I am now sitting in Cape Town, South Africa, with the warm summer sun beating down on me. The last two days have involved getting out of Halley, a process which is different to when I left in 2016. Now, due to a large crack, taking people to the coast and thus a ship, is hugely impractical and potentially unsafe. So, instead, I flew out via Novo, the Russian base. I've never done this before but have heard rumors of being trapped next to a blue ice runway for weeks waiting to leave. Fortunately, our departure was far more swift, the Basler (a modified WW2 DC3) arrived only one day late due to weather conditions. Then after only 36 hours on the Russian base, I flew to Cape town on the Elusion, a Russian cargo plane with 28 jump seats for passengers. I'll be honest, I've had comfier flights, but it did the job and after five sleepless hours I arrived in Capetown at 8am... just in time for rush hour. I will miss Antarctica.

The last week hasn't really been anything to write home about. It's been nothing other than good old fashioned graft, skiing out to the CASLab every day to work out kinks and niggles with equipment. It's been worth it though with the automated experiments running, apparently, smoothly. The first plane full of people leaves soon so the race is now on to document what we have done, what condition things are in and what parts we all have in stock. This is pretty much what it is all about regardless of what your job is here, if people don't leave Halley in a good state now, next year will have issues.

My flight out should be a week or so after this post.

I've been at Halley for a few days now. The place still feels like it did three years ago and it's just like being home. The first day was a Sunday, typically a day off on station, so a good chance to settle into my accommodation. I'm living in an "emergency caboose" for my time here. These were previously used as back-up accommodation for the modules in the event of a fire. They aren't too big, but they have what you want with four sleeping pods, a table and chairs and small kitchen area.

I did a bit of work too; setting up a desk, getting on the network, and finding all the links and files I need for my job. Since then it's been pretty much all go, with my time taken up with training, CASLab prep and helping the other engineers... until today.

Today the CASLab came on-line with the estates team commissioning the building. This means I can go in and start working. The building is a bit of a mess because it has not been used for some time except as an indoor, unheated storage space. The first job was for the meteorologist and I to tidy the room. After two hours of moving all the server racks, fridges, pumps, piping and cables into a side room, the main space was ready to go. I managed to check all my gear and set up the camera, taking some photos before the end of the working day. Tomorrow's plan is to create a network and to connect various instruments to it!

I arrived at Halley on the 13th after waiting for a BAS Twin Otter to fly me over from Rothera. I havn't been here since I left after my winter in early 2016 and a lot has changed. The base is now in a new location and some of the infrastructure is different. The modules are still here but now the station is "summer only". This is due to the cracks threatening to separate the ice shelf in two. The Base, personnel and resources are all on the "upstream", safe, side but it isn't safe to leave people behind without aircraft or ship support during the winter.

On arrival, I was pleased to meet many people I had worked with before, some from my time here and some from Cambridge. I'm now getting everything ready for my main task at Halley... CASLab Automation.

After a busy end to the cruise, I finally arrived in Punta late on New Year's Eve. So late that the crew, scientists and officers from the ship scrambled to get a drink on land for a New Year's countdown.

I lived on the ship for a few days, handing over to my colleague and helping prepare the ship for the next cruise. Eventually it was time for the JCR to leave, so I joined all the other BAS staff waiting in a hotel for the DASH 7 (BAS's larger aircraft) to fly me to Rothera.

There were some delays to the flight with weather, a ship and some building work interfering with the well laid out plans, but these are all part of working in Antarctica. Thankfully, due to the delay, I managed a tour of Tierra Del Fuego, seeing some penguins, a ship and a museum en route.

Eventually we flew to Rothera, with a nice, uneventful flight getting us here in no time at all. I'm currently sitting in my department's office, receiving some "refresher training" and helping out where I can, ready and waiting to go to Halley, where my real "land based" workload begins.

After the visit to Rothera the cruise got busy, with the last of the science, Christmas, packing, New Year and a visit to Palmer Station. We are now approaching Chile, where the science team will go home and I will enter stage two of this year's Antarctic summer season... the, as named by the ship's chief engineer, "land phase". On the 7th I will fly to Rothera and then on to Halley where I am installing equipment in the CASLAB (Clean Air Sector Laboratory). I'll tell you more about that at the time. For now, I'll wish everyone a Happy New Year.

While I wait for my plane I'll try and upload some photos of the trip and Palmer Station.

With arrival at Rothera, the science teams on the ship got a well-earned break, while I went and offered a helping hand to colleagues and the marine lab.

People appreciated the change of scene, space and the chance to eat, socialise and play with a different group of people. The (now traditional), JCR vs. Rothera football match was a crushing defeat for the ship (also traditional) and the run up and down the runway was a chance for the runners on the ship to travel more than 90m before they had to go back where they came from.

We now travel to science site 3, a bay just around the coast from Rothera which, despite its proximity, has never been surveyed. We have our normal science suite to complete but also a few jobs for the base which shouldn’t add much time.

Börgen Bay is the second science site for the JR18003 cruise. It started unfortunately with some issues as the CTD (a system which takes measurements and water samples from deep in the ocean) developed complications due to a strange mix of simultaneous failure states. After a frantic 36 hours the system was repaired and working again. Other science was done in the meantime so no time was lost.

As with the last site, and the next one, we have four days here, the first two being "physics" and the last two being "sampling". The physics is now complete so I have some time to do maintenance, help scientists and take some photos of all the wildlife in the bay.

Having completed the survey and testing we sailed for the Antarctic Peninsula. The Drake Passage lived up to it's reputation, with the ship hitting 45 degree rolls and most people being stuck in their beds.

Once through the storm we finally arrived at the first science site. A cove on King George Island. The scientists are looking into how the glacial melt water affects life on the seabed, the structure of the seabed and the currents in the bay. While we have been working, some of the local wildlife has been to visit with Gentoo Penguins, seals and a few whales coming to look at the ship

Once we left the Falklands the first science task was a survey of Burdwood Bank, with the echo sounders and some trawling. This is for the Falkland Islands to set up a marine nature reserve. It was also a good chance to test all the equipment prior to crossing the Drake Passage (a famously terrible crossing!).

After a gruelling 20 hours on an MOD flight I arrived in Stanley, the capital of the Falklands last night and joined the ship. Today was spent "handing over" with the previous engineer, checking out any changes to the ship and generally meeting any new crew. Tomorrow the real work will start with changes to some faulty science equipment which I brought the spares for, and a few jobs which two people are needed for.

The planning for the coming season started some time ago, with the logistics of people, places and equipment evolving over the last 12 months. My preparations for the Antarctic Summer started in May when I was assigned to work on air chemistry instruments for Halley, which has changed a great deal since I was last there (a proper Halley update will come later).

My season is particularly unusual. Starting in late November I am going on; a science cruise on the JCR; spending some time at Rothera Research Station and then travelling onwards to Halley. This is new for me, with a huge variety of work, lots of time on the move and nowhere to call "base" for the season but I'm looking forward to it. Spending some time at Rothera will be good as my previous (and only) trip was for just 18 hours, not quite enough to get the feeling for the place.

More updates should follow before November but the main blog should begin just before December. Like last year, I plan to write at least once a week, but with my travels you may need to excuse a late post or two! Hope you enjoy reading about this year's adventure.