Strong tea for heroes!

It seems that I am a little behind on this one as it has been about since September last year, but I have just spotted Captain Scott's Strong Expedition Tea in Tesco...

5p from each box of tea purchased will go to the United Kingdom Antarctic Heritage Trust (UKAHT) and be used to help to preserve Captain Scott's hut on Ross Island. More here...

Have you had any? Did you like it?

Year 13 meet an Antarctic explorer...

If you were asked to name a famous Antarctic explorer, chances are it might be Robert Falcon Scott or Ernest Shackleton... But probably not this man!

The Yr 13 geographers though, were lucky enough to "meet" Tom Crean - sometimes referred to as the "Unsung Hero" of Polar exploration, via a videoconference with the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich last week.

Crean, who grew up near Annascaul, a small village in Co. Kerry, was part of three major South Pole expeditions - Discovery and Terra Nova with Scott, and Endurance with Shackleton. Unlike Scott and Shackleton, who both died on expeditions, however, Crean returned to Annascaul, where he married Nell and opened a pub called the South Pole Inn. He died in Annascaul in 1938, from a burst appendix...