Day 6; January 28, 2009; Flight to SANAE Station, Vesleskaervet, Dronning Maud Land, Antarctica Average Daily Temperature: 19.4˚ F Average Daily Wind Speed: 26.17 mph Feels Like: -19.85˚ F Today, I do not have words. I must show you……read more »
Day 5; January 27, 2009; Cape Town, South Africa We continue to happily endure the seemingly never ending process of preparations, and spent the day getting extra tripod plates, DV tapes, a wind jammer for the microphone, s-rings, distilled water for our backup-power fuel cell, emergency blankets, signaling mirrors, a sound card for Ntsikelelo, and other random pieces of the equipment puzzle. Early in the day we stopped by Bobby De Beer’s warehouse where much of the ITASC’s mobile base was constructed, and met many of the people who built the three structures. At the end of the day, worn out from all the to and fro, Thomas dropped me…read more »
As I prepare for my first trip to Antarctica, now just weeks away, my mind is abound with visions of all the possible permutations of white. My imagination is confounded by the seemingly obvious fact that I cannot know this place in any capacity until I am fully there, feet planted solidly on the ground, eyes absorbing the view of vast ice deserts, breath taking in the cold air. The existence of Antarctica was first predicted by the ancient mathematician, astronomer and geographer, Ptolemy (1st century AD), who claimed that there must be a southern landmass to balance the North Pole. He named it terra incognita, “unknown land,” and amazingly…read more »
