A sad day

Some of you may already know that our return from Palmer Station has been a
roller coaster of emotion. One of our crewmates went missing on 17
April. The ship's crew did a thorough search of the ship, to no
avail. After figuring out the last time someone saw him, we came about and
started a search grid in his last known location: 57 53' South, 64 03'
West. We searched for two days, each taking shifts on the bridge to try to
locate him in the water. We received assistance from an Argentine plane
each of those two days, but no other vessels were in the vicinity. But the
Drake Passage won again, as weather turned rough, we searched for the
second day in 40 knot winds and sea swells of 20 feet. He was not found.

Tonight, as they officially called off the search, we all put something to
remember him by in a bottle, and threw it in, to meet up with him in a
better place. While I only knew him on this cruise, many people called him
an old friend. A son. A helping hand. A killer player at Settlers of
Katan. His name was Joshua Spillane, and he will be missed.

Great Day for Boating

Today I had the chance to go boating around Palmer Station with the winter-over station manager, a grantee, an NSF representative, and another fellow RPSC employee. It was a wonderful day to be on the water. We took a zodiac out to Torgersen Island, then to Norsel Point, which isn't a point anymore since the glacier has calved off enough to disconnect it from the main part of Anvers Island. We also motored around Loudwater Cove, and went to Humble Island. I saw lots of the local wildlife, including gentoo and adelie penguins, elephant seals, giant petrels and giant petrel chicks, cormorants, sheathbills... it was just beautiful. The weather was perfect, with little to no wind, and sun shining the whole day. I'll be doing work tonight, but it was well worth the trip.
We only have tomorrow left on station, so we'll finish up our work sometime tomorrow. All the ship people are invited to eat dinner at Palmer tomorrow, as a sort-of farewell. A lot of folks are coming out of Palmer on this northbound crossing and leaving the winter-over crew in place. They seem ready to get on with it, but as the current station manager said today, the good-byes never get easy.

Neumayer Channel

We're visiting a Canadian ship (the Sedna IV) that is wintering in near the
Neumayer Channel, just on the other side of Anvers Island, where Palmer
Station is. We're transferring cargo to them. They were very happy to see
freshies (produce), and those of us on this ship were happy to finally see
some wonderful scenery. We'll finish offloading cargo to the Sedna IV and
then be on our way to Palmer Station. We should arrive mid-afternoon
today, get a briefing from the station manager, and then get to work. It's
a beautiful day without many clouds, so we'll see if there's more
adventuring to do this afternoon before sunset. I'll be working hard the
next two days on work stuff, of course, since we only have 2 days at Palmer
to get everything done.

Everyone pray for another smooth crossing on the northbound!

The Drake Lake

We are having an unseasonably smooth crossing of the Drake Passage. When
this happens, which isn't often, people refer to the Drake as Drake Lake,
because you just can't beat a smooth crossing. Unfortunately, it also
usually means that the way back will probably be rougher. We've still got
a good deal of sunlight during the day, and so if the clouds cooperate, we
can get some good sunrises and sunsets. Pictures of some of this on
flickr: www.flickr.com/photos/squeedunk.

We'll be crossing 60 degrees south sometime in the early morning, and we'll
hit some good scenery sometime tomorrow. 60 south is the boundary of the
Antarctic Treaty, which is important. We won't be crossing the Antarctic
Circle on this trip, as Palmer Station is located just north of the Circle.

The next few days will be exciting, getting ready for our validation at
Palmer Station and finally seeing the station. I've been looking forward
to this since 1999, when I had to look at it from the deck of the NBP and
couldn't get onto shore.

Stay tuned!

The Tip of Cape Horn

We're just passing the tip of Cape Horn, and it's starting to get a little
rocky on the ship. Some people have disappeared into their rooms, and many
started wearing seasick patches this morning. I'm still fine, although I
did take a second meclazine this morning. Today was gorgeous--sunny and
smooth waters off the coast of Argentina. Here begins the Drake Passage,
and we still hope for a smooth crossing, as I think one of the mates said
we were coming in behind a low pressure system. I cannot imagine crossing
these waters in a boat made of wood, or one of only 100 feet or less, like
Shackleton and Scott.

We have a map display which shows us exactly where we are, and I love
looking at it. We are denoted by a bulls-eye symbol that moves ever so
slowly toward the empty blue at the bottom of the screen.

Having had a late afternoon nap, it's time for dinner. We'll hit our first
science station after dinner, but my first shift isn't until 6:00 tomorrow
morning.

It's sort of nice to be in media blackout--no internet, no phone, no
CNN.com. Just our work, the science, and whatever else we want to do (for
me, that's writing poems). Josh, one of the MTs, said he'd heard about my
poem painted on the side of the Seismic van just this last portcall. They
painted over it a long time ago, but I loved knowing that one of my poems,
a sonnet, had ridden around the Antarctic for a while before being covered
up. I made a small mark that way.

The Straits of Magellan

We left on time today, and are making our way through the Straits of
Magellan. We're in protected waters until around 11:00 tonight, which is
when the ship will start to roll a bit. The weather reports weren't too
specific, but we might miss a weather system, which we'd all be very happy
to miss. I took some pictures as we left, and will have them up to flickr
as soon as I can. I will definitely be trying the "sailor's
cocktail"--sudafed and meclazine for seasickness. Better to take it and
not need it for the first exposure to open water than regret it much
later. I'm about 90% sure I won't need any more drugs than a first dose,
but I'd rather be ahead than trying to catch up.

