Reflections

The past year has been one of many changes. I would be lying if I told you that at no point did I think I was making a mistake. I regularly challenged my decisions and wondered if I was making the right choice. I can now look back and see I made the right choice but that doesn't make it any less scary. I have realized now that I must take chances and step into the unknown in order to find adventure and happiness. I would now like to share with you all some of the highlights of my season.

Although it was sad to leave the O'Brien family, I can say it was a great joy to spend 1.5 months living with two cute kids and two parents that care deeply about them. This was one of the best highlights of the past year.

Not much can top the feeling of stepping onto the ice for the first time. I wonder if next year I'll get as excited when I see the back of plane open and feel the rush of cold air hit my face?

Making new friends is always a good thing. Eric and Megan are two great friends that I will miss after this season. Megan and I are going to travel a little bit together when I get back to Chch.Halloween, I didn't find my icewife but I realize that is not what is important. I found some of the best friends anyone could hope for. The drunkenness of the evening was shared by all.
WAIS divide was another magical moment. Stepping off a plane into a camp of nothingness only to leave two weeks later with a small town assembled. What a feeling of accomplishment. Here I experienced white out conditions, heavy winds, and more shoveling than I ever care to do again.I think the Turkey Trot changed my attitude. I haven't run in 5+ years but doing this race didn't bother my knees at all. I finished in ~30th place which won me a shirt. Thanksgiving was a great time.I've always liked snowmobiling, but doing it on the sea ice in Antarctica adds a little something extra you don't get in VT. I already miss the days when the sea ice was open for travel and we were regularly assigned to off station activities. We can't forget about swimming! What a great rush and accomplishment. This is one of the activities that in another 10-15 years I'll be sitting in a bar with friends and I'll get to whip this story out and awe them all. Operation Tiger Strike, our trip to AGAP. Altitude, cold, and remoteness added a touch of danger to this mission. I'm glad I got a chance to do it and will always be grateful I came back in coach not cargo.Xmas was a fun time of year. Each department made a decoration to add to the party at the VMF (Vehicle Maintenance Facility). They included a striper pole from the waste barn and this reindeer with "rocks" from shuttles. Each party on the ice was filled with laughter, food, and fun. I'll never forget the two weeks of my life where the world literally revolved around me. More great people and interesting sights (ice tunnels, the dome, new station, Jamesways...)The tour of the Oden was a lot of fun and now I really want to get a job working on a boat! This was also the first time it became a reality that the area out in front of the station really was ocean.More good friends. I know I'll never forget these two clowns. We had many fun moments together including many Red Sox vs Yankees debates and trying to figure out how old Terry was. The best was the time I was harassing Betty and the guy she was working with looks at her and said "I don't think he likes your hat." (it was a Yankees hat).Tanker offload was another fun time filled with new faces and job possibilities for next year. Plus it meant I got to see more boats.Lastly there was Vessel Offload. This was not a fun time. For the first time since arriving in Antarctica I was truly cold. I also was now ready to leave. As the song goes, "24 hours to go" and I'll be off the ice until next year. It has really been an awesome adventure and I highly recommend it to everyone (Wanda, Diddy). I must now go finish packing up my room and say my goodbyes. Once again I must step into the unknown but I know a new adventure awaits.

M/V American Tern

For the past four days I've been helping with ship offload. This is the time of year that we get all our food and supplies that will be used next year. My job for this has been as Pier Announcer and Hatch Checker. Besides a couple equipment operators on the pier, I am the only American civilian there. The rest of the people are either Kiwi cargo handlers or US NAVCHAPS (part of the Navy). The Pier by the way (the dirt part you see up against the ship) is actually a big chunk of ice covered in dirt. So, all containers are loaded onto trucks that are driving on this "ice pier" that is just floating their. The trucks then drive over the bridge and onto solid ground.

