in the colonies of other smaller
petrels were again observed in mid-December, this time in the Fulmar
study-area at Robertson Landing. During the time that two Giants were trying
to kill a Fulmar they had grabbed from its nest, a Skua (Fred actually) took
5 eggs from Fulmar nests nearby before the Fulmars could return. A bit sad
really, because the Giants let the Fulmar escape (more dead than alive) to
sea and so ended up with nothing. Nevertheless, the frequency of Giant
visits seems to decrease, and we hope for a more or less stable situation
soon.
CHRISTMAS BABIES
During Christmas, after 29 days of patient incubation of their eggs, Fred
and Elze, the pair of Skua's living close to the cabin on Ardery, have
become the proud parents of two beautiful and healthy chicks. The event gave
special touch to the Christmas celebrations of Rob Easther and Atilla, who
assisted Jeroen during the absence of Willem and Jan. The Fulmars probably
do not quite have the same Christmas feelings at the foresight of two more
hungry Skua stomachs that have to be filled.
DUTCH OVEN REBUILDING PROGRAM
Apart from
helping Jeroen with the daily checks of the study-areas on Ardery, Atilla
and Rob have initiated an Ardery Island rebuilding program. A courageous
complete clean-out of the Dutch Oven Cabins and some changes with locally
available building-materials have apparently been completed. Carpet-tiles
and large desk-shelves were seen leaving the Casey wharf yesterday morning
when George and Anthony were sent out in the rubberboats as the second
reconstruction crew of ACS (Atilla Construction Services). Meanwhile ACS
supervisor Atilla is continuing his reconstruction planning at the base and
is currently redesigning much of the birdstudy equipment.
CASEY JOLLY VIRUS
On 15 December, Jan went out for a Casey holiday for the first time and was
immediately struck by the jolly virus that seems to thrive at station. In
three days time Jan managed to get just about everywhere on Quads and in
Hagglunds, assisted by George, Rob, and Swivel and of course the Palm Beach
climate. After just 5 days work on Ardery, on the 24th of December Jan
reappeared at Casey with Willem arguing that Jeroen 'wanted' to stay on the
island during Christmas. This message remains unconfirmed though. After
Christmas festivities, Willem and Jan immediately indulged in further
jollies. In spite of considerable computerproblems for Jeroen, both Jan and
Willem have refused to go back to Ardery. Willem persists in saying that
'solving problems' is a good exercise for Jeroen for after voyage 4.
Probably Doc Annette will be needed to cure the virus to prevent that Jan
and Willem will find another excuse for 30 December, when they are supposed
to change over with Jeroen. Luckily for Jeroen, Willems attempt to alter
identity as a means to escape from imminent duties on Ardery, has failed.
Drastic changes to his looks in Alby's barbershop (a nr.4 hairtrim and
complete beard shave) did cause some confusion around Casey: however, Willem
gave himself away by wearing his famous Russian felt-hat during the visit of
the 'Kapitan Khlebnikov'.
ARDERY ISLAND SWIMMING CONTEST
On 24 Dec, Psycho started the new Ardery Island International Free-style
Swimming Contest. However, his first attempt to set the record for the
fastest possible swim around Ardery failed dramatically. After a highly
spectacular dive from the Robertson Landing starting point, Psycho decided
that his outfit was not adequate and climbed back in the boats. The next
day, on Christmas, a large group of potential contestants had a training
session at the Casey wharf. Most of them, including the organizing
committee, immediately spurted back to shore after the first (and only)
dive/jump from the wharf. Several contestants had to be warned that
screaming foul language at the watertemperature is reason for
disqualification in the real contest. Fester did a serious training attempt
but fell in love with a lump of ice on the way. Mike, wearing a high speed
swimming hat, made three good looking starts but got nowhere nevertheless.
Psycho, trying to scare off potential competitors immediately demonstrated
his long distance swimming skills but the purple-violet colours of his skin
after training were reason for concern. Frank finally experimented with a
balloon-shaped dry suit, but it seems unlikely that he could peddle this
design around the island. It's more likely that he'd become windblown and
end up near Mirny or so.
This sporting news concludes issue 7 of the 'Ardery Blizzard'. Summer is
running along it seems. Departure of Willem and Jan on V4 is approaching.
Eagerly waiting on the incoming ship is Oliver Hentschel, a Hobart volunteer
who will assist Jeroen during the remainder of the season. After a long time
on the ship he's keen to get out to Ardery. He's also a fanatic home-beer
brewer, so no doubt he'll fit in well in the community over here. Let's just
hope he's not too susceptible to the Jolly-virus.
Jan, Jeroen and Willem
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THE 'ARDERY BLIZZARD' IS BROUGHT TO YOU
BY YOUR JOLLYSTRUCK BIRD-TEAM
IN THE DUTCH OVEN DEPARTMENT
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