Port Lockroy is a historic British research base that sits on tiny Goudier island off the tip of the Antarctic Peninsula. Better-known today as the Penguin Post Office, it is maintained by the UK Antarctic Heritage Trust (UKAHT), and is a perennially popular place for Antarctic expedition cruise ships to visit when the weather allows.
Every year, a small team arrives in Port Lockroy to spend the season welcoming visitors to the island and sending their postcards home from one of the most remote post offices on the planet. But what is it like to actually live in such an extraordinary place? We chatted to Lisa Ford of the UKAHT to discover more.
Can you describe Port Lockroy to us?
Port Lockroy is in a beautiful sheltered bay with glaciers all around and a backdrop of amazing mountains. Goudier Island is about the size of a football pitch. The whole island is rocky, but at the beginning of the season it’s covered in snow, with just our huts and about 500 breeding pairs of gentoo penguins.
What is the history of the Penguin Post office?
Port Lockroy came into being in 1944 under Operation Tabarin, which was a secret World War II mission under Churchill. The British wanted a presence in the Antarctic to keep a lookout for ships. It was called Base A, and that operation carried on for two years before becoming a science station. Before that it was the site of a whaling station – you can see the whalers’ chains on the rocks and some of their old wooden boats.
Today Bransfield House, which was the original base, is now a museum and small gift shop. In the 1950s when the guys were there doing amazing science, they had to live in really basic conditions with a huge amount of resilience. Now Port Lockroy is run by the UKAHT so that tourists can visit on various Antarctic cruise ships, along with the occasional yacht.
How did you get to work at Port Lockroy?
I was always a bit addicted to the Antarctic. I spent 18 months at Signy Island in the South Orkneys many years ago, but life takes you away from that and other things become a priority. But my family is grown up now, my husband went back to work for the British Antarctic Survey, and I thought ‘hang on a minute, I’m going too.’
I’d always watched what UKAHT were doing so I applied but didn’t get anywhere, so I applied again and again. Through sheer persistence I got to go down for two and a half months. There’s a lot of competition: last season there were over 600 applicants for the four or five jobs there.
How many people are at Port Lockry, and what are the living/sleeping/eating arrangements like?
We live in what’s called the Nissen Hut, on the site of an old storage site. The UKAHT built it and it’s actually quite comfortable.
It’s open-plan living to an extent, with a kitchen and lounge area with a gas fire. It’s quite compact for six people (or sometimes seven), but we’re all as respectful as you can be of each other’s space. Then there’s the bunk room with bunk beds for six people—we’re all in the same room—then an area for washing and the toilet, plus somewhere to take on and off all your outdoor clothes. You’re trying to keep everything as pristine as possible in an environment where you are living with Gentoo penguins who like to poo a lot. We find that we have to be really careful with our boots and things because otherwise it can get quite smelly!
We’re a small community but everyone knows that they’re in a really special place and have to adapt and be tolerant of one another because inevitably in that small space with a small number of people you are going to have your moments. But if you’re ever having a moment, all you have to do is walk outside and think ‘hang on a minute.’ and look at the scenery. It’s good medicine.
What does a day at Port Lockroy look like?
There’s a lot of planning involved with ship visits and the base leader will talk to the ship’s Expedition Leader so that we can get everything ready in advance. Someone will usually go onto the ship to talk to the passengers about what to expect when they come on the island. There’s often some time on board to have a shower as well – it’s quite a prized thing. The ships are very generous in letting us wash, but it’s probably in everyone’s interest that we do!
First thing in the morning we’ll get the shop and museum ready for the passengers. At the beginning of the season we’ll also make sure that snow steps on the island are safe for passengers to get up and down. Later in the season, it’s all about cleaning the rocks so that there isn’t lots of guano for people to to tread in. We also set out the areas that the passengers will go to on the island, so they’re keeping their distance from the penguins and not disturbing them..
When the passengers arrive they’ll visit the museum and the gift shop and maybe send some mail. With a typical ship, visits take two or three hours. Then we say goodbye, grab a bite to eat, and then get ready for an afternoon visit. At the end of the day, we regroup and make dinner, though sometimes we’re very fortunate that the cruise ships will invite us on board if they’re staying around the bay.
How do you relax on a day when there aren’t any ships?
There’s always a lot of catch-up – during the busy season we’re talking two ships a day. It gets a little quieter from February, but we also do things like live teaching sessions, which we did this year with the British Schools Exploratory Society. There’s always a lot of back room stuff to do – we spend a lot of time franking mail!
How does the post get from Port Lockroy to its destination?
At the post office we have a lot of postcards, letters and parcels that we frank by hand on the kitchen table. Each season we’ll post anything up to 80,000 postcards. People drop their postcard off or buy one here. They’re always itching for it to arrive home, but it all depends on a ship coming by.
We bundle them up and put them on any ship that’s going to the Falkland Islands. From there they get put on a Royal Air Force flight to Brize Norton in the UK, where they’re fed into the international postal system. The quickest we’ve ever known a card to get back to the UK has been two weeks, which is actually I think really good.
How are the gentoo penguins as neighbours?
They’re very smelly and get progressively smellier as the months go on! Sometimes I think you lose your sense of smell – it’s when you go on a ship and realise that actually people are smelling you because some of our clothes have absorbed some of the penguin smell.
But watching the penguins going up and down their highways from the shore to the colony is always wonderful – the meet and greet of two penguins and how they get past one another. I never tire of spending time outside and watching their sort of antics particularly, particularly all the nest thieving that goes on with taking each other’s pebbles.
The penguins trumpet away, but we actually get more noise from the sheathbills. They like to go on the roof of the Nissen hut – they love tapping at the chimney and can be quite noisy at night. So there are all sorts of weird and wonderful noises!
What was the most unexpected thing for you about working at Port Lockroy?
The most surprising thing was actually that it was quite comfortable in our Nissen hut and how warm it is inside once the summer gets going.
I worked in the Antarctic back in the 90s and it was all pretty basic. Port Lockroy is small and some of the things are still simple like the toilet and no running water, and for many people that wouldn’t be anything that they would want to do. I actually quite like it. Someone said it’s a bit like glamping, but it’s a lot better.
What was your favourite thing about living for a whole season in Antarctica?
Clearly the penguins are quite amazing. I love the simplicity of life there. People talk a lot about digital detox. We do have the internet for the day-to-day running of the site and communications with ships and back home, but being able to remove yourself from the complexities of life elsewhere is probably my favorite thing. And then just being able to wander out in a free moment and just look at what’s around. It’s Antarctica! On a good day you just can’t beat it, you really can’t.
Finally, what’s your favourite thing to share with visitors to Port Lockroy
Passengers get really interested in the history of the place. I think it’s really important that we try to raise funds for the charity so that we can keep the conservation work going so time capsules are kept for future generations. I think when people are on these cruises, they see the magnificence and enormity of Antarctica, but a big part of our role is really to get people to see that this was an amazing thing that these men (and they were all men) did back in the day with their science, and how little they had and what they endured.
*
Discover more about the work of the UK Antarctic Heritage Trust on their website.
*
Please note that visits to specific landing sites in Antarctica—including Port Lockroy—can never be guaranteed. Plans can change as fast as the polar weather, and decisions on which locations to visit are always made on the day by the ship’s captain and expedition leader.
*
