Ice-aween

10-29.

Today the town was all abuzz b/c it is Saturday (our Friday) and the day of the epic halloween party. I had the 5:15 Ice runway shuttle this morning and got to witness some amazing phantasmagorias out towards the mountains. The illusion was so strong that it made the sea ice sheet look like it was jutting straight up just like a cliff. So it looked like I was driving towards a giant ice cliff. It also made the tails of the planes look like they were 100 feet tall. Pretty cool.

On the shuttle today, after greeting some people, they told me they thought I was the nicest shuttle driver b/c I said hello and goodbye to everyone on the shuttle and waived to all passing vehicles. That was a nice compliment to get.

And today, Shuttle Bill (he's the guy that is like 70 and has been here for many, many seasons and is sort of 2nd in command at shuttles, though kind of runs it still b/c he has all the experience and clout) asked me to come out and take a polaski and shovel to this huge ice and snow drift to dig some things out. I can tell he really likes me, which is good b/c he is the guy with all the connections here. But today he told me that Pete Cruzer (the guy right below the head head guy of ATO) likes me and my work ethic and wants me to work a higher up job in Cargo next year. That was pretty cool to hear. Shuttle Bill has a lot of nicknames for me for some reason. He calls me Junior (I think b/c maybe I'm the youngest shuttle driver other than Shuttle Queen (Kirsty Queen, but she was here last year). He also calls me Mr. Hormone which makes everyone laugh. He says it's b/c all the girls follow me around, which I would say is pretty far from the truth. But it's funny anyways.

Got packages from mom and the bighorn this week which was nice!

The Halloween party was quite awesome. Perhaps the best group party I have ever been to. Everyone dressed up and got really into it and everyone was very creative. They played good music and the whole crowd was dancing. I had originally brought a cape and a mask for the party, but I soon realized that it wasn't creative enough compared to what most people did. So I ended up going with the theme "a waste of time" by going as facebook. I wore cut eye slits on a blue book to use as a mask and wore a blue shirt in which I wrote a few things mocking facebook like "poke me" "like me" and had a photo of a pretty mountain scene with the caption "me somewhere you aren't" and of course a status update making fun of all those people constantly posting statuses where they are just trying to show people how cool they are.

It was funny, I was thinking over the last few Halloweens that I have had, and they've all been pretty unique. Last year's Halloween I was at gorgeous Gokyo lake and hiked to the peak of Gokyo Ri after having been at the Everest Base camp a few days before. I was rooming with Moshi and hanging out with the Norwegian PumoRi climbing team. One of the norwegian guy gave us all tasty european chocolate (a huge treat up there) for Halloween. Two years ago I was in Thailand on a tiny island during the offseason, so it was just me and a few people on the island. I was camping but walked across the island to another place where there were 3 or 4 europeans, a brazilian, and an american that we had a little party. And 3 years ago the Hous of Sin (Kendracyte, Morganic, Pickles, and myself)through a pretty epic halloween party.

Before the party really got going, we did Antarctica's version of Occupy Wallstreet. Our occupy the Ice was organized by my boss sharona. Of course we weren't allowed to wear anything gov't issued so we were just wearing a costumes and not our big red parkas so the occupying didn't last long as we were freezing.

10-30 I woke up early to go to Church and then I met up with Ginny (the shuttles lady from EP) and her friend Anne Dal Vera to do the castle rock ski trip. Shuttle Bill when he took us to the trailhead said, "Jr. you better have your A game on to go with these ladies". Turns out Anne was on the team of the first ladies to ski to the south pole. Ginny was invited but decided not to go.

