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Right now I’m totally knackered and about to fall asleep, but good news are here to be shared, so: I’ve done it! Today I’ve defended my PhD thesis and passed! Well, as it’s the ETH there’s of course more paper work involved, but in a couple of weeks you can all call me Dr. Suter, please. 🙂

It was actually a great day. I first had to give a short talk (three years of work summarized in twenty minutes, tss) followed by 40 minutes questions from three examiners. Everything went really well, and later we had a big lunch on the roof terrace, of course with lots of booze. My whole family came to celebrate as well, from as far as northern Germany, and even the weather played along. Of course there was also the traditional silly hat (see image), a terrific poster about my PhD, and a congratulations card from my group in the shape of a direction sign saying “new life”. Guess that’s just where I’m heading now!

While Patrick has earned his PhD degree years ago on invasive species in the Southern Ocean, I spent the last three years on researching how heritable information that is not directly encoded in the DNA (so called epigenetic inheritance) may contribute to adaptation in plants. Facing climate change and habitat loss genetic diversity of many species is declining, thus it is crucial to understand whether organisms can adapt to novel conditions independent of genetic variation. To study this I was using the study species Arabidopsis thaliana, which is the equivalent of the Drosophila fruit fly for plant scientists – both these species are routinely probed and played with by enthusiastic geneticists to solve the mysteries of the DNA world. For my PhD I have grown thousands and thousands of plants, measured their phenotypes under many different environmental conditions over several generations and performed a myriad of manual crosses on their tiny flowers. In the lab we measured the expression of genes of hundreds of plants … and in the end everything was compiled in my PhD thesis, which I have finally handed in to the ETH Zürich last week!

So now while Patrick is up in chilly Tromso tidying up the yacht in preparation for the trip I am tidying up three years of accumulated paper work, empty coffee mugs, and the general detritus left from long nights in the lab. Looking very forward to replacing the banks of beeping scientific equipment and white lab walls with the jagged coastline of the arctic and the wide blue ocean!

As the departure date for the Two in the Blue voyage approaches Leonie and I are working our fingers to the bone getting all the preparations in good order. Many moments I sit back from the desk and contemplate with a smile the idea of actually unfurling the sails, but for now it’s all business and not much fun! While I am tacking my way through the jagged piles of paperwork, Leonie is living through that particularly exquisite form of hell known as the final week of a PhD degree! It won’t be long before there are two doctors on board the ship.

So just in case you were wondering about the silence coming from this end – everything is going well it’s just that the highlight of both our day tends to be shuffling a pile of paper from one side of the desk to the other…. but not for much longer! We will be in the water by late May and before long all these flows of white paper before me will be replaces with floes of white ice!

There’s never a dull day in the bush. Last night there was a bit of barking and snarling outside and we awoke this morning to find that a pademelon had been killed by dogs last night. For those not from Tasmania – a pademelon is a very small wallaby (which could be described as a small kangaroo). These little wallabies are quite common around Tasmania and can regularly be seen hopping around of an evening. Despite the fact that they are clearly doing quite well it is never pleasant to awake to see the lifeless corpse of one of these little critters in the backyard.

But on closer inspection …. there was movement. As you will know wallabies carry their young (a joey) in a pouch, and though this female was very much passed on, a small tail could be seen protruding from the pouch and wiggling. Moments later there was a writhing bundle of life in my hand.

As it turned out the female joey was absolutely full of beans and seemed none too the worse for wear despite the night of terror. Indeed it needed no encouragement at all to wrap its lips around an eye dropper and take a drink of warm water with glucose to get its energy and fluids up. Actually, I reckon this joey has a bit of a sweet tooth as it spent quite some considerable time lapping up the spilt solution after it had downed it’s ration!

Unfortunately I am in no palace to take on the care of this cute little fellow, though I have fond memories of bringing up a baby pretty face wallaby as a child on the farm in Queensland. It’s amazing how much appeal and character these creatures have and though it was certainly the right thing to do it was a little sad to hand over the little joey to Trowunna Wildlife Park (www.trowunna.com.au) to take over its care. Trowunna have a policy of releasing orphaned wallabies in the same location as they were found so hopefully this little gal will be hopping around the house again in a couple of months.

