Friday 8 December 2006.

by Amanda Rodrigues Alves

First day on the SA Agulhas has been good. We woke up late this morning and missed breakfast but we really needed the rest after a couple of nights with almost no sleep. There is not much going on the boat since most of the people will only start working once they get to the base. The is a lot of free time to relax, watch movies or sit on the top deck enjoying the view. We had a meeting before lunch and are going to try to establish a routine of working and getting to know the equipment we're going to set up in Antarctica in the mornings and after lunch we can work on our on projects. One of us will write everyday and send a short message so you can know how and what we're doing here.

We had a nice beautiful sunny morning with a calm sea, but now the weather is changing and the waves are getting bigger, they say that when we get to the 40 and 50º latitude the sea will be really rough and big. We'll see how we cope, Adam and I are already feeling a bit sick.

Colours: I finally understood why the colour marine blue is called so, the ocean around us is a beautiful transparent marine blue and as the water hits the boat you can see white foam and the water becomes turquoise. That against the bright orange of the boat is quite beautiful to watch.