Tips for the ice

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You remember that song in the 90’s about the importance of sunscreen? Well that definitely applies here. I tend to slather that on my face daily along with plenty of oil based moisturizer. One of the things that tripped me up when I first got here was the sheer amounts of water you have to guzzle just to not shrivel to the consistency of dried Icelandic cod.

yum.

This is especially useful when going out on long hikes. I was lucky enough to get a Sunday off and have girl brunch with Alexia and a crew of her friends. We also later met up with Miranda who was briefly a fellow chef who turned sous chef, managed us for a couple days, and then moved to PM shift.

This Sunday brunch consisted of duck and country fried steak instead of prime rib.

Much like the ice, things shift a lot here. I’m currently on AM’s but that might be due to change after Thanksgiving.

Anyways, the 3 of us went on a hike to Crescent point which is just before Castle Rock. To do the whole loop might be about 5+ hours but we just did a simple out and back which still ended up being 4+ hours.

It’s one thing to be on base and think “yup, i’m in Antarctica” but it’s an entirely different state of mind to set foot and wander out in the expanse. Within the red flags mind you.

It also looks like pretty light gear for us at the moment but it’s required to pack your extreme cold weather gear. Again, things shift all the time and weather can change on a dime. The wind had picked up a little bit more on our return walk. Definitely hit the sauna again later.

warming station apple hut antarctica

Some other fun things I did this week included:

  • Drag Kareoke night (It was Antarctica Pride week)

  • Lecture on Long Duration Balloon and finding neutrinos

  • Lecture on Herbies (intense wind storms) and the AMRC (Antarctic Meteorological Research Center

  • SKUA- basically the free thrift store of Antarctica

The above is SKUA. It’s where my roommate got a bunch of shirts to make a rug, sheets that don’t look like ancient hospital bed dressings, and some other cool stuff. I got a sweet Alaska shirt here that I plan on wearing, keeping, and have a silent promise to visit someday just to say it’s legit.

Parsons is our construction crew out here and apparently all of them got done up in drag and are fantastic performers. Who knew. They also have a rule about eating our pizza. It’s mandatory.

This man is a treasure. You get into your 40’s and forget the energy of what it feels like to be spoken to like a floor swaddling 6 year old, and not in an uncular way, but instead with all the enthusiasm and gusto of a man who really loves weather and truly enjoys teaching people of all ages about what he does.

What you see here is Crescent Point (or ridge) in the foreground, Castle Rock in the middle ground to the right. We can hike that at some point when the weather clears. Mount Erebus is in the background steaming away!