As a Pier Announcer, my task was to identify each container as it come off one of the three cranes and was loaded onto a flatbed truck. I then look up the container number, find out how much it weighs, and where it is going. From here, I announce the information on the radio so people around town know what is headed where. The weight is important, because some containers require cranes or heavy duty forklifts to pick them off the truck. Most of the containers are about 20-30,000lbs but some as heavy as 65,000lbs.

I saw some cool things come off including some new Challenger snow cats. Most of the time it was just Milvans (the orange containers you see in most of the pictures).

Since I am the RSPC contact person on the pier, I've gotten to meet a ton of people. I love the Kiwis. Two of the great people I've met include Vince on the left and John on the right. Vince is from Auckland and is normally a police officer at the airport. John works in a town just north of Wellington and does logistics work. Both of them are very nice guys and have given me their contact information incase I need a place to stay while on the North Island.

After the ship is offloaded, it's time to put all the milvans from last year back on the ship. A lot of them are empty, but some of them have our waste or other items being returned to the states. My task here is to watch the hatches from onboard the ship and record what containers go where. This task can be difficult. More or less we have a ~20 page three dementional map of the ship and each container location has an individual number. I would explain the rest of it, but it would take way to long and I'm sure no one really cares. Today we got things all messed up and I had to stay late (past the 12 hr shift) to try and sort everything out.

Up until now, I have really loved Antarctica, and have rarely complained or even wanted to leave. However, the past 4 days have been so cold that I can't wait to see the green grass of Christchurch. We have gone through about 4 cases of hand warmers that don't even come close to fighting the effects of the cold. I'm suprised I still have all my toes and that chunks of my face haven't turned black. Every night I take a hot shower and just stand there until feeling comes back to my hands and feet. The joys of the warm sand on the beaches of NZ will be the best reward! Ship offload has given a whole new definition to the meaning of COLD

Happy Birthday Old Man

Well I wanted to wish my Old Man (Big Skip) a happy birthday but due to vessel offload I did not have a long enough lunch break to make the call. I tried to email my wishes back to FL but that got kicked back by the firewall. So, this was the best way I could think of to wish the Old Man well.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

You are a great Dad and I appreciate all the help you have given me over the years and especially in the past 12 months! Thank you.

What's Next?

I'm sure many of you would like to know what is next on my journey through life. I don't know if I can really answer that, but I can share with you some of my thoughts, dreams and ideas for the next year. Before I get too far on this remember how far I came in the past 12 months (finished my MBA, sold my home, quit a job I worked for almost 5 years, came to Antarctica to shovel snow, worked at the South Pole for two weeks...). I am not ready to give up my adventure just yet!

It is not definite yet, but it looks like I will be leaving shortly after we are done offloading all our cargo from the ship which is planned for the 15th Feb. When I arrive in NZ I'm not sure what exactly I'll be doing, but here is a punch list:

• Couch surfing
• WWOOFing around the south island
• Hitchhiking
• Taking a Paragliding course
• Caving
• Tramping aka backpacking
• Meeting new people and enjoying adventures with old
• Making it back to the states around May
• Hopefully I'll get a summer job as a wild land firefighter out west somewhere
• Get back to the ice sometime between Aug and Oct

For the longest time (since I was a freshman at Alaska Pacific University), I have wanted to go paragliding. NZ is famous for paragliding and I plan on dropping the cash to take the course. I don't really want to spend that much money, but as my friend Brody put it, I "didn't come here for the money, but for the adventure." The cheapest school (may not be the best selective factor) is on the North Island. I was going to take the inter-island ferry up but found out it cost $72nz for a one way ticket. I looked up air travel and from CHCH I can fly to Wellington on the North Island for $27nz (~$20.75us). So as a no-brainer, I bought the ticket and hopefully the plan follows through.

I am not going to rent a car in NZ since I won't have that kind of money. I could buy a cheap car and sell it for the same price when I leave, but then I would have to insure and register it. So I am going to travel by thumb. I did it a bunch in AK and apparently NZ is very hitchiker friendly.

