Today has been an exhausting day at work for The Grandma, who has just arrived home and just wants to read a little and rest. She has always been fascinated by those periods of history where there were still places on the planet unknown to humans, by the explorers who risked their lives to reach the most remote places on the planet. Then, she has chosen to read about CarolineMikkelsen,theexplorerwho set foot on Antarctica on a day like today in 1935. Now that the planet has become small and we have mapped it, we have a whole Universe waiting to be discovered and understood.
Caroline Mikkelsen (20 November 1906-15 September 1998) was a Danish-Norwegian explorer who on 20 February 1935 was the first woman to set foot on Antarctica, although whether this was on the mainland or an island is a matter of dispute.
Caroline Mikkelsen was born on 20 November 1906 in Denmark, later she married her first husband Norwegian Captain Klarius Mikkelsen and moved to Norway.
In the winter of 1934-1935, Mikkelsenaccompanied her Norwegian husband Klarius on an Antarctic expedition sponsored by Lars Christensen, on the resupply vessel M/S Thorshavn with instructions to look for Antarctic lands that could be annexed for Norway. Mount Caroline Mikkelsen is named for her.
On 20 February 1935, the expedition made landfall somewhere on the Antarctic continental shelf. Mikkelsen left the ship and participated in raising the Norwegian flag and in building a memorial cairn. Mikkelsen never made any recorded claims to have landed on the mainland, but was initially thought to have landed on the Vestfold Hills not far from the present Davis Station. She did not publicly speak about her Antarctic voyage until sixty years after her landing in 1995 when she spoke about her journey to the Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten having been contacted by Davis Station Leader Diana Patterson.
In 1941, her husband Klarius died and in 1944 she married Johan Mandel from Tønsberg. Mikkelsen-Mandel died in 1998.
In 1998 and 2002, Australian researchers published historical articles in the Polar Record concluding that the landing party from the Thorshavn -and thus Mikkelsen- landed on the Tryne Islands where a marker at Mikkelsen's Cairn can still be seen today. The landing site is an approximately five kilometres from the Antarctic mainland. No alternative mainland landing site for the Mikkelsen party has been discovered, in spite of years of searching by Davis Station workers.
Consequently, Mikkelsen is regarded as the first woman to set foot onAntarctica, and Ingrid Christensen as the first to stand on the Antarctic mainland.
Today, Claire Fontaineand TheGrandma have got up early again to prepare a special and emotional day of diving.
While Tina Picotes has stayed at home having breakfast and reading, Claire and The Grandma have gone to pay tribute to Pepita, who left us last Monday the 2nd after a life full of incredible experiences and leaving a unique and personal scientific legacy.
So, after checking the state of the sea; planning the entry and exit point; reviewing the equipment and doing the buddy check, they have calmly entered while checking their buoyancy before going down in a sad, but at the same time emotional dive, which has helped them remember the moments shared and, above all, to leave them there so that the sea will take them to new ports, and, if possible, reach her beloved Antarctica.
It has been a dive that they have shared with posidonias, corals, cystoseiras, gorgonians; but also octopuses, breams, rays, cuttlefish, sponges, anemones, small corals and countless starfish. One even has accompanied them to take a photo when they have returned to the shore, and then they have returned it to the sea.
And throughout the dive they have had the company of a manta ray, which they have respected the distance between them, but which has been a pleasure to see swimming and unfolding on this seabed where we all mourn your absence today, from your beloved Barcelona and Castelldefels to the great love of your life: Antarctica.
T'estimem Pepita.
Has estat una figura clau per al nostre país, per a la ciència mundial, i una divulgadora i mestra que ens ha mostrat a molts de nosaltres el camí a seguir.
No és un adéu perquè ens acompanyaràs sempre en cada immersió.
Josefina Castellví i Piulachs (1 July 1935-2 February 2026) was a Catalan oceanographer, biologist and writer.
Castellvi Peak on Hurd Peninsula, on Livingston Island in Antarctica is named in her honour.
In 1984, she participated in an international expedition to Antarctica. She received her bachelor's degree in 1957 and a PhD in biological sciences at the University of Barcelona in 1969. In 1960 she started working for the Institut de Ciències del Mar in Barcelona. In addition, she conducted research at the CSIC and was a delegate in Catalunya for two years (1984-1986).
Starting in 1984, she participated in the Organization of Research in Antarctica and assisted with the installation of the JCI Antarctic Base on Livingston Island, of which she was the lead oceanographer from 1989 to 1997, replacing Antoni Ballester. From 1989 to 1995 she directed National Program of Antarctic Research, and later, from 1994 to 1995, she directed the Institute of Marine Sciences.
Castellví was awarded, among other prizes like the Gold Medal of the Generalitat of Catalunya in 1994, the Creu de Sant Jordi in 2003, the IEC Environment Prize in 2006 and the CONCA National Award in 2013.
