Endurance Read online

  In serious tones Azzi feigned great knowledge of Antarctica, but had trouble explaining his own name.

  ‘It’s a nickname. It’s short for Azimuth.’

  ‘Is that from the Old Testament?’

  ‘No, no, it’s meteorological!’

  ‘Meet who?’ they laughed.

  I insisted it was just his Kiwi drawl until he became quite tetchy. He was such a serious fellow, younger than me, but together we were full of stories that produced gales of laughter among our new friends.

  But we had few occasions for leisure, in between packing and loading. It was not long before every available inch inside the ship was full. I could not see how we would fit the very large objects, including prefabricated huts and an aeroplane which, having crashed, was without wings and was to be used as a tractor. Eventually these were hoisted on board and lashed to the deck along with water casks and tins of petrol and kerosene. Captain Davis then announced we would depart with the tide the following afternoon.

  ●

  Saturday, 2 December 1911. We are given a heroes’ send-off. We are not heroes, though, save for Dr Mawson. Mostly we are unknowns who dream of achieving great things for ourselves, our country and for the British Empire.

  There is a brass band and ‘God Save the King’ is played more than once. The lord mayor of Hobart, dignitaries and politicians are in attendance, as are reporters and press photographers. The telegram of good wishes from King George V is read aloud. The crowd yells loud ‘hurrahs’ as the men toss their straw boaters and the women wave their lace handkerchiefs.

  Before embarking I had put to Captain Davis my ideas for filming on board Aurora. The cinematograph on its tripod weighs over ninety pounds. Most cameramen are content to stand the camera in a stationary position and wind the film through. However, since working at the Sandford Ironworks I delight in the use of pulleys, winches and flywheels to achieve novel effects. Captain Davis with some reservation has agreed I am allowed anywhere in the rigging that I can climb. So as the crowd swells and Aurora separates from the dock I am forty feet in the air, perched on a yardarm off the foremast. I have used the pulleys and halyards on the mast to winch the cinematograph up alongside me and have then strapped it securely to the yardarm to hold its weight and with just enough movement that I can tilt and pivot at the same time. With my legs wrapped around the yardarm I wind the crank handle, two turns a second. I am happy as a lark. It does not trouble me that, because of my camera’s distance, I miss out on the handshakes, hugs and kisses that Les Blake, Azzi and the other boys receive.

  ●

  Before leaving the Derwent River we pull into the quarantine station and pick up forty Greenland huskies. The dogs are quite striking in their appearance, solid with wild wolf-like faces. They do not bark, but howl and nip at their leashes as they are brought on board to their newly built kennels on the main deck.

  Looking after the dogs on their ‘round the world’ trip were two of the few non-Australians on the expedition: Belgrave Ninnis, a young lieutenant in the British Army, and Dr Xavier Mertz, a Swiss lawyer and skiing champion. Mawson greets Ninnis and Mertz warmly. Ninnis is tall and lanky with a boyish face, big ears and a ready smile. Mertz is short and very dapper with a neat moustache and speaks the most amazing ‘Ingleesh’. We soon find ourselves mimicking him, which he accepts with good humour. Les Blake, Azzi and I watch them bring the dogs on board one by one.

  Les remarks, ‘I heard these chaps just missed out on selection with Scott’s expedition.’

  ‘Lucky for them they have a second chance with us,’ says Azzi.

  ‘But why did the dogs have to stay in quarantine with them?’ I joke, surprising myself with my new-found confidence.

  Within days of leaving Hobart the weather deteriorates and the crew reef sails before they are ripped asunder. The overloaded Aurora rolls and dips like billy-o. It is as if we are imprisoned on a carnival carousel with no brake. Waves come over the deck and cause havoc with the dogs and cargo. The foredeck is several feet underwater as she plunges through wave after wave. The dogs are terrified but their howling is drowned out by the storm. Their poop washes everywhere. One by one most of the expedition team fall ill with seasickness. They lie helpless in their bunks. I have been wondering how I will fare. I keep busy and am spared.

