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Tuesday, April 10, 2018

Back across the Drake


On the way back north we took a detour south about 40 nm to drip off some Ukrainian sciencyosts at Vernasky station. And then took the Gould through the lens Marie channel. It too bad it was snowing really hard but it was still amazing to see what we did see. These are the mountains I have been looking at out my window for 6 months. Too bad we didn't see the big ones. 
 The snow stopped once we reached the Drake and it was a nice easy lake of a crossing
 we were visited by a Wilson storm petrel, which I've never seen not on the wing. Poor guy must have been really tired.
 I had an eastern facing cabin with a porthole in my bunk so I watched the sunrise every morning.
It was a great end to a good season, fingers crossed I'll be back next year, until then I'm out adventuring. Bye, bye!

Saturday, April 7, 2018

Cache barrels

Every year the cache barrels get swapped out. The emergency food inside them gets changed and clothing and tents get looked at and or replaced. I was able to help on a few of these swap out adventures.

Saturday, March 17, 2018

Another beautiful Antarctic sunset

We have a new iceberg in the front yard and it was beautifully lit by the amazing sunset we had a few nights ago.
The amazing light gave the glacier an unreal glow.
 And the mountains across the Bismark Strait were amazing.
 The Gould was in town for that last north bound voyage before I leave.
 A bunch of people in the crows nest over looking the harbor.
What a nice night!

Thursday, March 15, 2018

NPR Talk

A scientist who was down here for the summer had an interview on NRP today, here is the link: https://www.npr.org/2018/03/15/593812865/botanist-studies-climates-effects-on-adelie-penguins


Monday, March 12, 2018

The Gosslers

 The Gossler's are a set of island is the north west of station, about nine miles or so. The Palmer is looking into putting up another weather station there so we have another reference point to the north if scientists want to go boating up around the corner of Anvers island where there are more penguins.
 The communications technician and I went out a couple times to do some reconnaissance on which islands would make the best weather station locations.
 THis ones a bit too high for a weather station.
 This one has too many seals and is protected from the wind on many sides by the surrounding islands.
 The big one is pretty cool.

 I really like the crack in this rock.
 A really big berg was off in the distance.

 A balanced rock!



It was a good reconnaissance trip on a beautiful day!

 The second trip out we brought a zodiac out as well and made a landing on an island to check it for a good location for a tower.
 This island was a bit more rugged than it appeared from the water.
 And have a lot of thick moss beds.



 Giant petrel chick! Which means even if there was a nice path up to the top (there wasn't), and with the chick and the moss this island isn't the greatest option for a tower site just due to environmental impact.
 These moss fingers were almost an inch long.
 There was a weddell seal hanging out with a bunch of fur seals on the  rocky beach.
Lots of moss. It was a fun trip, even though we didn't find a place for a tower.

Wednesday, March 7, 2018

Time Magazine Online

My photo of the eclipse made it into a TIME Magazine online article about the eclipse in Antartica, how exciting! Here is the link: http://time.com/5188349/partial-solar-eclipse-antarctica/

Thursday, February 15, 2018

Up a tower

 I have been working on clearing a tower of an old decommissioned weather station. With the nice weather today I finally finished the project up and took my camera up for the view.


 What a beautiful day!
Home sweet station!

Giant Petrel Chicks

I was able to go out with the birders to Humble island to help/watch them with their rounds. This time I got to see the giant petrel chicks, I think they are my favorite of the birds around Palmer.

There were a bunch of elephant seals hanging out on the beach in a big pile.

 These giant petrel chicks are not quite the size of small turkeys yet but they are getting there.



 Once a giant petrel couple is able to lay and hatch an egg they have a near 100% success rate of fledgling their chick.

 They are so dinosaur like. 
And fluffy!

Eclipse

 It has been cloudy and rainy for weeks and is finally cleared up just in time for the eclipse!

 I made a pin hole box to see the eclipse through.

We also had welding glass to look through, this is just after the max.