At Pole

So here we are, sitting in an empty cargo plane, packed like sardines, waiting to step out onto the bottom of the earth. I pretty much bundle up in everything I possibly can and unfortunately, did not have my balaclava on me, it had been in my checked bag which I never unchecked in Mcmurdo. So I step out and am immediately greeted by some friendly faces from work and they walk me about 50 yards to the new station. I step inside and there is a lady handing out room assignments. She takes one look at me and says, do this (as she holds her palm on her nose and rubs it back and forth). I put my palm on my nose and say why? She says, your nose has turned white. So I'm at the pole for no less than five minutes and I have already gotten frost nip on the nose. Kind of painful when it warms up, but as I understand it, not nearly as bad as frost bite can be. I really need to find that balaclava.



Fortunately, I arrived at South Pole just in time for lunch, which was really pretty good. It turns out that due to shipping costs, a meal at the South Pole is probably the most expensive meal a person will ever eat. What you don't eat, food scraps, etc, gets shipped all the way back to the states for disposal. Needless to say, you take what you can eat and eat what you take. After lunch. Another orientation. However, this time the atmosphere is remarkably different. In short, the pace here is slower and much more congenial. There are a lot less people at the South Pole, which makes for a much cozier environment compared to the feel of McMurdo, which some describe as a cross between a mining town and a fraternity house. Kind of the Deadwood of the Antarctic. After the orientation, I went on a little sightseeing trip of the station and was fortunate to visit the old station under the dome before it gets dismantled later this year. I am staying in the new station, in a berthing just outside of the dining facility (they don't call it a galley anymore). The new station is remarkably clean, efficient, comfortable, warm, sterile. After nearly 30 years, the old station had grown quite a bit of character. It will be a long time, if ever, before the new station will get that "Lived in" feeling. I'm actually very lucky as most transitional people (such as myself since I'm only here for three weeks) stay out in what is called Summer Camp. You betcha, summer camp is, well, a camp with tents and everything. Okay, the tents are heated but not very efficiently and you have to go outside to use the facilities. If you live in summer camp and you have to pee at 3AM, you must don all your ECW gear or freeze, walk out into mid day sun (The sun doesn't actually go down in the summer) and then crawl back into bed to get warm again while listening to the 24/7 shifts of snow bulldozers making snow birms outside your tent. Large coffee cans are a hot commodity for a commode, no stench as they freeze as soon as you set them on the floor. Needless to say, not much sleep going on in summer camp. Anyway, I was able to get some "Hero Shots" outside the old dome, at the ceremonial South Pole and at the geographic south pole. Now it is time for me to get back to work and focus on the reasons why I'm down here.