Adventurers Don and Margie McIntyre are known as Australia's "Antarctic Couple". In 1995 they spent a year living together alone in a 2.4 x 3.6 metre box chained to rocks at Cape Denison in Commonwealth Bay, the windiest spot on the face of the earth. Living only 400 metres from the historic 1911 Aurora Expedition huts of Sir Douglas Mawson, they struggled to survive a frontier experience battling blizzards which at times kept them trapped in their box for up to 20 days. The effects of this self imposed isolation are the subject of an award winning documentary and best selling book 'Two Below Zero'.

As a couple their awards and accolades are many and varied. In 1996 Margie was recognised as one of Australia's 12 most outstanding women and together they were presented with the Australian Geographical Societies highest honour - a gold medal as Adventurers of the Year, the youngest ever to receive it. They both ran with the Olympic torch on the day of the Opening Ceremony and have been Australia Day Ambassadors since 1998. Don & Margie are both AAP Mawson Huts Foundation Ambassadors along with Sir Edmund Hillary, Tim Bowden and Sir Peter Durham.

From 1993 to 2000, the McIntyre's organised and participated in nine sailing expeditions in their own expedition yachts and worked on Russian Antarctic tourist ships as Lecturers, Field Guides, Boat Drivers and joint Expedition Leaders. In 2000 they purchased their own 36 metre 500 tonne helicopter equipped ice ship 'Sir Hubert Wilkins' in Finland. During the next three years they sailed half way around the world and then set out on four Antarctic Expeditions in support of education, research and adventure. To thaw out, the McIntyre's headed north to the Philippines on a six month treasure hunting expedition.

Diana Patterson is considered to be one of the pioneering women of Antarctica. In late 1989 she assumed the role of Leader of Mawson Station for what was to be a period of thirteen months. In doing so she realized an ambition held for nearly a decade and at the same time became the first woman in the world to lead an Antarctic research station.

Diana has worked on all three of Australia’s permanent continental Antarctic Research stations, first at Casey then as the leader of Mawson and Davis spending 13 months at each. In 2002 she returned to Antarctica as Field Leader of a small project team charged with conserving the historic huts of the legendary Australian Antarctic scientist and explorer, Sir Douglas Mawson.

Since 1996, she has provided commentary on tourist flights from Australia to Antarctica.

Since her first expedition to Antarctica, Diana has made an extensive number of presentations to a wide diversity of organizations and conferences. She is an entertaining storyteller, describing what she terms her “girls’ own Antarctic adventure story” or addressing the challenges of leadership through her own experiences. In 2010, her book “The Ice Beneath My Feet: My year in Antarctica” was published to much acclaim.

Subscribing to the view of “adventure at any age” in recent years Diana has skied across Finland, ski toured in Svalbard, climbed Mt Kilimanjaro, been trekking gorillas in Uganda and maintains an ongoing involvement in the Kalahari where she is co-organising the construction of a boarding house for orphans and impoverished children..

Painter, photographer, writer, historian and some-time architect, Alasdair McGregor’s creative interests range from natural history and the environment, to architecture and design, and the history of exploration.

His contact with the Antarctic region began with the 1983 Heard Island Expedition. Sailing aboard the maxi-yacht Anaconda, Alasdair was involved in supporting the second only successful attempt on 3,000 metre-high Big Ben. Voyages to Casey Station and Macquarie Island followed as part of the Australian Antarctic Division’s Humanities Program.

Alasdair was artist and photographer for two Mawson’s Huts Foundation expeditions to Cape Denison, Adélie Land, and in 2000 was curator (for the Australian High Commission to Canada) of a travelling photographic exhibition, ‘… that sweep of savage splendour’: A Century of Australians in Antarctica.

Alasdair has published three books with Antarctic themes: – Mawson’s Huts: An Antarctic Expedition Journal (1999); Antarctica: that sweep of savage splendour (collected writings – editor 2011); and a biography of the renowned polar photographer Frank Hurley: A photographer’s life (2004). His other books include Grand Obsessions: The life and work of Walter Burley Griffin and Marion Mahony Griffin, winner of the 2011 National Biography Award.

In 1999, Alasdair staged Mawson’s Antarctica: A view from the huts, a major exhibition of his Antarctic paintings and photographs in aid of the Mawson’s Huts Foundation.

Alasdair has worked each season as a lecturer, historian and field guide on voyages to East Antarctica, the Ross Sea, the Antarctic Peninsula and the sub-Antarctic islands.

We welcome Alasdair onboard Orion again for another Antarctic season with us.