My backpack smells awesome. This old soldier started cruising with me 14 years ago in June, when Drew and I set out for a summer in Europe, a decision that forever branded me and shaped my future outlook and motivations for a life I have been blessed to embrace. Scars and scratches cover my pack, some with stories, some casualties of a night forgotten making awesomely poor choices in the company of friends and fellow travelers. Putting Ziploc bags full of travel trinkets, clothes and carefully packaged toiletries (more on that to follow) in my backpack is a ritual I will never tire of, a symbol of freedom and irresponsibility that makes me feel like me.
After shenanigans in San Diego with some quality individuals, bags packed, morale in the clouds and a final embrace from the Southern California sun, we board the first of four flights in route to Antarctica.
Crossing the Pacific is always in experience in itself. It is a marvel how many people, for a myriad of reasons, find themselves in a position to do so on a random Monday in early October. People from all walks of life seem to find common ground packed into a flying torpedo, eating “food” that we probably feed to Gitmo detainees, and mouth breathing for 15 hours. Sleep for me has always been more of a full contact sport than a natural part of human life, and the gloves come off every time I cross the Pacific. I think my brain delights in the challenge of making my body allergic to sleeping on airplanes of duration exceeding 4 hours. Don’t get me wrong, with the exception of Thanksgiving in San Diego, which amounted to a week long bender with Cresto and Devin (no lightweights mind you) and the subsequent flight to Taiwan, I have enjoyed and embraced the quarrel. So, San Francisco to Sydney was to be the newest title match. Victory, brain.
Halfway through the 15 hour jaunt I think I was literally the only dumbass awake, staring bleary eyed at the Sky Mall catalogue trying to find the most expensive item in the magazine. Who buys this crap? Probable the guy next to me wearing one of those eye masks with built in retinal humidifiers, sound asleep since take off, fucking jerk. You know that overwhelming feeling of committing inappropriate acts during a sophisticated dinner party, farting proud and loud at church, or pushing an old lady into a swimming pool? Yet you chuckle at your indecent thoughts and go about your day, behaving as you should, wondering why we want to jump when we approach an edge. That’s how I feel when someone sleeps next to me on a plane for 10 hours, in an impossibly uncomfortable situation surrounded by strangers, in a chair designed specifically to piss you off. My mind races with possibilities: Oops I spilled my scalding coffee in your lap, sorry I farted so loud; how embarrassing! Elbow to the ribs, fake coughing. I behave. I do nod off, but the sky waitresses have radar to this nature and an uncanny knack for giving me the knee and or elbow bump with the little metal cart full of shitola as soon as I close my eyes. Jostled out of “sleep,” tongue plastered to my palate like wet Velcro the only sign of neglecting to close my yaw for the last 15 minutes as I had temporarily joined the mouth-breathers. However, I sit behaving, eyes increasingly loosing moisture like a puddle on a hot driveway, smiling at my situation; as bitter as I sound there is no place I’d rather be then uncomfortable on a plane going somewhere far away.
After transferring planes in Sydney, we board Air New Zealand for Christchurch. The Kiwis have a sense of humor that is part Aussie, part London gentleman. They seem to care about nothing and everything at the same time and are the most informal people on this green Earth. Check out this inflight safety video:
They used to have one with Richard Simmons, which was a real jewel; nothing says aircraft safety like bikini shorts and a big blonde Jew-fro sweating to the oldies.
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| The entire top is soaked in goo! |
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| The nerve! |
A backpack rounds the corner on the nifty luggage belt, a design unchallenged in the last 50 years of aviation; the crocodilian of modern luggage transport. Encased in a large plastic bag that used to be clear is the redesigned interior of the backpack that used to not be completely covered in what used to be my carefully packaged toiletries. In there ultimate wisdom the TSA decided to “inspect” my shampoo, lotions and other such potions by removing them from their Ziploc home and placing them atop my clothes, no doubt soon after hurtling them both through time and space off the fingertips of a linebacker baggage handler. Sitting neatly amongst the mess is a kick in the groin: A nearly perfect, unblemished piece of parchment reading, “Inspected by the TSA.” Thanks ass hats. I relieved a nearby garbage can of its empty plastic sack and re-packaged my goods, later to shower with them in an effort to rid said goods of 32 ounces of Head and Shoulders. Jenna’s bag faired better than mine; they chose to merely scatter her clothes around, leaving her toiletries intact.
So, after 10,000 miles of travel, $30 of New Zealand lamb and 5 beers it’s time to embrace the Sandman at the Pavilions Hotel in Christchurch.
The bastard language of military, a congress backed science foundation, and a defense contractor is spoken almost entirely in acronyms and cheesy catch phrases. So, before departing for The Ice, we need to clear CDC with appropriate ECW for either MCO or SPL aboard our MILCRAFT. No shit? In English: go to the clothes building, find your orange bad full of cold weather shit, and get on the right plane dummy.
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| All our ECW |
Carhart overalls, gloves and long underwear, knee-high socks and fleece pants, goggles, mittens and kittens; these are a few of my favorite things. Nothing beats Big Red, the obnoxiously huge and almost unbearable warm parka decorated with the National Science Foundation and United States Antarctic Program patches and, of course, your name. Pride swelling, I don my Big Red for the second time and pose for photo op. Gear checked and situated. Flight manifest shows I leave at 07:30 the following morning. More lamb, more beer, more sleep.
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| POW! |
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| Jenna is one happy passenger! |
Flying on a C-17 is an awesome experience. They’re huge, loud, amazing engineering achievements. We shuffle on, all grins, picking up our sack lunch along as we board. Rumbling down the runway the plane takes flight to the sound of cheers and high-fives. After about 4 hours we’re over continent and the Seattle based USAF flight crew, each wearing a small Seahawks patch (got a picture of course) lets us visit the cockpit for one of the most awe inspiring sights a traveler can hope for: the unspoiled beauty of Antarctica. The Trans-Antarctic mountains spine the lower third of the continent and sprawling masses of sea ice skirt the continental shelf like a bridal train, everywhere an impossibly white and blue symphony; the vastness and stark beauty of this place is nearly indescribable and something I wish all my loved ones could gaze upon.
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| Inside the cockpit of the C-17 |
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| Seahawks! America! |
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| Beautiful Antarctica |
Feet wiggling in boots, Antarctica under foot again, we are transported in Deltas to McMurdo from the sea ice runway.
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| Our C-17 at the Ice Runway |
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| A Delta, transport to and from the runway |
Antarctica is the size of America and Mexico, yet the largest human presence is just over a thousand individuals during the height of the Austral summer. For all our differences and conflicts that threaten to shatter our fragile society, somehow we were able to agree in the most agreeable way on how to manage this massive place at the bottom of our world. There are no wars, genocide, deforestation, pollution, or any other nasty that has become a human trademark across the globe. In a beautifully rare exception to our typical behavior, we set aside this place, exempting it from our chaotic obsession with destruction. Signing the Antarctic Treaty in 1959 (50 nations currently) we agreed this place would be the chapel for science only. We study life, the elements, the ancient earth, the atmosphere, the universe. Antarctica is a preserved blueprint of the origins of the planet, a continent twice the size of Australia with rivers, lakes and mountains, frozen along with their inhabitants of a warmer time eons ago, buried under miles of ice. 
