HERITAGE CORNER The post where most wear a tuxedo by Przemysław Myszka Port Lockroy, a natural-harbour bay located on the northwestern shore of the Wiencke Island in the Palmer Archipelago in front of the Antarctic Peninsula, is home to the world’s most southerly operational post office
(700 km ‘under’ Argentina and Chile) – usually manned by four-five people, plus a few thousand gentoo penguins.
Photo:British PobjoyMint Photo: Wikimedia Commons/Harley D. Nygren; Port Lockroy in 1962 in Lockroy Port Nygren; D. Commons/Harley Wikimedia Photo:
Photo: UKAHT
Photo: UKAHTPhoto: Photo: Wikimedia Commons/Jason Auch
he bay was discovered for humans as well as of an atmospheric whistler, the wind howling days. And to top it all, well, by the German explorer Eduard station ceased operations on 16 January 1962. the entire place’s covered in gentoo guano. Dallman in 1873 while exploring A light in the tunnel appeared in the 1990s. Actual work isn’t all sunshine and rainbows, the area for whales on-board After a 1994 conservation survey, Port Lockroy too, shifts can last for 10-12 hours, including TGrönland. However, it was only later in 1904 was designated as Historic Site and Monument the most obvious things such as stamping when the French Antarctic Expedition made No. 61 under the Antarctic Treaty. In 1996, BAS letters & postcards (some 60-70k sent by 18k a landing, naming the area after Edouard and the UK Foreign and Commonwealth visitors; souvenir passport stamps are also Lockroy, a French politician and VP of the Office began restoring the base to its working in the offer), selling gifts, maintaining the Chamber of Deputies, who assisted Jean- condition. Ten years later, a museum and a post museum and all the facilities (among which are Baptiste Charcot in obtaining government office, better known as the Penguin Post Office, historic huts), taking care of the tourists (incl. funding for the escapade. Starting in 1911, kicked off under the auspices of the Cambridge- the dos and don’ts in their pursuit of the best the harbour had been a whaling base for based United Kingdom Antarctic Heritage Trust penguin photo ever, as per the Antarctic Treaty two decades. In February 1944, the British (UKAHT). What used to be an abandoned guidelines), and giving lectures (also on-board established the Port Lockroy Station A on the military/research site for many years, is now the vessels – the only occasion for a really Goudier Island under the Operation Tabarin the most popular tourist destination in the long hot shower and food that doesn’t come (“A” because it was the first). After the war, Antarctic, with two cruise ship calls a day on from a tin). Now and then there’s extra staff at the facility operated as a research post (run average (around 120 in total) at the height of the hand, like a carpenter, or an expedition leader by the Falkland Islands Dependencies Survey, four/five-month-long austral summer season. in need of tutoring before travellers storm the the predecessor to the British Antarctic Hundreds of job applications are submitted to island (cut in half, one exclusively reserved for Survey, BAS). Despite being quite successful inhabit the Goudier Island, a place the size of a the penguins). “While some people cannot in that role, among other things it managed football pitch, with no running water nor mains fathom living and working on an island the to make measurements of the ionosphere electricity but plenty of sub-zero no-night size of a football field for four months, others
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Photo: Wikimedia Commons/Butterfly voyages/Serge Ouachée
Photo: Wikimedia Commons/Andrew Shiva
Photo: UKAHT
Photo: UKAHT Photo: Wikimedia Commons
is in the good company of those around move slow and don’t block their path of travel. us, and most of our work is achieved with We also stop frequently just to watch them – satisfaction each day. Whether greeting guests thievery of rocks for nest building is a constant or preparing for visits, sorting and cancelling penguin pastime, and watching their greeting mail, or working on a long list of conservation bows, gestures, and calls can stir one’s heart.
Photo: Wikimedia Commons/Butterfly voyages/Serge Ouachée and maintenance tasks, we have plenty to do It is difficult not to be anthropomorphic and cannot even imagine boredom or ‘cabin when watching them because they really fever’,” Liesl Schernthanner, who worked on do remind you of little people strolling in the UKAHT’s Conservation Team, wrote back the park or gently moving through the day.” in 2014. She also added that the Antarctic ‘on The works of the UKAHT, including the the rocks’ drinks are quite the thing, as “clear Penguin Post Office, can be supported glacier ice has a tendency to pop and crack through becoming a member of the Friends when releasing ancient air bubbles, making of Antarctica programme, purchasing any beverage more tasty and entertaining.” Antarctic-inspired accessories (incl. a Port And there are the penguins themselves. Lockroy USB 16 GB card, different patches, Each November, the gentoo colony (around or an umbrella that depicts the map of 3,000 individuals) comes back to Port Lockroy Antarctica as painted by MacDonald Gill for nesting (two eggs on average). After two in 1934 on the Interior of the Scott Polar months, the penguin chicks hatch and start Research Institute’s Polar Museum Antarctic their Darwinian race – against skuas’ aerial Dome; though, it’s actually inaccurate, as the will welcome the simplicity and tangible assaults as well as each other in the fight for true shape of Antarctica wasn’t worked out by pleasures that are easily attained here. Most food or caught in-between parents’ territorial explorers until 1937), various forms of direct of our food is canned (but warm, filling, and skirmishes. Liesl recalled, “They seem and indirect donations, or by ‘simply’ visiting very easy to cook), most of our entertainment unbothered by our presence as long as we the station and buying gifts on the spot.
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