Still held in our holding bay, hiding from the ice.
Yesterday morning we walked up to the crown of a vanished glacier – no doubt the strongest image of climate change on our tour so far. We set out across a muddy bay streaked by the scars of summer rivers, and then walked uphill over broken rock, until the reward of a frozen lake beneath the summit. The sun came out as we walked in the ice field of the glacier and all around us and far below us, on the plain by the sea, the world started to steam.
After lunch there was more holding in our holding bay and then all of a sudden, just as we had sat down to supper, we set sail at a very brisk eight knots. The crew were ecstatic to be sailing in a force six gale, but nobody seemed to know why we have gone, as it turns out, just around the corner to do more waiting; nor why we started sailing during supper, hurling everything everywhere.
This morning we woke to the sound of the engine and we’re on the move again, but very quickly we are in a fierce wind making only one knot progress and the boat is being tossed about and sea-sickness is rife. Everyone takes to their bunks, lunch is delayed and finally we are defeated and turn tail, travelling back for the third time now to our safe bay.
Tomorrow we will try, once again, to get south via the preferred route.
We’re going nowhere. It’s half time and we’re stuck.
Patience.
This afternoon a group of us celebrate with a desolate walk across a fearful and arid plain. It is a landscape Beckett would be proud of – Act II of “Happy Days” – but this place is devoid of life, not even Winnie’s talking head to marvel at. Back to the boat and, thankfully, a very inspiring talk from German/Canadian visual artist Iris Haeussler, who, as she says, makes “novels in three dimensions.” Her work has great integrity, and is hugely complicated to describe. She reminds us why we are all here, and of the possibility of great work.
