Happy holidays from the future

You know, since I'm almost a full day ahead of Seattle time while I'm down here.

Our flight out to WAIS has been rescheduled for Wednesday (the 28th). I think we're all getting pretty excited.

The 23rd was McMurdo's town Christmas party, held at the Vehicle Maintenance Facility. There were a ton of people there, and it was a lot of fun. I totally got my picture taken with Santa on a snowmobile. Last night (Christmas Eve) we had Christmas dinner, which was wonderful. I miss home, but Christmas in Mactown has been pretty fun.

I hope everyone enjoys their time off of school (or work) and gets to have a relaxing (and safe) holiday. I might upload some more photos, but my next update (knock on wood) won't be until we get to WAIS, so until then!

Photos!

I discovered that Picasa has this neat web uploading feature and made an online photo album.

You can see it here: http://picasaweb.google.com/vrpalmer

Preparations for the field

First off, my apologies for not updating sooner. We've been really busy up until recently here at McMurdo Station, getting supplies together and testing out the radar equipment. Plus, I've been studying for finals. I finished my physics final today (I took it here and Kenny emailed it to my professor), and we're tentatively scheduled to fly to the Went Antarctica Ice Sheet Divide Camp on Monday morning. We'll leave for the deep field (just the five of us) as soon as we can after that.

A quick recap: HC and I went to "Happy Camper School," which is an overnight trip where new Antarcticans go to learn basic survival techniques for out in the field. We made snow walls, pitched the big yellow Antarctic tents (they're called Scott tents), and learned how to use a high-frequency radio. Some Happy Campers before us had made quinzhees, which are hollowed-out snow mounds, and I got to sleep in one. It was surprisingly warm.

Kenny and Donovan safely made it down here five days after we did, and we've just been getting our gear together since then. Everything's almost ready to go, but there are still some last-minute checks to be made on the radar equipment.

Yesterday, Donovan, HC, and I got an amazing opportunity to see some of the sights of Ross Island (where McMurdo is located). We went out with a group of scientists to see the winter-over huts of the great Antarctic explorers Shackleton and Scott, which are still really well preserved even after almost 100 years. They stay in such great condition because the temperature here rarely gets above freezing -- everything seems as if it were left there just recently. On the way, we saw seals, Adélie penguins, and (my pick as a highlight) an emperor penguin! It was by far the most exciting day of my trip so far.

With that, I had better get back to studying for my glaciology exam tomorrow. I'll post some photos of what we've been up to and of all the cool things we saw yesterday on our field trip.