26 CEUISE OF THE NEPTUNE 



and about five miles from Cape Fullerton, at the entrance to 

 Roes Welcome. The harbour is quite small, with room for 

 about three ships, and is fully protected by the islands and reefs 

 surrounding it. The usual entrance is from the westward, 

 where the channel is not above fifty yards wide, and the water 

 at high tide is only five fathoms deep. The eastern entrance is 

 narrower, and a ship is obliged to make several sharp turns 

 when passing through it. Owing to the low even coast, without 

 any landmark in the vicinity, the position of the harbour is 

 difficult to locate without entering the wide danger-zone of 

 shoals. The wide fringe of islands to the westward practically 

 ends at Fullerton, so that a ship making the coast may know 

 the position by the presence or absence of islands; but as the 

 islands are very low it is hard to distinguish them from the 

 mainland at a safe distance away, as the shoals and reefs extend 

 more than five miles beyond the harbour. The surveys made 

 in the spring of 1904 show that a fairly safe channel will be 

 found by keeping well to the eastward of the harbour, and by 

 then following a northwest course, keeping in line the beacons 

 on a small island about a mile outside the harbour. When the 

 Beacon island is reached the ship should pass in mid-channel 

 between it and the adjoining island to the westward ; passing 

 these, the outer harbour island should be given a wide berth, 

 until the entrance to the harbour is opened fully, a long shoal 

 extending from the western point of the island 



On the return of the Neptune to Fullerton, immediate 

 preparations were made for the coming winter. The first 

 undertaking was the cutting of a large quantity of ice, from a 

 fresh-water pond close to the house and about a mile distant 

 from the ship. The ice was about nine inches thick, and one 

 day's work, by the entire crew, sufficed to cut and to store 

 enough to supply the ship with fresh water until the ponds 

 melted again in the spring. The detachment of Mounted Police, 

 assisted by some of the crew of the Era, were busily engaged 