  After a week we run down the western edge of a dramatic landfall, Macquarie Island, on which the bleak weather permits not a single tree. To escape the worst of the breeze we tuck into Caroline Cove, a narrow inlet on its south-west corner, Captain Davis sends in a boat to determine the cove’s suitability. Les, Azzi and I are among the few expedition members well enough to go ashore. We plot our way through a narrow channel which opens up into a spectacular inlet surrounded by steep tussock-grass hillsides.

  We have entered a zoo without walls. The sea around our boat is alive with scores of penguins leaping and diving. There are thousands more in rookeries along the edges of the cove. Seabirds disturbed by our arrival are squawking and swirling in front of us, trying to lift themselves back up the hillside. We cross a sandy shoal into deeper water and observe that most of the large rocks along the cove are home to large cumbersome-looking sea elephants drying and sunning themselves. As we scrape the shingle Les and I leap overboard and drag the boat through a large troop of royal penguin spectators. They have inquisitive eyes, bright orange chests and earmuffs and are most reluctant to vacate their spots. They stand around me chattering in a language I do not understand and peck at my legs as if to say, ‘Do you mind!’ I am more threatened by the sea elephants, which exceed twenty feet in length. They shake their heads at us, then smoothly drop into the water and disappear.

  I am in a photographer’s paradise. While the others labour at establishing a small stores depot I am at liberty to capture whatever images I can. The boat goes back to Aurora and I request they bring more photographic plates and the cinematograph on their return. In the meantime I explore the hinterland.

  A lively stream leads me up several hundred feet between the hills above the cove. As I ascend, the ground opens out, there is a babble of commotion and I find myself the centre of attention of some thousands of birds. I have stumbled onto a major rookery of terns, boobies, shearwaters and many others I don’t recognise. They are in the middle of nesting and their eggs are strewn across the tussocky ground. The birds squawk their protests and I am deafened as I reverse my path back down the hill. I spy colourful Maori hens and the nests of giant petrels whose young have hatched into grotesque fluffy toys. Along the shore large flocks of royal penguins are begrudgingly prepared to put up with my company. The boat returns and I find a convenient spot to set up the tripod.

  After only a few exposures I am accosted by one of the sailors and told that I am to return to Aurora at once. Mawson and Davis have decided the cove is unsuitable for a permanent anchorage and we are to search for a more protected shelter. I am stunned. This is a remarkable opportunity to obtain unique photographs and footage; I have never seen photographs of these creatures in the wild taken on anything like the modern equipment I have, and there is no telling if such an opportunity will present itself again. Reluctantly I do as am I bid, inwardly fuming.

  By evening we have sailed to the north-eastern tip of the island, but are unable to go ashore due to the strong surf. In the morning the surf is still too big and we again wait at anchor. Shortly, a solitary figure emerges above a dune behind the beach. He disappears and then there are several figures excitedly waving. Using flags they semaphore that their sealing ship, Clyde, has been wrecked. The figures endeavour to launch a lifeboat but all their attempts are rebuffed by the surf and their boat overturned. In response to their further messages, Aurora ups anchor and rounds the sand spit to its western side, Hasselborough Bay. There we find a suitable spot to land. Mawson and Davis decide this is the ideal site for our proposed Macquarie Island base.

  Hasselborough Bay has nothing of the wildlife which abounds on the southern tip of the island. One o
f the shipwrecked sealers, a fellow named Hutchinson, confirms my suspicion that the north of the island has been the most regularly inhabited by man and, as a result, its seal and penguin populations have been completely decimated. He tells me it is a rugged twenty miles to Caroline Cove and would be much quicker by boat than overland. It is unlikely Aurora will return to Caroline Cove and, in any case, it is the photographs from a walking tour that I am after. Hutchinson appreciates my interest and offers to guide me if I can provide supplies.

  I present my plan to Mawson, but he is occupied with unloading and setting up a wireless transmission station to link with our Antarctic bases.

  When he doesn’t respond I press further.

  ‘Look, you know the crew rushed me into the boat to leave Caroline Cove. Well, I think I’ve left the main lens for the cinematograph on the rocks where I set up. I can’t find it anywhere. It’s essential for the moving pictures you want.’