Besides going paragliding, I want to travel around the South Island and see some of the towns. For this I've decided I will go WWOOFing. WWOOFing stands for Willing Workers On Organic Farms (aka World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms). I paid the $40nz for the "passport" that lists 1000+ farms around the country. All I have to do is email or call a farm and see if they have openings. If they do I show up and for 4-6hrs of daily work, I will get free room and board. I have gone through the book and found cool places like, micro brewery, vineyard, mud brick factory, deer farm, little place on an island and many others. Sounds like a good cheap way to travel.

As for couch surfing, this is a great thing my friend "Hitch Hiker Ben" taught me about. After going online, I was able to create a profile that is entered into a database. When going to a new town, I look up the city on the web page and it gives me a list of available couches. I email the people until I find someone willing to give me a couch. I then have a free place to stay for a night or two. I know, many of you think this is crazy (Dad, Grama), but it's all part of the adventure and it isn't as sketchy as it sounds.

Since NZ is so beautiful, I couldn't possibly leave without making a trek into the backcountry. I'm hoping to do 2-3 backpacking trips. So far I only know one that is a must and it is a four day costal hike. For $45nz, I'll take a boat taxi out to the start of the tramp. I'll then spend four wonderful days walking on the beach and on small hills along the shore. It will be nice to have my feet in the warm sand. While tramping, I'm thinking I'll pick up a fishing license and do a little world class trout fishing. NZ in home to some of the biggest browns.

After playing in NZ for a little while, I will make my way back home to good old VT. I hope to spend a week or so there and visit friends and family. I even hope to make it down to the "Upper Valley." After this I will go see my cute niece Ella before heading West to some place where I hope to get a fire fighting job. I've applied all over Montana, Idaho, Wyoming, Washington, and Oregon. I hope one of them turns up something or I'll just have to resort to playing the guitar on the street for pocket change (joke). I know that adventure is back in my blood and I feel like I did when I lived in AK. There are a lot of cool places out there and I want to see them all after living and working in the "coolest" (little pun).

Welcome to McMurdo

I thought that since I'm going to be leaving here in a short while, it would be worth giving everyone a quick tour of my town. You will notice that there are a lot of similarities from this town to other towns but that there are also many differences. One of the most interesting differences that I have found is that main doors to the buildings open in. This may not sound odd, but next time you are out, pay attention to all the doors you go through. For fire reasons, doors in public buildings must open out however here in Antarctica they open in. Why is this? Well in a short period of time (over night) snow can easily drift in and quickly block a door creating a bigger hazard. To eliminate this risk, all doors open in. To prove this point, when I was at WAIS, a UT was sleeping in a Jamesway and couldn't get out in the morning because the door opened out. He had to wait until people noticed he was missing and go shovel him out.

I'll start with the "Chapel of the Snows." This is our chapel. Although I don't go to church every week, I do go semi regularly. This past week during mass the Palmer was coming into the turning basin and we were all watching it out the window behind the alter. This building is also used for GA morning stretching, yoga, AA, "quiet time", and bible study. It has burned down 2 times since 1956.

This is the McM coffee house. Currently it is condemned but we were told it will open again next year. This is where I did open mic night and saw many good performers. It was a fun place we could have a glass of wine, visit with friends, and play board games.

Welcome to the McMurdo General Hospital. I've only been twice, once for a flu shot and again for altitude meds.

Right next door to the Hospital is the Fire Station. Each airfield also has a fire station. The response time for in town calls is at 3min. Not bad when most towns is 10-15min. The hardest part here is not letting the water freeze.

The BFC. I've spent many days working here as a GA. They are a great crew and they have a fun job. The best comparison is that the BFC is like Eastern Mountain Sports. This is where we check out sleeping bags, tents, survival bags...

What town would be complete without a NASA Lunar Habitat? This was just set up in the MEC parking lot a couple weeks ago. I'm guessing it's a test for the moon?

