Monday, January 19

Helo showed up about 1:30, about 45 min. earlier than scheduled, we were all scrambling, left two burners on. Thankfully the coffee pot did not totally evaporate and blow up...

On our way, Paul pointed out in Wright Valley a "Rock Glacier":



The Onyx River we hiked the other day:



We had to stop at Marble Point for fuel. The sea ice there is very fractured and looks like marble, I guess:


Two "Fuelies" live there for a few weeks at a time, and don't get many visitors other than helo pilots. So, for a group like us, they bake fresh cookies:



The Marble Point Visitor's Center:


Communications tower and shack, a couple of luxury trailers to live in, and the fuel tanks. The fuel gets driven across in the winter when the ice is thick. It saves a lot of helo time, fuel, and money to be able to refuel in the field where all the scientists need support:



I can't remember her name, but she works at Denali National Park in Alaska in the summer there, winter here. She loves being a fuelie...



We dropped off Ziggy and Ryan first near Lake Vanda, at one end of the valley. They will hike down to Canada Glacier from one end, Pat and I from the other. It doesn't look like much from this shot, but keep looking...



The face is at least 50' tall, more in some places:






Michelle and Paul were getting dropped off and picked up in a different valley surrounding Lake Bonnie.

Pat and I walked were dropped off at the head of Lake Hoar starting at Suess glacier and were to walk down to almost past Canada Glacier. Excellent weather, a bit below 32, but sunny, very little wind. Very peaceful, spectacular views. got good video and photos right up against the glaciers. The disappearing helo is the dot at the left just above the glacier:




higher up:


Pat in front for scale:


This glacier is at the top of the valley, and creates Lake Hoar:


We are leaving Suess Glacier and hiking along Lake Hoar. Canada Glacier is in the distance about 4 mi.:



After about an hour, we decided to look up the other way to see what the other side of the valley looked like, and we didn't look again:


We're finally within about a mile of Canada Glacier:





Hard to see in the compressed image, but there a a couple of "huts" (buildings) to the left of the glacier. There are also a few tents, but two hard to see. Usually biologists hang out there, but get flown in/out of McMurdo daily. They don't stay in camp like us.


Now were just across a little lake from Canada:



This gives you a feel for scale. We walked along the curved face for more than a mile:


Pat tried to call the home planet:


A boulder about the size of a pick-up, trapped for nearly a thousand years, will be released soon:


One of many locations where water is running off the top:


A recent calving, probably from this season, because the fallen ice looks so clean and slightly blue:


We collected our last point at the far end of the glacier, and had time for tea before the helo was scheduled to pick us up.


While we were sitting there, we heard a loud sound somewhere between and crack and a boom, and saw a live "calving". It lasted only a second, so I didn't capture it in action. However, here is what it looks like aftward. The large dirty block to the bottom left was along the ground and broke free with the other ice. It is about the size of a mini-cooper:


Ryan and Ziggy were dropped off first, before the SVB’s, but did not get notified of the location of the SVB drop. This could have been disastrous if the weather was bad. We had to fly around a bit to find them. Pat and I took some time to find the bags also. We knew where they were, but I couldn’t figure out how to measure distance on the hand-held GPS until we were almost there. As were were flying back, we could see Mt. Erubus across the Ross sea:


Other than that, Pat and I had a peaceful day.

Paul and Michelle ran into nematoad nazi’s at Lake Bonnie, and were photographed “Off the trail” while trying to cross a stream correctly……..by a person that wants imagery from Paul, but doesn’t understand that we are trying to help her… nematoads are small microscopic worms some biologists are studying.....

Fried frozen vegetarian enchiladas for dinner in the interest of speed. We got back late, and have an early morning start. Ended the day with a toast using 900 year old glacial ice in our Antarctica shot glasses with 10 year old scotch. Not sure who obtained the ice, or how.......