  Within a few hours Hutchinson and I are on our way south. We are accompanied by the biologist Charles Harrisson, whom Mawson has asked to look for any useful specimens. I am ecstatic, despite being weighed down with a huge load of supplies, cameras and tripod.

  The best walking is along a central plateau, but it is crisscrossed with lakes and watercourses and we lose our bearings as thick fog constantly rolls over the top of us. There is nothing for it but to find our way back down to the shoreline and climb a series of rocky headlands separated by shingle beaches. By evening we are done in and there is a cold steady drizzle. The only flat ground with anything approaching shelter is already occupied by elephant seals. We chase them off but they leave their stench. We are not prepared to go any further. Pulling blankets under our oilskin jackets, we spend a damp and uncomfortable night.

  At the end of another day of hard going we stand looking down on a beach crowded with royal penguins and the ribbed carcass of their giant predator, a wrecked sealing ship, its hull dismasted and smashed open by the waves. I have secured the photographs I wanted of the Caroline Cove seal and bird colonies. Harrisson, in the meantime, has collected a large number of king penguin eggs and other specimens.

  We head back to the north-east and in darkness drop down a ravine that leads to Lusitania Bay on the east coast. Hutchinson leads us to a sealers’ hut in which we soon have a fire going. The hut is grimy and foul-smelling, but it is dry. As the fire dies down the hut comes alive with rats, which Harrisson explains arrived from the shipwrecks and now infest the island. My blanket is like the King’s highway to the rats, but eventually I sleep.

  In the morning I look outside and see we are surrounded by king penguins, standing around nonchalantly in pairs. Many shelter from the wind behind a huge cast-iron tank, not much smaller than the hut we have slept in.

  ‘Harrisson, wake up, we’ve got guests,’ I say. ‘There’s thousands of penguins outside and they want back those eggs you pinched.’

  ‘Not thousands,’ said Hutchinson. ‘Not anymore. When Joe Hatch built this hut there were over a hundred thousand kingies, just on this beach alone. You see that old steam digester there?’

  He pointed to a barrel-shaped pressure cooker.

  ‘Hatch had it specially made in New Zealand. He put the digester smack bang in the middle of the colony. Well, you’ve seen how curious penguins are. They watched his blokes toil away. Then the men cranked up the boiler and Hatch and his crew pulled out their clubs and started working their way through the birds. Knocked ’em all on the head. Hardest bit was tossing them into the boiler. Less than a thousand here now. Hardly worth bothering with.’

  Harrisson and I went quiet and looked at each other.

  ‘Of course,’ said Hutchinson, ‘that was after the sealers killed every fur seal on the island. Not a single one left now. Only reason there are still elephant seals is they were on beaches sealers couldn’t get in and out of.’

  ‘That’s a lot of dead penguins and fur seals just to get oil,’ Harrisson observes.

  Hutchinson shrugged. ‘Man’s got to live. It was good money then, especially with the big colonies here—but those big numbers have all gone now so Joe Hatch is gone. They wiped out the seals in five years. After that the digestors on the island processed up to 200,000 penguins a year. Plenty of work then. But I won’t be coming back here again. No sirree. This is my farewell. Can’t tell you how pleased I was to see you lot. Thought I’d never get off the place. Other sealers will be back, though, most likely finish off these penguins this summer . . . If you’re a nature lover, you’re in the wrong place. Wait till you walk up the north end of this bay. You’ll see carcasses of hundreds of sea elephants. Actually you’ll smell ’em first ’cause we don’t bother with their hide or the meat. We just want their blubber for the oil.’

  We have another long day of it up the eastern side of the island. Harrisson’s collecting box is full and as we climb yet another headland I observe him discard items. Presumably their scientific value is less than the exertion required. Not too long before dusk he spies a magnificent albatross perched on the hillside a little below us and about thirty yards away. The biologist is awestruck.

  ‘Its wingspan would have to be at least ten feet. I should have brought a gun.’

  ‘I could get him with a rock,’ I say, thinking of my days with the gangs around Glebe. ‘Or I could try with this.’ And before I know it I have taken a tin of corned beef from my swag and pitched it furiously at the majestic bird. The albatross is knocked flat and does not get up. Harrisson has his prize. I am immediately aghast at what I have just done. I sense the others are too, though they say nothing.

