595 x 428 mm. A view from the west showing the North Beach, the base camp at Cape Evans and Mount Erebus in the distance (not smoking at this time). Scott's party arrived at Cape Evans at the beginning of January 1911, this camp being in fact their second choice, Scott preferring the Cape Crozier side of Ross Island on the very edge of the Ross Ice Shelf. It proved impossible, however, to land the stores safely at this spot, and Cape Evans was chosen instead. This photograph was taken on March 7th, about two months after the party had landed; the expedition partly lived in the large hut near the shore (insulated with double boarding stuffed with quilted seaweed), and behind and to the sides of the hut can be seen the piles of provisions for the Antarctic winter, most prominent being the bales of hay for the ponies. Scott described the camp in glowing terms on January 11 1911:

‘The hut is becoming the most comfortable dwelling place imaginable. We have made unto ourselves a truly seductive home, within the walls of which peace, quiet and comfort reign supreme… the word ‘hut’ is misleading. Our residence is really a house of considerable size, in every respect the finest that has ever been erected in the Polar regions; 50 feet long by 25 feet wide and 9 feet to the eaves. If you can picture our house nestling below this small hill on a long stretch of black sand, with many tons of provision cases ranged in neat blocks in front of it and the sea lapping the icefoot below, you will have some idea of our immediate vicinity. Cape Evans is one of the many spurs of Erebus and the one that stands closest under the mountain, so that always towering above us we have the grand snowy peak with its smoking summit’.