I wrote this piece awhile ago and it seemed timely to give it another airing. Sea elephants are beyond ordinary. They are something else! Sea elephants spend the most of their life (90%) underwater and, while clumsy on land, their blubber helps them resist pressures deeper than most submarines can go. (That nose is a rebreather.) Imagine what your world view would be if you were a sea elephant – maybe looking at these weak, small and ungainly humans huddled in their tin cigar cases underwater.

Andrew Kelly, convenor