Josefina Castellví was born the daughter of a doctor and housewife inBarcelona during the last few months of the Spanish Republic before the explosive outbreak of the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939). She studied at the Montserrat Institute and in 1957 graduated with a degree in biology from the University of Barcelona. In 1960 she specialized in oceanography from the Sorbonne. In 1969, Josefina got a doctorate in science from the University of Barcelona.
Castellví and her older sister attended school at an exceptionally young age near Eixample, where their family began. Later, they were transferred to a convent school, where they studied until their second year of high school. Ultimately, they completed their basic studies at the Institute Monsterrat, in the neighbourhood of Sant Gervasi, where Josefina prepared to enter university. In spite of living in a postwar period and the immense poverty the country suffered, Josefina's childhood and adolescence were normal; she lived alternately in Barcelona and Castelldefels, where her parents had a house.
In 1953, around the age of 18, Josefina began studying biology at the University of Barcelona. She completed two tracks in one and graduated in 1957, when she was 22 years old. Only two people finished the degree that year: Josefina and a nun. She continued her studies in order to engage more deeply with her research.
After finishing her degree Josefina Castellví traveled to France to study for two years. By 1960, when she specialized and received her PhD in oceanography at the age of 25, she participated in her first oceanographic expeditions on French ships and taught at the Sorbonne. Also starting that year, she began work at the Institute of Marine Sciences as Council Superior of Scientific Research, where she would later assume the role of director from 1994 to 1995 whilst also being a delegate to Catalunya.
In 1984 she was the first Catalan woman to participate in an international expedition in Antarctica; it ought to be noted that she contributed mainly to those expeditions' research, for which she was awarded recognition alongside Antonio Ballester i Nolla. Ballester was recognized as well for his intervention in the installation of the JCI Antarctic Base on Island Livingston, of which Josefina was chief director from 1989 to 1993.
When she returned to Barcelona, Josefina continued her research at the CSIC. The research in Antarctica was both a great learning experience and emotionally validating for her. Antarctica is a natural laboratory; deep in the ice there is written billions of years of Earth's history and knowing how to analyze these ancient writings allows us to share that vast history.
In 1995, after living a few years in Madrid, where she had commissioned the National Research Program Antarctica, Josefina Castellví returned to Barcelona to lead the Institute of Marine Sciences of the CSIC. Throughout her working life, she combined her research with conference work in order to disseminate her findings and her books, one of which was a book published in 1996 titled I Have lived in Antarctica.
In 1994, she received the Gold Medal of Generalitat of Catalunya and in 2003 she received the Creu de Sant Jordi. The Gold Medal is an honourary distinction awarded annually by the Generalitat of Catalunya to those persons or social entities who on their merits, have provided outstanding services to Catalunya in the defense of her identity, especially at the civic and cultural level. Moreover, it is considered, together with the International Prize of Catalunya, to be one of the most prestigious distinctions granted in Catalunya. From 2010, she was the president of the Summer University of Andorra.
On 8 October 2013, she won the Culture of the Generalitat of Catalunya Award, which distinguishes those people, entities, or institutions in any field that are worthy of institutional recognition for his or her contribution to Catalan culture, with preference for excellence, innovation, trajectory and projection, and bearing in mind their contribution during the year before of the concession. In addition, on 13 May 2013 she received the Catalan of the year Award.
In 2014, she was appointed vice-president of the Consell Assessor per al Desenvolupament Sostenible de Catalunya (Advisory Council for the Sustainable Development of Catalonia) (CADS).
On 5 March 2015, she received the August Pi i Sunyer Medal from the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Barcelona, in commemoration of International Women's Day. Researcher Josefina Castellví was the first woman to receive this medal. Despite her retirement in 2000, Castellví remained active; she continued to collaborate with the Consell Assessor per al Desenvolupament Sostenible de Catalunya. She also continued to give lectures on her work in Antarctica, during which she testified to the importance of this frozen desert. As the coldest place on Earth, she said, it is ideal for studying the capacity to adapt inherent in all organisms, which must change to survive, since, if they do not, they will disappear like the trees and plants that have disappeared from Antarctica.
She was the first Catalan female oceanographer and received many awards in recognition of her research. The difficult part is to receive first prize, here she quoted the scientist Ramon Margalef, because others come such as mimetic actions. Of all the awards that she had, Josefina especially valued two: the Gold Medal of the Generalitat of Catalunya (1994) and the Creu de Sant Jordi (2003), because they represent the homage of her city and country.
Castellví continued to live on the same floor where she was born, a testament to her devotion to origins. She died on 2 February 2026.
Antarctica is the windiest, highest, brightest, most brilliant, driest, and most remote continent on this misnamed Earth, which should be called Ocean, as the writer Arthur C. Clarke requested.
Today, The Grandma has been reading about Ernest Shackleton,the Anglo-Irish explorer, whose expedition finds the magnetic South Pole on a day like today in 1909.