Most towns have a parking lot but do they look like this? When we need a vehicle, we sign it out at the MEC. It's hard to tell, but there are power cords going down between the Pisten Bullys and Tuckers so we can plug them in.Government! Each town has a government and McM is no exception. This is the NSF Chalet. My friend Cindy works in this building. I don't know what to compare this to, but some towns do have some form of industry. In McM it's science and this is where the "beakers" (Scientists) work. Known as the Crary Lab on Beaker street, it is three levels that stretch almost to the beach. They have an aquarium, offices, labs...

The McM Gas Station. We have two choices, Mogas or Diesel. One major difference is that we don't pay at the pump. Actually, we don't pay at all. If your vehicle is less than 3/4 full you fill it up. We also use a grounding clamp when fueling Mogas to eliminate static charges.

Our Post Office. It was closed when I took the picture. We also have a mail room where we receive our mail. Each time mail comes in, a list is published on who has mail. This allows us to know when to go to the mail room.

Our flight terminal. We don't have metal detectors, drug sniffing dogs, or X-Ray machines but we do have a scale. When we go to fly somewhere, we check in the night before at "bag drag." They weigh all our checked baggage then have us get on the scale with our carry on. This lets them know how much fuel to bring. The next day they bring us from here to whichever airfield we are flying from.

The Scales are like what the DOT uses at rest stops. These trucks are finding out how much their loads (millvans) weigh so they can be loaded onto the cargo ship to be returned to the states.

The Carp Shop. Two buildings connected together full of power tools and educated craftsmen. In the distance is the flush-a-way. The carp shop doesn't have running water so they go out to the flush-a-way to "powder their noses." The carp shop has a great view of the bay and has some of the best parties in town.Trash. Since everything gets recycled, we must sort our own trash. Kim here is going through the trash can from her office and separating out all the different materials.

Every town has a bank, and this is ours. I guess there isn't anything too exciting about an ATM. At Pole they don't have an ATM so if they need cash they need to have it pulled from their pay.

The Skua shack. So the Skua is a bird but it is a bird with a great talent. This talent is scavenging for anything of use (most of the time food). We use the term in honor of the bird. This shack is like the thrift store where you can get almost anything you could dream of. This season I skua'd a tent, food, shoes, jacket, pictures, Christmas presents for my roommates... What a great culture, if you have something you don't need, give it to someone else.

Only Two weeks left!

Funny Signs Around Town

Back a few months ago I stated that I would post some funny signs around station on the blog. Well, I have finally gotten to the point of doing it. The signs are pretty much appropriate but I would rate some of them PG-13 if your kid can read and G if they can't.

WARNING MAY CONTAIN ADULT CONTENT (PG-13)

This first sign is a fun sign that I found in the Waste Barn. This is the part of town where all trash if picked through and sorted for recycling, burning, or burying (back in the states that is).
This is a funny sign that was found in the Carp Shop. There are a lot of smart people up there and I all of them can still count to 10 except for "Pinky" who can only count to 9.5.
This is the less appropriate sign found in Men's Bathrooms around station. I can only guess what made this sign necessary.
This is the sign you can see while entering any of the bathrooms in Building 155. Because all trash is sorted, it is important that Food Waste is not mixed in any of the other sorting bins.
This is a fun little sign found at the entrance of the SSC that is hung on a bulletin board. Looks like a little photo-shop was used.

This isn't the best sign, but this is found on the wall of an LC-130. Usually you don't think you need to cut your own emergency exit.

Questions for 1Q

Since I have been down here, I have been getting a range of questions for different school groups. I've noticed that some of the same questions come up so I thought that this time I would answer Ms Quinton's 1Q questions on my blog for other students (and parents) to learn from.

