Last night, I got to go on the most exciting recreation trip, out on the sea ice to see Cape Evans and a huge iceburg. These are the vehicles (called deltas) that we took out there.
It was so great to get out on the ice and away from town for a bit, and really experience the environment and take in the beauty of it all. This picture is taken at about 9 at night by the way, to give you an idea of the sun's height in the sky. There are no more sunsets now.
We went to go see Cape Evans, where Scott stayed before going to the pole. It looks like he left 20 minutes ago, and is coming back any second. Everything is still where it was left, and it is so cool to look around inside. Its really creepy and bizarre actually, like you are going back in time. Its astounding to think that people lived in this hut for a year and a half. Here is a picture of a penguin they had killed and had on the table, and a British newspaper from 1908 that they were reading.
It was such a cool place to go and see. You could walk around the land around it, but I was so absorbed with the hut that I stayed in it the whole time. But, here is what it looks like from the outside. At the top of the hill on the right is a cross, and a dog skeleton tied to it. The story goes that the survivors in the hut saw their ship coming for them from the hill, shot their dog and ran for it, leaving everything inside as if they were coming back moments later.
Cape Evans was simply amazing to see, but my favorite part of the trip was seeing this huge iceburg that was on the way out there. We drove over the ice to get to Cape Evans, and there was this giant iceburg kind of in the way. We got to walk around it and just explore which was awesome. I now want to learn how to climb glaciers, or some such thing.
They gave us ski poles to poke around so that we wouldn't fall down any cracks or crevasses (although I still fell in a small one). The iceburg is moving, very slowly of course, but there are still lots of cracks and fissures in the ice around it. We got to touch it, and investigate the cracks and crevasses in the burg itself, which was absolutely incredible.
It was so, so much fun, and so amazing to see. To give you an idea of the size of it, it took about 40 minutes to walk around, and here is a picture of us walking next to it.
My picture doesn't even reach the top of it!
This was one of those unforgettable, beautiful, epic Antarctic days. Life is simply amazing here.
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