Ernest Henry Shackleton (15 February 1874-5 January 1922) wasan Anglo-Irish Antarcticexplorerwho led three British expeditions tothe Antarctic.
He was one of the principal figures of the period known as the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration.
Born in Kilkea, County Kildare, Ireland, Shackleton and his Anglo-Irish family moved to Sydenham in suburban south London when he was ten.
Shackleton's first experience of the polar regions was as third officer on Captain Robert Falcon Scott's Discovery expedition of 1901-1904, from which he was sent home early on health grounds, after he and his companions Scott and Edward Adrian Wilson set a new southern record by marching to latitude 82°S.
During the Nimrod expedition of 1907-1909, he and three companions established a new record Farthest South latitude at 88°S, only 97 geographical miles (180 kilometres) from the South Pole, the largest advance to the pole in exploration history. Also, members of his team climbed Mount Erebus, the most active Antarctic volcano. For these achievements, Shackleton was knighted by King Edward VII on his return home.
After the race to the South Pole ended in December 1911, with Roald Amundsen's conquest, Shackleton turned his attention to the crossing of Antarctica from sea to sea, via the pole. To this end, he made preparations for what became the Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition, 1914–1917.
Disaster struck this expedition when its ship, Endurance, became trapped in pack ice and was slowly crushed before the shore parties could be landed. The crew escaped by camping on the sea ice until it disintegrated, then by launching the lifeboats to reach Elephant Island and ultimately South Georgia Island, a stormy ocean voyage of 1,330 km and Shackleton's most famous exploit.
In 1921, he returned to the Antarctic with the Shackleton-Rowett Expedition, but died of a heart attack while his ship was moored in South Georgia. At his wife's request, he was buried there. The wreck of Endurance was discovered just over a century later.
Away from his expeditions, Shackleton's life was generally restless and unfulfilled. In his search for rapid pathways to wealth and security, he launched business ventures which failed to prosper, and he died heavily in debt. Upon his death, he was lauded in the press but was thereafter largely forgotten, while the heroic reputation of his rival Scott was sustained for many decades.
Later in the 20th century, Shackleton was rediscovered, and became a role model for leadership in extreme circumstances.
In his 1956 address to the British Science Association, Sir Raymond Priestley, one of his contemporaries, said Scott for scientific method, Amundsen for speed and efficiency but when disaster strikes and all hope is gone, get down on your knees and pray for Shackleton, paraphrasing what Apsley Cherry-Garrard had written in a preface to his 1922 memoir The Worst Journey in the World.
In 2002, Shackleton was voted eleventh in a BBC poll of the 100 Greatest Britons.
Today, The Grandma has been reading about Caroline Mikkelsen, the Danish-Norwegian explorer who was the first woman to set foot on Antarctica on a day like today in 1935.
Caroline Mikkelsen (20 November 1906-15 September 1998, later married Mandel) was a Danish-Norwegianexplorer who on 20 February 1935was the first woman to set foot onAntarctica.
Caroline Mikkelsen was born 1906 inDenmark, later she married her first husband Norwegian Captain Klarius Mikkelsen and moved to Norway.
In the winter of 1934-1935, Mikkelsen accompanied her Norwegian husband Klarius on an Antarctic expedition sponsored by Lars Christensen, on the resupply vessel M/S Thorshavn with instructions to look for Antarctic lands that could be annexed for Norway. Mount Caroline Mikkelsen is named for her.
On 20 February 1935, the expedition made landfall somewhere on theAntarctic continental shelf.
Mikkelsen left the ship and participated in raising the Norwegian flag and in building a memorial cairn.
Mikkelsen never made any recorded claims to have landed on the mainland, but was initially thought to have landed on the Vestfold Hills not far from the present Davis Station. She did not publicly speak about her Antarctic voyage until sixty years after her landing in 1995 when she spoke about her journey to the Norwegian newspaper Aftenposten having been contacted by Davis Station Leader Diana Patterson.
In 1941, her husband Klarius died and in 1944 she married Johan Mandel from Tønsberg.
Caroline Mikkelsen-Mandel died in 1998.
In 1998 and 2002, Australian researchers published historical articles in the Polar Record concluding that the landing party from the Thorshavn -and thus Mikkelsen- landed on the Tryne Islands where a marker at Mikkelsen's Cairn can still be seen today.
The landing site is an approximately five kilometres from the Antarctic mainland. No alternative mainland landing site for the Mikkelsen party has been discovered, in spite of years of searching by Davis Station workers.
Consequently, Mikkelsen is regarded as the first woman to set foot on anAntarctic island, and Ingrid Christensen as the first to stand on the Antarctic mainland.
Antarctica has this mythic weight. It resides in the collective unconscious of so many people, and it makes this huge impact, just like outer space. It's like going to the moon.
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