tiabunna's favorite photos

A real delight at Lake Mungo was being able to view totally dark skies, with no light pollution, because of the distance from towns and cities. This shot shows the deep southern sky, with notes indicating some points of interest. I prefer this on black (click on the image). I'll leave my Lake Mungo series for a while and return to it later.

From an old slide. Late night sunset reflections in Vincennes Bay, near Casey Station, Antarctica.

From an old 1966 slide. The major field trip away from the station was the Spring Trip, here seen at its first stop. This was to the northern Prince Charles Mountains and involved seven of us surveying previously unvisited mountains, some 300 km inland - we were away for four months. Everything was moved in caravan trains, drawn by D4 bulldozers. Only a short distance inland, the blue ice seen at the edge of the plateau gives way to compacted snow, carved by the wind into waves known as "sastrugi", as seen here.

From an old slide. Heading for Peak 7, about 170 miles south of Mawson, Antarctica. Sunset was about 2230 and the sun then travelled along just below the horizon, so we made the most of the good weather and travelled late into the night. Minolta SR1, Auto Rokkor_PF 58/1.4 .

Reposted after reprocessing. From an old negative, taken exactly 50 years ago today (9 October 1966). View large. Here the 1966 Spring surveying trip from Mawson is just heading out across the blue ice at the edge of the Antarctic plateau. Taken from the roof of the main caravan. In the distance, several expeditioners can be seen on the ice farewelling us, also the VW following for the early stage. For the next four months, "the world" consisted of just the seven of us.

From an old negative and best viewed on black. The only previous expedition to this area had described Mt Bechervaise as "impossible". That was something of a challenge to the more expert climbers in our group: here the climbing party prepares to make the first ascent. I was quite happy to watch. :) They took about four hours to reach the summit and another four to return.

Great excitement at the first flower on our (fairly new) frangipanni tree.

This waterspout developed in unstable weather ahead of an approaching cold front. It was maybe 2km offshore and caused understandable excitement. Explored.

Updated from my original posting (and originally on F..r). I'd been copying some old slides. This is the Lauritzen Lines ship MV Nella Dan, on contract to the Australian National Antarctic Research Expeditions (ANARE) preparing to depart for Antarctica in late December 1965 with me on board. HFF and best wishes for the weekend, everyone.