The Mind Creative FEB 2014
Various expedition cruises do
not see Erebus, due to too much
cloud.
Our guides check that our boot
brushing is acceptable, and take
us into Scott’s Terra Nova hut.
It is the largest historic hut in
the Antarctic region. It was built
in 1911 from weatherboard, two
and three-ply ‘ruberoid’ and
insulated in finely shredded,
quilted seaweed.
This was the hut from which
Scott and his polar party
departed
from
and
never
returned. Shackleton and his
Ross Sea Party later used the hut
in 1915 – 1917 for the Imperial
Trans-Antarctic
Expedition.
‘Terra Nova’ was the base for
some of the earliest advances in
the study of earth sciences,
meteorology and biology in
Antarctica,
which
is
still
significant in scientific research
today.
As in the hut at Cape Royds, the
atmosphere is warm and dry. We
can feel hairs standing up on our
necks. The larger than expected
size of the building, and the
perfect condition it was in, stirs
our emotions. We feel we are in
a place of sanctity.
The
boardroom table, depicted in the
famous Ponting photograph of
47