Crystal Blue Chandelier

As the sun began to return to the Antarctic Continent after a long six weeks without breaking the horizon, we took every opportunity to get out and explore everything the light touched in the quiet ice scapes off Davis Station. I'd been in Antarctica for just under a year, yet the icebergs and snowy landscapes never ceased to amaze and surprise me.

It was the quiet that always struck me.

The blue icebergs, the ones that didn't have snow and sea water ingrained in their surfaces (like the one central to this picture) were few and far between. We were always looking for new angles- voids carved from the solid ice structures. The ice, like clear blue crystal, slick and textural lead us to explore deeper. I loved this angle. In my mind, the blue void made a sort of love heart shape, almost kissing the huge berg in the distance as the sun set over a quietly still landscape. Only three months later, the sea ice had thinned enough to allow the icebreaker (ship) close enough to station to take us back to Australia, and reality.

Moments like this stand frozen in my memories of a really special, changing world that is Antarctica.