Penguins and fat seals

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So my phone charger took a dive this week- sorry if it’s been quiet on the IG and video chats for a bit. I painstakingly ordered one off Amazon which may get here…..mid January. So until then I’m sneaking power from wherever I can find it.

Things I got up to this week:

  • Man haul/ Adelie penguins

  • Thanksgiving prep/dinner

  • Rave

  • Pressure Ridges/ Seals

So these little guys are Adelie penguins. They showed up during the man-haul, which is a sled team that goes across Armitage and lands at Scott Base. These cute little fuckers delayed it with their curiosity at seeing all these giants red penguins on the ice (people). One particular penguin stuck around while it’s other buddies scooted off.

This whole week we have been prepping in the kitchen for Thanksgiving which included about 900lbs total of turkey.

I’ve realized I really haven’t talked too much about my actual job here in Antarctica as a chef. My first week was pretty chaotic. There was A LOT going on in the kitchen with produce and and stacks of food cases everywhere piled way too high. I had one sous chef for a couple days, then a different one, then another one, and by the middle of the following week our AM shift had a consistent sous.

I am also just going to make a blanket statement about good vs bad leadership. In my experience, anyone who has to wax superlatives and spew exhausted quotes on teamwork in order convey their red hat leadership but then can’t hold a candle to the flame of taking any their own crap words to personal action, is a garbage leader.

Anyways, our current sous is a solid leader and our crew is pretty tight. It makes me sad to know that we will all be playing the shift roulette again and I could be moving to PM’s, MidRat (midnight), or with any luck- stay on AM’s.

Thanksgiving happened on a Saturday and it was pretty chaotic. Everyone worked. And there were definitely too many cooks in the kitchen. But everything went off without a hitch and we even got 2 Thanksgiving dinners out of it. Galley crew was first and then we could sign up for later dinner times.

Then after Thanksgiving there was a rave. I think I stayed for all of an hour and a half- by 10:30 I had to call it quits with a 4am wake up time and Sunday brunch to prepare.

Last up in my week was seeing the Pressure Ridges. We had to sign up for a time slot and spaces filled quickly. Luckily I got in for the 7pm on Tuesday. We packed into a vehicle and drove out to Scott Base which was maybe 10 minutes of slow driving. We were able to walk out onto the ice and around where the ice sheets hit the shelf and jutted upwards. It also happens to be a place where a lot of seals gather. We are told to keep our distance- especially with mother and baby seals. They are also territorial about their holes.

Who isn’t.

I think the seals were more of a highlight than the ridges themselves.

Anyways. Enjoy all these penguins and fat seals if the darned photos ever load.