This week our Year Two cohort boarded the caoch for Selborne in Hampshire to visit the Oates Collection, where they learned about Antarctic explorer, Captain Laurence Oates. Oates was a  key member of the groundbreaking 1910 expedition to race to the South Pole, led by Captain Scott. They collected valuable scientific evidence and research on this, thus far, unexplored continent. Unfortunately, the intrepid British polar explorers were beaten to the Pole by their Norwegian rivals, led by Roald Amundsen. Scott and a small, handpicked team, who undertook the gruelling final leg of the expedition to the Pole, all perished in a harsh blizzard. Oates is famed for sacrificing his life for his friends, as supplies were running out, by exiting the tent with the famed, immortal last words, "I am just going outside and may be some time." 

The children are currently studying all things polar and the collection is brimful of authentic artefacts from the expedition and exhibits on the landscape and wildlife of the region. They enjoyed fantastic workshops on how the explorers travelled to the Pole, with lots of opportunities to dress up in polar gear. They even got to pull each other on sleds, a la Scott's team, and enjoyed interesting sessions on albatrosses and penguins. More pictures on page four ...