Shackleton's Salvation...

Stromness (named after the town in Orkney, Scotland) is the whaling station that Shackleton's bedraggled crew eventually staggered into after their arduous late Autumn hike across the upmapped mountain ranges of South Georgia, having landed on the exposed south west coast in the James Caird lifeboat.

Heavy fog had descended on the abandoned whaling factory at Stromness, creating an eerie light. Huge hills behind the factory are lost in the gloom.

The fur seals don't seem perturbed at the giant Orion hovering above them.

A seal's ideal playground at Stromness.

We arrived there by sea aboard the Orion. The weather was typical South Georgia - rainy! As Frank Hurley said "King Weather is the tyrant of these latitudes, and he rules South Georgia with ruthless despotism". Today was dead calm with a heavy fog covering the hills and mountains, giving the abandoned whaling works an etherial quality. Rain came and went.

The Orion pulled right into the beach at Stromness. The bins are where we put our life jackets when exploring. Poles for walking, and flags for guidance.

The whaling station is fascinating, but so dangerous we couldn't go in.

The whaling station wreckage itself is forbidden territory, so dangerous is it structurally and with asbestos, but most of us were able to take a waterfall walk, led by Tom Richie. The walk was a tale of two kilometers...

The first kilometer was through flat heathland liberally populated with fur seals (and one female elephant seal). The baby fur seals were cute and squeaky, but the bigger ones, especially the juvenile males, were unwelcoming and sometimes hostile. But by now, we all know how to ward them off. Waving orange coloured arms and barking loudly seems to do the trick. But you have to be on your guard, doing it repeatedly.

Running the gauntlet of fur seals, there were also elephant seals to bypass.

The first kilometer of the walk was boggy heath populated by fur seals of various dispositions.

Being in retreat, we couldn't actually catch an attack by a cranky fur seal, but this will give you the idea.

The second kilometer was along what Tom Ritchie described as a braided network of interconnected streams. The surface was coarse river rocks, and we had to cross the streams multiple times. Our Bogs boots did a magnificent job at keeping our feet warm and dry as we traversed these fast-flowing waterways.

Greater burnet burrs are all over open healthland that we have walked. They easily catch velcro on your overpants.

We walked along a rocky river bed, but Tom called it a "braided network of streams".

And finally we arrived at a pretty waterfall with great historical significance. In total, it must be about 250m high, and is the place where Shackleton and his two offsiders finished their horrendous crossing of South Georgia. They slid and stumbled down beside the waterfall and made their way along the flat 2km to Stromness. Looking unbelieveably awful, they scared the local children and were not, at first, even recognised by the manager of the whaling station. How sweet it must have been to finally arrive at this outpost of civilisation, and to set about readying rescue missions for the rest of his crew holed up on Elephant Island and at Pegotty Bluff on South Georgia.

This is the waterfall Shackleton heard, found and descended on his last few kilometers into Stromness and "salvation".

In heavy rain, Shaun using the Orion for an umbrella.

The guy in the wetsuit is about to be the crash test dummy in a "man overboard" exercise for the crew. The zodiac team pulled him back in quickly and expertly.