Keeping time in Jougla Point at Port Lockroy:
How do we mark time? Can a photo capture time? Is it defined by the gentoo penguin chicks only days young or by the million-year-old rocks on which they nest? Or is it somewhere in between? The snows in the background lie packed and frozen over thousands of years. Bleached bones of a blue whale that fattened itself in these waters two centuries ago now lie on the shore. The lone sailor in a small boat spends an Antarctic winter encased in the harbor ice. By what watch does he measure time? Our boot prints could last long after our brief visit. Is the Antarctic really a timeless place or a time line that includes penguins and whale bones and ice and old rocks and the occasional boot print in snow?
