Blog

Eating fresh tomatoes for the first time since April

Folks lining up to get their mail!

The first sunrise isn’t until August 19th, but folks at McMurdo are starting to get a taste of the sunrise for a few hours every afternoon. The horizon beyond Hut Point is lit up with cold, red, and purple, the Transantarctic Mountains can be faintly seen in the distance, and the land is bathed in a deep blue light just a shade lighter than the 24-hour Polar Night we’ve had since May.

Three friends and I went on a seven-mile round trip hike the other day. It was cloudy and we couldn’t see many stars, but we were treated to some beautiful pre-sunrise light on the horizon for a few hours.

In other news, the midwinter flight, which was delayed three weeks, finally arrived and departed, bringing us much longed-for mail and fresh vegetables.

I ate a salad for the first time in three months. It was awesome.

Milky Way

Faint nacreous clouds

More aurora

Milky Way and Aurora

An aurora over town a few weeks ago

Discovery Hut on a cloudy day

Survival “apple” on the Castle Rock trail

Castle Rock hike

The Ice shelf looking towards Scott Base

Pre-sunrise in the middle of the afternoon

I wrote a longer article for The Antarctic Sun, which was six months in the making from proposal to submission. My colleague Mike let me know the NSF published it today.

Check it out!

https://antarcticsun.usap.gov/features/contenthandler.cfm?id=4367

Also, more pictures!

I organized a five-person marching band for the 4th of July parade.

My only breakdance move (photo: Steve Allinger)

Playing music for Midwinter dinner with my boss, Victoria (photo: Dray Bowens Rubin)

Evan bravely let me paint his face.

Seeing my photographer friends take stunning, National Geographic-like photos of the Milky Way and the auroras is reminding me how little I know about photography. Clarification: I knew nothing about photography when I came here, and now I know a tiny bit about photography.

Still, I have a lot to learn. We went out to the road to the Phoenix runway last night for stargazing and photography. We had the clearest, densest, most stupendous Milky Way I have ever seen in my life. The faint scattering of stars that passes for the Milky Way back in rural parts of the States pales in comparison to how the Milky Way looks down here.

I don’t think I will ever see a more stunning night sky. I look at the vast, cloudy streak of the Milky Way, the shooting stars, and the red and green aurora on the horizon and feel like I’m inside a Nova episode on PBS. Or like Neil deGrasse Tyson is going to walk up to me at any second and start pointing out the planets and star clusters.

It’s almost beautiful enough to bring me back for a second winter in a row. But not quite. Maybe after a year off 🙂

My friend Roberrt and I looking skeptical.

With July right around the corner and my winter contract ending in eight weeks (!!!), I’m beginning to feel slightly frantic about getting to my uncompleted/unstarted winter projects and activities, like playing the drums more, volunteering with the fuels department, and maybe practicing my new barista skills.

I also have to do some grown-up things, like documentation, preparing work for Dave, the man who will cover for me when I’m off the ice for 6-8 weeks this fall, and figuring out how to get health insurance before I arrive back in the States.

I currently have more affordable health care in Antarctica than in the United States. Maybe I should just stay here.

I’m looking forward to leaving in late August mainly because I’m starting to feel a bit stifled here. I like my job, I like my friends and co-workers, and I like having free food, shelter, and medical care, but eight months on the Ice is wearing on me. I’m beginning to pine for the activities I had originally planned on doing this spring and summer, like visiting Australia, going on long-distance bike adventures, and getting tower climber training and certification, amongst other professional development activities. I’m also pining for actual pines. And oaks. And maples. And wildflowers. And salads. And not being so pasty white that my veins show through my skin in places they’ve never been visible before.

I like living here and I’m glad I’m coming back for another four months in late October, but I’m also feeling myself pulled in new directions.

I’d like to get enough IT training that I can apply for well-paying IT and comms jobs at Pole and Palmer Station and actually get one of those jobs in the next five years.

I’d like to get some kind of training in renewable energy technology in the next year or two.

I’d like to go to Australia, Asia, and South America in the next year, and meet my “30 by 30” goal of visiting 30 countries by the time I’m 30. I’m 26.5 years old and have been to 18 countries, so it’s totally doable. Especially if I take the next few austral winters off to actually do all the aforementioned things.

Convinced I am about to die before the Midwinter Mile.

Music!

My friend Liz gave me a riibbon even though I was probably in tenth place 🙂

Tired and SO not prepared to run a mile in frigid temperatures.

I’m sure folks in the arctic have their own version of Midwinter, but as far as I’m concerned, austral Midwinter is the one truly Antarctic holiday.

Midwinter broke the monotony I’ve been feeling for the last few months.

It reminded me how lucky I am to be here.

It reminded me that I am one of just a few thousand humans in all of human history who have lived in Antarctica in winter.

It made me feel a kinship with folks from Argentina, Chile, France, the U.K, Norway, Russia, South Korea, India, Japan, South Africa, Australia, and New Zealand who are wintering at their countries’ research stations and also celebrating Midwinter.

It made me feel grateful for the friends and co-workers who make living and working here tolerable, if not downright hilarious and wonderful.

It made me joyous because I got to attend Midwinter dinner at Scott Base as well as McMurdo. And there were faint but visible auroras over the ice shelf as we were driving over.

It made me grateful that I have a consistent core of friends this season and am experiencing the Antarctic community life that I kind of missed out on last summer (since I’m no longer a newbie with a weird work schedule).

It made me really freakin’ glad I decided to spend a winter here. Even though it wasn’t my original plan. Even though the decision terrified me at first. Even though I felt underprepared. Even though it’ll probably be at least a year or two before I have the energy to do another winter.

But you never know. As our National Science Foundation Station Manager said at Midwinter dinner, “In Antarctica, never say never!”

The winter 2018 IT&C department! (photo credit: Steve Allinger)

We made Marty fly (Allinger)

… and then turned him upside down (Allinger).

My jellyfish.

I was very happy with my decorations at Gallagher’s.

My friend Douggles had patches made for everyone.

The waste barn made an orca whale for the galley.

Midwinter greetings from stations around the continent.

Amazing work by the wasties, as usual.

The Scott Base galley.

Frank, the Macops mascot, moved into my office.

My office in pre-Midwinter chaos.

Looking skeptical at the Scott Base bar. (Photo by Steve Allinger)

My band, Casual Bob Stimulation, being silly as usual. (Allinger)

Women of Ross Island! (Allinger)