Antarctica 2006
Antarctica 2006
(48cm deep x 34cm wide)
A calendar by Andy Townsend & Lyn Irvine
Published by Images of Antarctica
ISBN 0-9752041-2-2
It’s that time of year again when thoughts turn to the next and how to keep track of time. A calendar for 2006 is what is needed, and intrepid Antarctic recorders have done it again.
Lyn Irvine is a marine biologist, and Andy Townsend is a freelance photographer and computer programmer. Together they have captured serene and awesome moments of the frozen continent, unparalled for its purity, beauty and (for the most part) inaccessibility.
Enjoy it month by month without leaving home by consulting this large calender and engrossing yourself in its glossy photographs:
Such as rich red sunsets, especially spectacular because Antarctica has the cleanest air on the planet, allowing atmospheric gases and ice crystals to scatter the blue light away from the sun;
or the rich red of our own Aurora Australis, a ship familiar to many Tasmanians when it berths in Hobart, but here against a seascape of ice;
and Emperor penguins, the only animals to breed over the harsh Antarctic winter, here epitomised by three little balls of fluff with enigmatic black and white masks for faces which will metamorphose into the all-black visage of dad standing behind.
In an interesting addendum, the last page gives some facts and figures about Antarctica, where the lowest temperature ever recorded on Earth was -89.6°C and winds of up to twice the velocity of hurricanes have been notched up.
It’s amazing to think that in a geological blink — to quote the calender — “as recently as 3 million years ago vegetation similar to the Tasmanian cold temperate rainforests grew near the South Pole.”
In the interests of closer to home, a percentage of profits from the sale of this calendar will be donated to Greening Australia (Tasmania) for tree planting and revegetation projects.
Visit the Images of Antarctica web site.
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