JANUARY 3, 2013, 54° 49.8′ SOUTH AND 35° 59.8′ WEST — A booming
voice sounded over the ship’s public address system at 6:30am.
Dr. Ian Dalziel, professor of geophysics at the Jackson School
of Geosciences (University of Texas at Austin), was on the horn,
enticing us to forsake our warm beds for the ship’s bridge. At
the very least, Dalziel encouraged us to gaze out of the cabin
potholes. But, it wasn’t charismatic mega fauna – Southern Right
Whales, Humpback Whales or Weddell Seals – that catapulted me
and my fellow group of explorers to rise so early. For the group
of intrepid geologists, it was the opportunity to view something
that’s rarely observed in nature: ophiolites or primordial rocks
formed at oceanic spreading centres and brought to the Earth’s
surface via violent tectonic forces. A world-class outcrop of
these ancient sea floor rocks is exposed in the Drygalski Fjord
on the southwestern tip of the island of South Georgia. Suitably
inspired, I assembled my camera gear and headed to the Akademik
Iof