It was hard waving to Marc as we pulled away. I've done this now
twice--left port on a boat while he stayed behind on solid ground. Ironic
that most of the time I'm the one waving him off at the airport. We've
been through so much in the past year, and while I'm only gone for another
16 days, that's 16 days without anyone from my family. And even if some of
the boat feels like family, it's not the same.

Hopefully I'll be able to send more posts from the Drake Passage, roughest
seas in the world. Hopefully, I'll get out my notebook and start writing
some poems tonight.

Underway at 1400 Tomorrow

Tomorrow, we'll be leaving the pier at 1400 hours. I'm excited, but also a little anxious. I've never ridden the Gould, and am worried I'll get seasick, even though I've never experienced seasickness in my life. I also know a lot of work and a very little amount of time are ahead of us at Palmer Station. I also work with a great engineer, who can do more than I ever imagined.

I haven't had a chance to do any of the little projects I planned on yet--I've either been working, or been having fun with Marc. I'm glad he's going home next week to be with our little girl, who's getting bigger by the second--she already looks different than when I left less than a week ago. Grammy has put pictures up on flickr here.

More from the Straits of Magellan tomorrow.

Office Space

Larry, my coworker, is great at giving movie lines and making me guess the movie it's from. Unfortunately, I'm just plain awful at guessing the movies, mostly because I haven't seen a lot of them. I used to play this game with my best friend in high school. We were movie buffs, and never saw even a moderately interesting movie just once. I saw Back to the Future in the theater 7 times. I saw The Goonies on video enough to have the entire thing memorized so that I could recite it without it playing in the background. We both could do Aliens.

During this back and forth between security documents, Larry discovers that I have not seen Office Space. Apparently, this is a travesty of justice. He has told me that we will be watching it in the next 24-48 hours, or else he just can't work with me anymore.

Los Ganaderos

On Wednesday night, we went to Los Ganaderos, an Argentinian Barbeque restaurant. It was wonderful--Larry, Kathleen, and Marc all had lamb, which is a specialty. It's also all-you-can-eat. They loved it. I had chicken, which wasn't bad, but isn't a specialty. I asked the waiter if I could take a picture of the lambs on the spits, and he let me into the fire room to take the picture, something that would never happen in the US--people crazy over liability and such. The picture's up on my flickr account. I got to practice more of my Spanish with the waiter and with the cab driver.

I realized that I'm writing mostly about food here. I think we all think about it because while the food on the boats is ok, it's not amazing, and we look forward to having good food when we're back in port. Of course, I haven't even left yet, but I feel like I have in the past with my boat travel.

Rain Like Seattle Never Saw

Today the NBP got in to port. It's great to see both ships tied up to each side of the pier. There were a lot of people I haven't seen in a long time coming through. There's a lot of work going on--onload, offload, preparation for the next cruise--I miss being in the thick of it. I'm here this time for a specific purpose, and it's hard not to be so involved with everything else. But there's plenty to do with our validation, so I'm not without things to do. Larry (my co-worker) is teaching me a lot about Linux while we're validating the systems on the vessels.

The weather's been atrocious, but typical for this time of year down here. Torrential downpours and very strong winds make for a very wet walk from the apartment down to the pier... my feet have been wet all day long. I can even say I never had it this bad when I lived in Seattle.

The next two days will be very busy, as we only have 2 days on board the NBP before we set sail on the Gould. It just hit me today that while I miss Claire very much, I have Marc here, and after Saturday, I will be without the comfort of family for 12 days... I forgot about that part. As soon as I see the first icebergs, I know there will be a leap of familiarity, though.

Sopa de Ajo

Last night, we went to dinner at Remazon, a very cute and small restaurant near the pier. The chef came out to list off the appetizers and entrees, and to describe them. There were only about 5 of each to choose from, and they were all delicious-sounding. While we all joked about it, no one tried the beaver, although it is supposedly very good. I had a beef fillet with king crab for my entre. Others had lamb and congril. We all had sopa de ajo, or garlic soup. I wasn't sure it would be good, but man, it was fantastic.

All in all, a good night's rest wears off the airplane scum that seems to stick to you even after a shower. The Gould got in early this morning, so it's a busy time to get the ship offloaded and then onloaded. My work is going well so far, too. We're getting our bearings so that when the NBP gets in to port, we can really plow through our verifications of the information systems.

I have written one more sonnet in the crown of sonnets I'm working on, but can't find the last line. The problem is that I can't start the next one without it.

The weather is cold, and very windy, but the sun is shining after a brief rainstorm this morning. I'm feeling at home here, but also out of place, as I don't know most of the people here anymore. I'm sure that will change in a couple of days.

Arrived--Sur America

After 24 hours of airports, lines, and airplane food, and approximately 10,000 miles, we've arrived in Punta Arenas, Chile. The weather is very much like Seattle's winter right now. While the flights weren't bad, being in airports for an entire day takes its toll... so it's a shower, a walk to the pier, and then dinner. One of the vessels arrives tomorrow morning, so we'll hit the ground running!