Logan - Can we call you Skippy? Why do you have snowmobiles there? You could just walk over the ice? I like arctic wolves. Yes Logan, you can call me Skippy although the nickname didn't really catch on down here. As for the second question, we could walk over the ice but some of the places that I need to go are very far away. Even with snowmobiles it can talk an hour or two to get there. Plus whenever we leave the station we need to bring survival gear with us just in case a bad storm comes in. During bad weather you can't see the flags that mark the routes and you can really only travel by GPS. These survival bags are very heavy and it would be hard to carry them. A typical survival bag (that is checked before each time going out) has a tent, sleeping bag, dehydrated food, stove with fuel, first aid kit, toilet paper, and books for reading.

Shayla - are there puffins or any other birds down there (besides penguins)? are kids allowed to go down there? We do not have puffins, but there are other birds. First off there are many kinds of penguins. In McMurdo we have Adelie and Emperor Penguins but you can find others along the coast. The bird we see the most is the Skua. It's a very large seagull looking bird that is very cleaver at sneaking up behind you and stealing your food. Skuas love to sit on top of the buildings looking down on the area were we come out of the galley. If they see someone with food, they swoop down from behind and quickly duck up over their shoulder and are off with the food. It's really funny to watch. Unfortunately you must be 18 or older to come down here with the USAP. However it may be possible to come down on a cruise ship but I hear that costs about $17,000.
Kennedi - Have you seen any whales? Did you know that polar bears have black skin? I have seen one whale. It was a Minke whale which is a baleen whale that feeds on plankton in the water. The channel that the ice breaker made is finally starting to clear out so we hope to have more whales come into our bay soon. In another day or two we will have a fuel tanker here to offload 7 Million gallons of fuel for us (that's a lot of fuel). It has been delayed over a week because of pack ice about 500miles out. Oden, our icebreaker headed out the other day to go help it. The information about polar bears is very interesting.

Jalyse - Do the penguins like you? Do you have hats? Do you like it down there? I don't really know if the penguins like me or not. I think we have a relationship that if I leave them alone, they will leave me alone. We enjoy looking at each other, but from a comfortable distance. I have a bunch of hats down here. The United States Antarctic Program (USAP) gave me two hats at the Clothing Distribution Center (CDC) in Christchurch. However I also brought two hats down with me, bought a hat, and had a hat sent to me. Lots of hats, but I like my Red Sox (thank you Steve-O) and Scott Base ones (thank you Amber) the best. I love it down here and am already looking forward to coming back again next year.

Hayden - Do you have a lot of fun on the snowmobiles? Have you caught a penguin? Hayden, snowmobiles are a ton of fun. Most of the ones we have are old and don't go very fast, but it is still nice to have the wind in your hair. The thing I like most about snowmobiling here is driving towards Erebus (our active volcano on the island) on a sunny day where you can see smoke coming out of the top and have a helicopter fly a couple hundred feet over the top of your head where you can see the pilot wave. Truly a great experience. I have not caught a penguin. The National Science Foundation (NSF) says that we can not approach the wildlife in any way that will effect their behavior. However some of the scientists get special permission to capture them for research but must let them go after they are done.

Luke - Why did the penguins walk away from you? Are there any stuffed animals down there? I'm not really sure why the penguins walked away but I bet they got bored with us. It was neat watching them go away because after they waddled a little, the dropped on their bellies and pushed themselves along with their toes. We do have some stuffed animals in the station store. I sent a cute little stuffed animal penguin to my adorable niece Ella for Christmas.
Gabe - Have you touched a seal? While with scientists, I have been very close to seals, closer than you would get to most wild animals, however the NSF and the Antarctic Treaty (signed by 20+ countries) don't allow interaction with the animals down here except by special permit. Touching a seal could be dangerous and if I got caught they would send me home. The picture above is of a bunch of seals laying on the ice.

