After Mackintosh left the ‘Aurora’ on January 25, 1915, Stenhouse kept the ship with difficulty off Tent Island.  The ice-anchors would not hold, owing to the continual breaking away of the pack, and he found it necessary much of the time to steam slow ahead against the floes.  The third sledging party, under Cope, left the ship on the afternoon of the 31st, with the motor-tractor towing two sledges, and disappeared towards Hut Point.  Cope’s party returned to the ship on February 2 and left again on February 5, after a delay caused by the loose condition of the ice.  Two days later, after more trouble with drifting floes, Stenhouse proceeded to Cape Evans, where he took a line of soundings for the winter quarters.  During the next month the ‘Aurora’ occupied various positions in the neighbourhood of Cape Evans.  No secure moorings were available.  The ship had to keep clear of threatening floes, dodge “growlers” and drifting bergs, and find shelter from the blizzards.  A sudden shift of wind on February 24, when the ship was sheltering in the lee of Glacier Tongue, caused her to be jammed hard against the low ice off the glacier, but no damage was done.  Early in March Stenhouse sent moorings ashore at Cape Evans, and on March 11 he proceeded to Hut Point, where he dropped anchor in Discovery Bay.  Here he landed stores, amounting to about two months’ full rations for twelve men, and embarked Spencer-Smith, Stevens, Hook, Richards, Ninnis, and Gaze, with two dogs.  He returned to Cape Evans that evening.

“We had a bad time when we were ‘sculling’ about the Sound, first endeavouring to make Hut Point to land provisions, and then looking for winter quarters in the neighbourhood of Glacier Tongue,” wrote Stenhouse afterwards.  “The ice kept breaking away in small floes, and we were apparently no nearer to anywhere than when the sledges left; we were frustrated in every move.  The ship broke away from the fast ice in blizzards, and then we went dodging about the Sound from the Ross Island side to the western pack, avoiding and clearing floes and growlers in heavy drift when we could see nothing, our compasses unreliable and the ship short-handed.  In that homeless time I kept watch and watch with the second officer, and was hard pressed to know what to do.  Was ever ship in such predicament?  To the northward of Cape Royds was taboo, as also was the coast south of Glacier Tongue.  In a small stretch of ice-bound coast we had to find winter quarters.  The ice lingered on, and all this time we could find nowhere to drop anchor, but had to keep steam handy for emergencies.  Once I tried the North Bay of Cape Evans, as it apparently was the only ice-free spot.  I called all hands, and making up a boat’s crew with one of the firemen sent the whaler away with the second officer in charge to sound.  No sooner had the boat left ship than the wind freshened from the northward, and large bergs and growlers, setting into the bay, made the place untenable.  The anchorage I eventually selected seemed the best available—­and here we are drifting, with all plans upset, when we ought to be lying in winter quarters.”