One of the cooler features near station is a series of pressure ridges in the sea ice. These form where thin-ish ice is being pushed up against other ice that isn't moving and results in big crazy chunks of blue ice poking up out of the otherwise flat surroundings. The ice here also gets pushed up into wavy features that look like large ocean rollers, as if a huge ship just passed and the ice is rippling over the water. It's gorgeous and is a seasonal feature that will be gone soon. So, I jumped at the chance to go on a pressure ridge tour one night after work. Kinda like being a tourist in my own back yard...
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| Pressure ridge and Erebus in the background |
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| Melt water ponds on top of the ice |
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| Weddell seal |
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| The "tour group" with Erebus in the background |
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| That's me..... |
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| The "bathtub" used by the first Kiwi's at Scott Base |
The tour starts and ends at Scott Base (the New Zealand base, which is about 2.5 miles from McMurdo). Luckily, I had some long-time Antarctica folk on my tour, who took us into the first hut that brought to Scott Base and was used by Edmond Hillary. Pretty cool stuff.
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| Recipes in the original Scott Base building |
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| Hell and gone from everything |
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