Tyler - Do you have any weapons? Do you hunt down there? Good question Tyler, no I do not have any weapons. We are not allowed to bring any weapons here and they search our bags in Christchurch before we fly over. The rumor is that there is one gun on station that is for the station manager (who is also a US Marshal). The gun is rumored to be in three places under lock and key of three separate people. This would be used only in an emergency and I don't know if it has ever been used. Hunting is not allowed in Antarctica so there is no reason to have a weapon. As a side note, we don't have a police department, but if something does happen, the fire department is called in to handle the situation. Every now and then a fight will happen and both sides will get sent home on the next flight.

Matthew - How many penguins have you seen? More than 10 or less than 10? Good question Matthew, I'm not sure how many penguins I've seen but it is over ten. When the Penguin Ranch was up and running, I saw penguins there and now that the ice breaker has come in, we have Adelie penguins around town. If I look out the window with binoculars, I can see them along the edge of the ice. My roommate saw about 20-30 Adelie penguins walking next to one of the trails on the edge of town while I was at the South Pole. I saw some of his pictures and videos and it looked pretty neat seeing them all walking in a line.

Kelsey - Do you have any friends down there? In the summer time is there lots of food or in the winter time is there lots of food (for the people) I do have a lot of friends down here. Coming down, I didn't know anyone but people are very friendly and it is easy to make connections. As for the food, this is lots of food. We have two huge warehouses that are FULL of food (food is even staked in the isles so that you can't even walk down them). We also have a greenhouse that was made out of scrap supplies laying around. In the winter planes can't land here and this is the only place that the people can get fresh vegetables. In the summer about once a week "freshies" are flown in from NZ and we get good food like avocados, peaches, watermelon...

Shealyn - What is your favorite thing to do down there? There are a few things that I really like to do and I'm not sure I can narrow it down to one. I really like playing my guitar with friends as they sing along, going snowmobiling on the sea ice, driving a pisten bully, answering enthusiastic questions about Antarctica and watching really bad storms come through. Some of the things I don't like doing include working 6 days a week and not seeing my niece.

Hannah - Are there any cars down there? Great question Hannah. I haven't seen any "cars" down here, but we do have "normal" vehicles and some interesting vehicles. Normal transportation is in trucks and vans. Some of these vehicles have over sized tires for the snow while some have tracks. If the van or truck is only going to be used in town, they have normal tires. We also have a wide variety of snow vehicles including Ivan the Terra Bus, Deltas, Pisten Bullys, Hagglunds, snowmobiles, planes, helicopters, four wheelers, big tractors, small tractors, flatbed trucks and the list goes on.

Brian - I have 3 snowmobiles! Do you know that we made life size Arctic animals? You must love snowmobiling as much as I do. It must have been fun making the animals, what kind of animals did you make?

Taeva - How do you sleep down there? Do you wear any snow gear down there? Have you been in the Arctic? Interesting questions Taeva. Sleeping is very easy since we work 54hrs a week. If by any chance we can't fall asleep, we can get NyQuil in the store. We wear lots of snow gear and I hope this picture gives you an idea of what we wear. The clothing is known as ECW (Extreme Cold Weather Gear). I have not been to the Arctic, but did live in Alaska for a little while.
Mrs. Kern - Do you get to watch movies down there? Some of the new movies the kids like are Alvin and the Chipmunks, High school Musical etc. :) Just wondering. Also, have you seen any tourists, my dad went down there on a ship once. We watch a bunch of movies down here. We have two movie channels where they rotate the movies daily. Since we are part of the government, we get the AFN or Armed Forces Network. I haven't seen any of those movies, but we do get them shortly after being released in the theaters. While at Pole I saw some people that had skied in. In McM I haven't seen anyone yet, but I am on of the tour guides for when cruise ships come in. We were suppose to have two of them in town last week, but for weather reasons, they canceled. Maybe in a week or two. The picture above is of the three vessels currently in town. The one at the pier is the fuel tanker, left is the Oden (Icebreaker), right is the Palmer (USAP research vessel).

Thank you for all the great questions and I hope I was informative on the answers.