Pressure ridges

I walked over to Scott Base to try and fight off the weight gain from the inactivity and over-eating. It was a quick 1.75 miles, so not much of a workout. While I was there, I got a better look at the pressure ridges that form as a result of the ice starting to break up. Here is one of the photos that I uploaded to my albums:
From Antarctica

I should have gone down there with the guys I was walking with, but I really had to hit the men's room. I'll have to make another trip out there soon. I'm probably going to do it when I do the Armitage Loop hike.

Happy Halloween!

It's already Halloween day here, and there's a big party that everyone is excited about. Halloween isn't really my thing, so I'm not all that worked up about it. I am going to peek in for a bit, though. People have been hard at work on their costumes, so it should be interesting. I am excited about the possible trip to Cape Evans and the ice caves tomorrow, but there is a good chance that it will get cancelled due to vehicle problems. I'm crossing my fingers...

Who wudda thunk it?

Ok, I still can't wrap my brain around this. This is in my dorm, and it gets used. An ice-maker in Antarctica? Really?

From Antarctica

Not crafty enough

I eat a bunch of meals with John, one of the utilities technicians. Anyways, he went to Delta training last night because he volunteered to lead some of the Cape Evans trips. I need to find my own way into some sort of vehicle training.

Oh, I had a service call to Helo Ops today. I was really excited to go to the helicopter hangar, but it was a bit of a letdown. It was cool, but all of the helicopters were out on runs when I showed up. Also, the hangar only keeps them warm and provides a place for repairs. I guess they are all in tip-top shape, so I wouldn't have seen anything anyways.

Wildlife

Yesterday, I walked around Observation Hill. I punked out and couldn't make it all the way up, and everyone else had to come back down. On the way down, we saw a seal out in the distance, so we made our way over to get some pictures. I only took a few:
From Antarctica

From Antarctica

From Antarctica

The rule of thumb is that, if the animal reacts to you, then you are too close. I don't have a fancy telephoto lens, so this is the best I could do.

Peekaboo!

There's a bridge in town called the troll bridge. Everyone referred to it as such, and I didn't know why. After a few days of passing over it, the weather was finally good enough to make me glimpse the reason. Here he is:
From Antarctica
From Antarctica
From Antarctica

For the boys!

I decided to walk around the station to take pictures of all of the vehicles for my nephews. This is what daily traffic looks like at Mac Town. I think my buddy, Carl, will get a kick out of this, too. I think he drove some of these around town.

This is Fleet Ops, where all of the big vehicles are kept:
From Antarctica

My office is upstairs in the food warehouse, so I get to squeeze my way around this bad boy every time I get into or out of my office. All vehicles are given a name, but I'm not sure who does the naming. Our friend here is Heckle, and I saw Jeckle running around the other day:
From Antarctica

I don't really need to worry about getting run over by these, but you see them flying around all the time:
From Antarctica

People on station call these pickles:
From Antarctica

This is a delta. It was parked between a bunch of other large vehicles, so I couldn't get a profile view of it. It carries about 20 people at a time:
From Antarctica

Of course, I had to take a picture of Ivan. You'll probably find pictures of him all over the Internet, but here he is again:
From Antarctica

I see these ATV's towing snowmobiles and skidoo's around town all the time. There is a light vehicle garage in town that services those, so these ATV's are used to get them to and from the icy places:
From Antarctica

This is not technically a vehicle, but these are hitched up and used to get cargo around:
From Antarctica

Your standard dump trucks and bull dozers. These don't really run through the middle of town, though:
From Antarctica

I don't know what is in this tank, so I'm not sure if this is a fuel tank or if it is for something else. Based on the color, I would guess it is fuel:
From Antarctica

A pisten-bully from the front and back:
From Antarctica
From Antarctica

Most trucks just have tires, but a few have tracks installed:
From Antarctica