212 (Largest helo, can hold 8) picked us up on time, dropped off Ziggy, Ryan, and Pat first on kookery hills, but only after first 3 of 5 points struck out. Either too snowy, or cloudy. The rest of us – Paul, Michelle and I were dropped off on Commonwealth Glacier, and weather was beautiful. Cloudy, but no wind and within a few degrees of 32 all day, except for the last of 5 points, which was about 20 and windy. Breathtaking views. 1 of our 5 points didn’t take, but felt we made good progress for the first time today. Michelle took some video, but it’s on tape, and we can’t get it off until we get back.
Supper was beef stew with tomatoes and corn and red wine. Bagels instead of bread. We ran the extension cord from the generator to the Arctic Oven (Kitchen Tent) so Michelle could enter data, and I got a few radios charged for tomorrow.
We are having 2 DV’s (Distinguished Visitors). One is an artist, one is the Prince of Monaco. They just signed the Antarctic Treaty, so he is going around checking out the science. Hopefully he and/or Paul and/or Pat can get on Minnesota Public Radio. Pat has been phoning in 1 or 2 "audio postcards" every day. The hope to produce a piece about us and get it on the air after the innaguration.
Ryan is a really good roomie, not demanding, flexible, and quite funny.
Physically, I hel up just fine today, but we were in FDX boots and Big Red, and hiking only a few hundred meters at a time. Going from where the helo dropped us to the first obvious feature we could find.
Tomorrow we are scheduled for more leapfrogging, but will try to adjust to 2 teams of 2 instead of 2 teams of three, we’ll see how I do.
I have to sleep with the visor Quantas gave us because the sun is so bright, only way to fake out that it’s dark/night. Me feet and body stay warm with just long underwear, the only thing that’s cold when I wake up in the night is my nose&face. We sleep with hats one.
Just one of many views from the helo today:
They drop us off on a mountain peak near a feature we need to locate:
Then, he takes off to go shuttle the other half of our group to their next point while we collect data for 20-30 min. We're pretty sure he'll be back......
Here's me:
While flying around we have views like this, snow-capped peaks looking out onto the Ross Ice Shelf:
Here we are collecting data at our second location. You can tell it's warmer here, we've taken off our "Big Red" parkas:
Sometimes, we have to hike a bit to find the feature we're looking for at a location:
But just don't look down:
Got it. Our goal is always to get done collecting data before the helo shows up again. helo time is very expensive. No other project in the history of the NSF has asked for as much time as we have for our 2 weeks. We don't want them waiting and charging us.
The view from our third location of the day, Mt. Newell:
Michelle sitting by the receiver, our antennae is on the rocks behind her:
Here I am with my afternoon tea:
Because Mt. Newell is so tall (7,000 ft. ?) it has the radio repeater station I mentioned. With wind generator and solar panels, and a little hut in case the guys doing maintainance on stuff get stranded for a few days because of weather:
A bit more distant view:
And, look what I found:
And, of course, Paul has to call someone to tell them where he is:
While waiting for the helo, it can get chilly:
On to our next point. Just your typical view out the window:
Michelle and Paul at our next Mountain Peak of the day....
Looking the other way:
So, hopefully today's entry gives you a feel for what I'll be doing this Jan.........
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