Birthday Celebrations

So, after the Skirt Party on Saturday night, I ended up sleeping in most of the morning of my birthday.. After a drawn-out sunday brunch and some blogging and facebooking I summoned up the resolve to do something proper to celebrate my birthday in spite of the hangover!

Now, the question begs, what to do on your 25th birthday in Antarctica!?! Well, it just so happens that there's something worthy of the day! We decided on an ascent of Observation Hill- the 200m tall cone above McMurdo Station, and a dominant part of our skyline here at Scott Base. Instead of walking to the bottom of it, we decided to bike!!! We grabbed some bikes and started riding over the hill (on the gravel road to Mactown). Now, Glen bikes to work every day from Korokoro to Wellington and back, something like a 24km round trip or something. I bike every second fine Sunday, which in Wellington isn't that often!! So I was slogging up the hill on the bike, in the granny gear, hungover as anything behind Glen, wondering if this was really the best way that I could celebrate turning 25!!

Eventually we made it, after a quick descent and a bit more of a climb (to the site of a nuclear reactor that used to power McMurdo before it leaked!!!). Then the whole walking up hills thing started, which is more my cup of tea, except when hungover! We did get there in the end- carefully as its reasonably steep, and there's still a fair bit of snow/ice on it at this time of year.

But wow, getting to the top was worth it. Observation Hill was where Scott's men waited and watched for the polar party to return, but they never did. They erected the cross there in their memory. Pretty full on to finally make it there on an important day for me too. Definately a birthday I won't forget in a hurry!

After a return to base which took us about a fifth of the time, we were walking back to our room, and I was told to hurry up because they couldn't eat dessert until I cut my cake!!!
It was really nice of them to do it, as usually event personnel don't really get the privilege of having a cake baked for their birthdays- only the base staff. But I guess because we're here for so long at base, we kinda get treated a little differently. Anyway, I really appreciated it. There's quite a spate of birthdays here at the moment- 6 in 6 days! So birthday cake evey night!! haha.

Now, some photos from Ob Hill and my cake!



McMurdo Station below the cross on top of Ob Hill.



Me hanging out on the top of Ob Hill.





Birthday Cake!!!





Cutting the cake!

Dry Valleys extravaganza! Friday 21 November

Ok, so this is a bit of an epic post- lots of photos, so i'll try and keep the text down.

On Friday we went to the McMurdo Dry Valleys region to do some work. In the late 1980's, survey beacons were installed on trig marks throughout the region for survey work. In NZ we tend to use the sort of triangular black and white trig beacons that you've seen around on top of hills, and beside some roads. Down here they used two or three old oil drums stacked on top of each other bolted or welded together, guyed down and filled with rocks! These days the techniques for positioning down here such as GPS don't really need that sort of infrastructure, so we're taking them out. They're also a bit of an eyesore, and an environmental risk as sometimes they go 'missing' off the tops of the hills. This can be a problem in delicate places like the Dry Valleys, which is an Antarctic Specially Managed Area. And it's never good to have big drums rolling round the place.

So Glen and I were really lucky, as the seven of these beacons that are left are all in these Dry Valleys (which are the ones I would've got first, haha). We were planning on getting four on Friday in the Kukri Hills and the Asgard Range, and then on Monday picking up the remaining three from the Olympus range. The Kukri Hills are between the Ferrar Glacier and the Taylor Valley, the Asgard Range is between the Taylor and Wright Valleys, and the Olympus range is between the Wright and the McKelvey Valleys (for those playing along at home). We managed to get 6 of the sites done in one day, which is pretty good. The beacons came down a lot easier than we were expecting- only one of them was welded together, and there weren't many warratahs to bash out.

The scenes were absolutely spectacular- the english language doesn't have the superlatives for it really. To have seen so many photos of the place, and then to finally get there was just stunning. I've been getting similar emotions down here, but this one took the cake. I'd rate it as one of, if not the best day of my life so far. Epic.

I think that one of the most intense things I'm kinda struggling to get my head around is that all this stuff is in darkness for a large part of the year! I dunno, it just seems stranger than it being in light for the same length of time. I guess its because as humans we'd find it so much more difficult to function... Hmmm.. thats my deep thought for the day!

Anyway, onto the photos. I've got some panoramas from this trip as well, but I'll upload them seperately, and I'm still working on some of them. Also, the photos from the helo have some smudgy marks on them- its reflections and stuff off the windows. I didn't really want to open the door!



The eastern end of the Kukri Hills, looking north. We're flying over the Ferrar Glacier.


The first beacon we got to- and it'd been blown over!!


Looking towards the Upper Taylor I think..

Searching for the survey mark- the mark was called Glen, so we looked quite hard. Unfortunately we couldn't find it.

The Commonweath and Canada Glaciers in the lower Taylor Valley.

Getting ready to carry the drums to the helo.

Taking the drums down the hill. For the record, I was carrying all our heavy tools, so didn't get out of work!

A cool little rock feature, with the upper Taylor Valley in the background.

Our lunch break.

So each of the beacons had 2 drums, and we were able to fit 6 in the back of the helo, with three of us as well- just. There wasn't much room!

At the Marble Point refuelling facility. The NZ one's the one in the middle- HNO.

This one was welded together, so we had to chisel it off- hence the earphones.

Still chiselling.

Towards the upper Taylor Valley.

Lake Vanda!!! The NZ huts are at this end of the lake- you can't quite see them on this downsized image. It used to be quite the NZ outpost- a few people even used to winter over here!

The Upper Wright Glacier, with the Labyrinth to the left of it. Rob the helo pilot wasn't too impressed with my "Where's the Lower Left Glacier?" joke! haha...

The top end of the McKelvey Valley.

Our beacon. One of the Guys had snapped, so it was on a bit of a lean.

Looking down the McKelvey. Bull Pass comes off to the right.

It says something about a place when your helo pilot who's been flying down here for something like 18 years gets out his camera and starts taking photos!

Chris, one of the base staff, about to attack the beacon! I think we couldn't get to one of the nuts so chiselled it.

The Upper Wright again. This mesa landscape is stunning.

HNO with the barrels ready to be loaded..

The Wright Valley.

Soaking it all in.

More of the Upper Wright.

HNO again.

The insignificance of the man eh?

About ready to go..

The last beacon of the day. Apparently its a four hour walk up from Vanda if you're keen. And the McKelvey Valley is in the background.

The reasonably narrow ridge we landed on.

Attacking the beacon!

Glen inspecting the mark.

Trying to fit 6 drums in the back again..

Awesome.

I got to ride back in the front! Whoop!

I wasn't allowed to touch anything, cos I had the live controls in front of me too.. I reckon with my flight sim experience I'd be able to have a good go at it, haha.. Again, Rob wouldn't have been impressed.

Bull Pass.

Glaciers of the Lower Wright.

View in the rear-vision mirror thats below your feet!

Coming in to land at Scott Base after an amazing day in the field.

Some panoramas from the Darwin

Just another quick post with some more panoramas from the Darwin.


The Royal Society Range from the helicopter.


A cool glaciated headland. Again, from the helicopter.


From our first GPS point looking down towards the Byrd Glacier. This monster is about 18km wide! Thats ridiculous!


Overlooking the Darwin Mountains, and the Hatherton Glacier. Note the GPS in the foreground proves I am actually doing work here!

From pretty much the same spot at the previous one.