First of all, my apologies for the lack of updates over the past couple of weeks – Leonie and I have been seeking a small dose of solitude and serenity in the wilds of Tasmania before we launch ourselves into the final frantic preparations for our July departure.  While still keeping the preparations rolling at a steady pace we have been sampling the pleasures of terra firma – a stroll through the Tasmanian wilderness, wading through chuckling streams in search of a brown trout, or just generally catching up with friends and family after a long absence.

But still the wheels roll on, and we have not been entirely idle! Perhaps one of the largest challenges of late has been an ongoing tussle with bureaucracy.  I challenge you …. Just try and explain to the officials in a small Australian state that you very much need a rifle license as you are worried that you might be attacked by polar bears …  “yes the big hairy ones that live in the Arctic” … “no, I didn’t see a corresponding box in the form and it wouldn’t be very likely would it?”…“no sir, I’m not giving you cheek … ” [CLICK] beep beep beep …

Other than several long and very confusing telephone calls regarding licensing, permits, rifle exportation, etc etc., we have also been opening the floodgates on our meager finances to get some badly needed equipment. This includes satellite phones (so we can continue blogging), wet weather gear so we have a dry layer when we are not going for a swim), personal safety beacons (to alert one of us when the other takes an unexpected swim) an anemometers (to tell us exactly what the wind chill is after we have gone for an unexpected swim), and various other shiny and very expensive kit that is piling up and nudging my baggage weight into the “critical overweight” category.

Well now it’s back to chasing some very much needed funds to re-inflate our depleted back accounts … please let us know if you know anyone interested in helping us out on our journey!!

I woke early again and thought I’d check through the electrical system for any faults that might be contributing to my engine problem. So while I charged the old batteries from the shore I dove into the engine compartment and stripped down all the wiring to clean the contact points for the starting system. Thirty minutes later a flick of the ignition key prompted the engine to roar into life. After a moment of hesitation I decided to snub my dodgy wharf rat and pointed the bow to the open water and waved a cheery good bye to Horten and it ferries.

One of the reasons I decided to head off early was that I was supposed to meet an Indian Chief from Alberta, Francois Paulett, who was making a documentary on indigenous perspectives on oil and gas. I had a long way to go to the rendezvous point in Drøbak where I was supposed to meet him at 11:00, so the motor was put to the test as I charged north.

It rained. In fact it never stopped raining from the moment I left the harbor so I hunkered down in the shelter of the cockpit and braced myself for a miserable few hours of motoring which finally saw my tying up to the wharf at 12:00.

Despite the poor weather Francois was welcomed aboard with his film tech and a couple of WWF staff. Unfortunately there was not anything particularly nice to film unless you like grey mist and rain, so after some brief introductions on film, the guests retired below to have a lunch of buffalo jerky (brought by the chief) and several Norwegian courses. A very odd mix of cuisines, but all seemed to enjoy and then the chief had a nap while I stayed above in the rain and headed for home with no remarkable events en route.
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I am now tied up at the KNS yacht harbor on the Bygdøy peninsula and am settling into life aboard the yacht. It is a lovely setting here that while close to the city, is renowned for its bathing beaches and winding bike tracks through the woods which are fresh and green with spring growth at the moment. Unfortunately I took a tumble on one of those tracks while carrying gear to the boat. As a result I broke a finger which forces me to type with two fingers. Since I normally type with two fingers that is not such a problem but it still hurts!

I seem to constantly couple great times with minor disasters but either way I am looking forward to the next few months living on the water and exploring the fjord. Despite all the various catastrophes en route I wore a smile for at least 80% of the time. Life is good

I arrived in Oslo in one piece after an eventful maiden voyage up the Oslo Fjord (about 130 km). Unfortunately Léonie couldn’t make it to Oslo so it was single handed most of the way followed by a final leg with an Indian chief from Alberta and a film crew making a documentary.

Friday
I left on Friday morning and after a few hours of sailing to get used to the new yacht, the wind died down so I decided to turn on the motor to make some speed. Of course it wouldn’t start. So after practicing some newly learned Norwegian curses I resolved to sail slowly up the fjord until I reached the town of Åsgårdstrasse which according to my sailing guide had a chandlery where I could get a new battery (I suspected this was the problem). I finally made it to the town only to find that a new breakwater makes it impossible to enter under sail when the wind blows Westerly. The wind blew westerly. Anchored for the night outside the harbor entrance and hoped the anchor would hold.