See the links before to read a little bit more on Anne's trip. She also apparently wrote a book about it.

http://cuantarctica.blogspot.com/2009/11/spotlight-anne-dal-vera.html

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2000/11/1115_antarctica.html

Anne also has EP connections in that she lived there in the 70's and ran a company that taught and toured telemark skiers in Rocky. She's now a telemark instructor and lives in Durango when she's not here. She asked where I had cross country skied and when I told her RMNP, she said I'd do ok and be able to keep up with her and Ginny b/c RMNP is a lot like antarctica: windy, steep, at times icy, at times powder, steep dropp offs, and narrow ledges. Afterwords a lot of people told me they were impressed I skied with her. Bill said "it's not everyone that gets to ski with Anne Dal Vera" Apparently she's kind of a legend down here.

The Ski was fun. We were the only ones on the trail mainly b/c there was a lot of hungover people from the halloween party, but also bc it was very cold. The trail rised high up onto a ridge and plateau and the wind just blasts you. You had to have every single piece of skin covered, including your face or you would get frostbite on it. It wasn't bad once you were covered, but just if you had something exposed. And it was so cold that I had icicles of condensation dripping from my baclava mask and the inside of my glasses would often freeze with condensation. Once we got to the back side of the ridge it wasn't too windy and you could take off some of your face protection. It's a pretty big climb up and so then a good ski descent down. At one point the trail goes through the kiwi ski hill. Everywhere else you have to follow closely to the marked and flagged trail to avoid crevasses, but on the ski hill you can go wherever. One point right before the kiwi ski hill where it was pretty steep (the equivalent of a steeper blue run), narrow b/c of potential crevass danger, and incredibly icy, my ski (I was on cross-country skis without metal edges compared to Ginny and Anne's telemark skis), one got away from me. Because it was so steep and icy it slid away quickly. I could see where it landed, but of course b/c of crevasse danger I couldn't go after it. I was worried it was going to be a big issue and that I would have to pay for it or something, but it ended up being a positive thing for me b/c of course Raytheon and the NSF are huge on safety and always always drilling it into you. So I actually got an "atta boy" award from my boss when she found out and Ginny wrote a letter to some big wigs (see bottom of blog) about my safe methods. I think I impressed the ladies quite a lot though when I was able to ski the last 4 miles on one ski. We finished up at Scott Base (the NZ one) where we saw a seal pup and they did some shopping and then we hiked the hill back into mcmurdo.

I had a lot of fun with those ladies. They are quite impressive what they can still do and that they do it on their own without having some guy have to take them out. I hope that if I were ever to get married, I would have a girl like one of them while in their 60's that love to be outside, don't mind the cold and tough conditions, and are in great shape. I think I impressed them enough to be able to go again with them which is cool

10-31 Happy Halloween! I had the 5:45am airport shuttle and it was a nasty blizzard today. At some points it was 2 flag visibility while on the sea ice. They space flags about 20 feet apart so you know where to drive and don't just drive off into icy nothingness. Even with the flags you get quite the disoriented feeling when driving through it. I also had courier today which is where you walk around the base for 2 hours while you deliver packages and documents to different buildings. It was -30F windchill today and my face still burns a little bit from windburn and the cold b/c I didn't have my mask with me for work today. We've now switched to our 12 hour days, but the work isn't too hard and it's not monotonous, so it's ok.

The letter from Ginny:

Sunday, 30 October, 3 of us were skiing the Castle Rock Loop and enjoying the recreational experience. While descending the steeper trail section from Castle Rock going towards Scott Base, Travis Guy's gear issue ski came off and sailed OFF the flagged route. Anne Dal Vera yelled instructions for Travis to remain on the trail (which is what he was doing anyway but Anne wanted to reinforce his position). Down the steep and unflagged slope went the ski and where it remains.

This was Travis's first major ski in Antarctica and he held fast to the trail while watching the ski sail off.

Travis carried his lone ski down the steep hill and skied the flats on one ski out to Scott Base with us.

And the day remained an enjoyable recreational experience for all of us!

I thought you should know that the Outdoor Safety Lecture is a valuable training session.....especially emphasizing that no ski is worth risking a life to retrieve.

Ginny Deal (the third skier)
Shuttles, x2264