THE ONE WITH THE SNOW

"And here you can see the great Emperor Pengwengs in their moulting stage," Benedict Cumberbatch said seriously to the camera.

Behind the lens the cameraman stifled a giggle, the sound man smirked and looked away but Dr Jayne Allen did nothing to hide her amusement - she laughed out loud at the man in front of the camera in his silly blue jacket and heavy black trousers. She hadn't wanted him here, hadn't wanted to baby sit him and certainly hadn't wanted him muscling in on her first trip to Antarctica.

Benedict Cumberbatch may be Sherlock Holmes, the internet's boyfriend, thinking women's crumpet but to Dr Allen - Penguin expert - he was an un-wanted distraction.

She had been waiting 12 years to come down to the Southern-most continent and had been here six months studying Emperor penguins through their breeding and chick-raising to their feather moulting. It was amazing to finally be here to see this big colony of birds - so close to the Mawson Base in the Australian Antarctic Territory.

Staying at Mawson base, the oldest of Australia's three Antarctic bases, was not something that you just got to do. She had been on a waiting list for years and now here she was. And so was this film crew for a week - Christmas week, documenting the penguins and Christmas at Mawson. Jayne hadn't been pleased when she was told about the crew shadowing her, though Joe and Boyd seemed pretty experienced and laidback kind of guys who had travelled the world and served their time. No now her only real bugbear was Cumberbatch. Joe and Boyd had worked for David Attenborough and had worked hard to deserve this and they were Aussies, in Australian Territory, sleeping in Aussie beds. British Cumberbatch had been a late inclusion. She wasn't sure why they needed him. They were just going to edit in footage that Jayne herself had taken earlier in her trip, add it to what they were taking now and then he was going to do a voice over for the whole thing

But here he was taking a spot that could have gone to another scientist, asking too many questions and taking up too much of her valuable time. She was meant to be recording data from her key penguins particularly Majorie and Jackson and their chick Freeman. But instead they were stuck here while Cumberbatch ran through his script - again.

"So here you can see the Emperor Pingwings," he started and Jayne lost it again, lost it completely. Lost it so badly she had to walk away before she sent the other guys into hysterics. Instead she left them too it, heading down to where her main Emperors were sitting - unable to go swimming until their new feathers came in.

They were beautiful, scruffy looking at this time of year - heading into midsummer - but beautiful. In just a few weeks they would be fully feathered again and back at sea and she'd be back in Victoria and Tasmania studying fairy and little penguins or at the zoo with the captive population of Emperors. She was trying to savour every minute of this experience, collecting a lot of data to study and follow up on. No idea when she'd be back again.

The penguins were more than a metre tall and at breeding time they were often more than 25kg. These were no little birds, they were magnificent and it was such a privilege to be here in their world. She'd got lucky with Marjorie, Jackson and Freeman - they had all come here to moult. Often, according to her older colleague and mentor Dr Flora Banks, the penguins went elsewhere - out to one of the islands (and some of her key subjects had) but not these three or Ricciardo and Danni - her other key pair. No here they all were. In fact Ricci was right out in front of her today - just a couple of metres away and looking almost re-feathered. He was a beautiful majestic bird and by the looks of him, had managed not to lose too much weight while he refeatheared.

He was..............

"Fuck!" she exclaimed as a snow ball caught her right behind the ear. She turned to see Cumberbatch standing watching her.

She glared at him. And the smirk that had been on his face disappeared.

"I was only trying to get your attention, what is your problem with me woman?" he asked.

"Well other than you hitting me in the head with a snow ball?" she asked. At this time of year it was more an iceball and it stung- Antarctica was the driest continent on earth and didn't snow that often.

"You could have hit Ricciardo or Danni," she said angrily, still rubbing her neck.

Ben smiled again.

"Ricciardo as in the race driver?" he asked wide-eyed, surely not. This stiff, stuffy academic knew who Daniel Ricciardo was?

She sighed.

"Yes, I name all my penguins after sports stars - so does my boss - she called her first pair Marjory and Jackson after the famous Australian runner and we called their latest chick Freeman after Cathy Freeman - another Olympic runner. I'm a bit of a rev-head so mine are all superbike and grandprix drivers."

"I've followed the circuit," he said and she nodded.

"You seem to be in a very privileged position," she answered and he looked at her pointedly. She was a beautiful young woman, how could he have missed that? Though buried under her heavy snow gear, she had big green eyes and sharp cheekbones, full lips and he was sure under all that gear she was all woman. But she'd taken an instant dislike to him, one he was sure he didn't deserve.

"What is that supposed to mean?" he asked settling down next to her to watch the large birds - they were truly amazing.

"You get to do a lot of things us mere mortals don't, do you know how long I had to work to get here? I was put back twice because of rich people jumping in and taking the place of scientists," she sighed.

Ah so there it was. It would be easy to go on the defensive but he could see her point - even though he didn't really think it was fair in his case.

"Your government wanted to drum up a bit more support for their Antarctic program so they invited Sir David down but well, he opted to let someone younger and as I'm promoting a movie featuring pengwengs it made sense," he said adding his own sigh at the end. He had talked several influential groups into donating money towards helping the penguins but he didn't think he needed to say that, didn't feel the need to justify himself, though he wanted to impress her.

"My presence here could help raise the profile," was all he said.

She was smiling now.

"What?" he asked exasperated with her - one minute she was hassling him and the next minute smiling.

"You really can't say Penguin can you?" she giggled and he rolled his eyes.

"Penguin, penguin, penguin!" he chanted and she laughed more.

"See it wasn't that hard was it?" she said when she stopped laughing.

"Friends?" he said putting out his hand.

"Friends!" she replied shaking his hand.

"Now let's see if we can get you to say Pengwengs in Front of a camera!!!" she teased.