  No thought has been given to how we can carry back the dead bird. It’s a two-day walk to Aurora. Nor does Harrisson have equipment to skin it, which would reduce the burden. We are on the verge of leaving it behind when Hutchinson volunteers to carry the whole albatross across his shoulders.

  Next morning, with Coleridge’s ‘Rime of the Ancient Mariner’ ringing in my ears, my right foot becomes wedged between two rocks and I fall forwards, twisting my ankle. Shortly afterwards, no doubt due to fatigue from the rugged terrain, Harrisson twists his knee.

  Nevertheless Harrisson’s pace is more than I can maintain. Hutchinson stays with me while the biologist goes on ahead to Aurora to fetch help. The next morning good old Mertz and Ninnis set out to find us. The look in their eyes says we are quite a sight, grimy and battered by the elements, me using my tripod for a crutch and Hutchinson with a giant albatross spread across his shoulders. On my back I carry my glass plate prizes, though it will be a few days before I can see how my shots have turned out.

  I rest up in the hut erected for our Macquarie Island base party. Boxes of stores have been unloaded, along with generators and electrical plant for the wireless station. Large wooden masts have been brought ashore to be erected at the top of a prominent hill. Mawson hopes to use Macquarie Island as a relay station and maintain wireless contact from Antarctica with Hobart and the outside world. Our most experienced expeditioner, Frank Wild, has adapted a flying fox used by the sealers. Using heavy rocks from the top of the hill as a descending counterweight, Wild and his work party haul up the masts and other equipment from the beach. This presents an immediate opportunity for my enthusiasm to film from moving objects. To the amusement of Mawson and ribbing from all as being the one who shot the albatross, and despite my crook ankle, I take the opportunity for a return trip on the flying fox. With one hand cranking the cine camera, I hang on desperately with the other to avoid further mishap.

  On Christmas Eve, I farewell Les Blake and others of the Macquarie Island party. Aurora raises anchor and a strong northerly fills her sails and drives us south. The island is soon lost from sight, our last contact with the known world. Smooth brown petrels remain our constant companions, skimming above the swell. Between Aurora and the horizon whales sporadically breach and spout.

  Christmas Day is celebrated at sea with claret and cigars in the mess room and numerous toasts. Frank Wild raises his
glass: ‘To our wives and sweethearts . . .’ and then all voices reply in unison, ‘And may they never meet!’ I join in loudly though I have neither wife nor sweetheart. The others are so confident. Do they all have a wife or lady friend?

  Aurora is entering the seas directly below Australia and New Zealand where no living person has ever ventured.

  Mawson explains, ‘The French explorer Dumont d’Urville and the American Wilkes passed this way in the 1840s. Their ships sailed right past each other without so much as a bonjour. D’Urville believed he saw land under the iceshelf and he gave it the name Terre Adelie to honour his wife.’

  ‘I never met a woman called Terry,’ I say and Mawson gives me a look.

  We know Aurora will eventually run into the southern icecap. It remains unknown if we will find land and, if we do, whether it will be connected to Victoria Land, the landmass further east under the icecap from where Scott and Amundsen set out several months ago in their race to the pole. Will we sail into walls of ice or, if we see land, will it be an archipelago or an island continent like Australia?

  In the meantime I have shown Mawson the glass plate images of wildlife from Macquarie Island and he is well pleased. I feel a sense of relief that I have started on my work. I have opened the first chapter on all that may lie ahead. I was never good at waiting.

  Gloomy Davis tells each of us it is the worst time for collisions with icebergs on account of summer having unleashed a disintegrating icepack into our path. After five days south from Macquarie Island there is a rush on deck as the cry goes out, ‘Ice on the starboard bow!’ We pass close by a small berg with intricate caverns and streaks of blue and green light. Soon there are bergs all around us and Captain Davis regularly changes course to avoid them. One berg we pass is almost a mile long. Its sheer walls are higher than the masts on Aurora. The berg breathes with the swell. Across the water comes a rhythmic boom as waves rush in and out of its icy fissures and caverns. It is a beautiful but lonely sound.