McMurdo, Antarctica Travel Blogs

Around Town
Oct 2, 2007 (17 photos)

... Chapel of the Snows. The Chapel of the Snows is the only known house of worship on the continent of Antarctica and is the southernmost house of worship in the world. The Erebus Chalice, a commemorative chalice for the 75th anniversary of Captain ...

Answering some Questions
Jan 17, 2008

Up to this point in my emails with friends and family back home I had not really written to much about my trip. I was mainly just sending photos back home.. So this was really my first blog. The job is really cool I am enjoying it very much....Its ...

All settled in for another Antarctic winter
Mar 6, 2005 (6 photos)

... Our flight from Christchurch left and arrived on schedule-so unfortunately, no extra days in New Zealand for us. When we arrived at McMurdo, both of us commented on how this now feels like our home. I guess because we didn't have our own place during our ...

Happy New Year!
Jan 2, 2008 (13 photos)

... to be somewhere amazing to celebrate New Year's and this year was just that! A few days before New Year's we went to Antarctica's best concert - IceStock! There were 12 bands that played for 8 hours...in the snow! It wouldn't have been IceStock if it ...

Bowling in Antarctica
Jul 9, 2004 (4 photos)

It's sort of funny that I've been here for over 9 months and haven't set foot in the bowling alley. Last night I got my chance when I was asked to be a fill in on Ron's team. The two-lane bowling alley was built in 1960 and was probably high tech then, ...

Back at McMurdo, home-sweet-home-away-from-home
Dec 11, 2007 (5 photos)

... up pins. It's monotonous and physically tiring, but we make good tips-and it's cool too...now we can put "Pinsetter in Antarctica" on our resumes, haha. The weather is finally warming up and seems to be around 25 degrees or so most days. There is ...

McMurdo Station
Jan 14, 2008 (10 photos)

Day 6 and 2nd day on the ice. I finally got my computer to clear to run on the Mcmurdo Internet...Needed a anti virus software program. Anyway What I am doing at this point is writing blogs on my free time in my room then just copy and pasting them ...

A day in the life (At work)
Nov 20, 2007 (5 photos)

... might seem like it could get repeditive and mundane, and it would if I was anywhere else in the world. But the reality is, I'm in Antarctica.  All I have to do is look around and my mind is blown, if I can even truely fathom it.  Half of the time ...

Settling in quite nicely
Oct 23, 2007 (25 photos)

... 2.  It was blowing like mad, and it actually snowed a little bit.  Which is a rare occurance really, being Antarctica is actually a desert.  It's the highest, dryest, coldest and windiest continent on Earth.  It was so cool.  The ...

Black Ops Party
Jun 28, 2004 (3 photos)

Black Ops Party Lots of black lights, 35 tv's, high lighter marker tattoos, glow sticks, lasers, alien-like costumes, and dancing......that about describes it. The amount of effort that was put into this party was impressive. The Waste Barn was ...

Fire Fighter For A Day!
Oct 12, 2007 (14 photos)

... day when there is a better view! On the way back to the station we stopped to take a quick picture by the 'Welcome to McMurdo' sign. Even though we were only out there for 2 minutes my eyelashes we almost glued shut by the time we got back into the truck! ...

My Donut of Misery
Sep 15, 2005 (5 photos)

Okay, I'm not really miserable...but this is the time of year when we start to count every day until the end. Most of us even have this really cool Excel spreadsheet called "the Donut of Misery", that counts your time left here down to the last second. ...

Working as a D.A. at McMurdo
Jun 14, 2004 (5 photos)

... a better job--(big woohoo!), working in Supply. Now I wear Carharts too. So in the end it was worth it to get here. My words of advice for anyone applying....try for a Janitor position first but if you do end up a D.A., at least you're in Antarctica!

Sullywan Kenobi has landed in Antarctica
Oct 16, 2007 (20 photos)

... It's funny how it still doesn't seem real. I landed on the Ross Ice shelf in the Ross Sea off the coast of Antarctica in a C-17 Airforce plane today after spending the last two days in Chistchurch, New Zealand (Cheech for short, in the McMurdo lingo). ...

White Trash Toga Party
Jul 25, 2004 (5 photos)

Another great party! The people that threw this hall party couldn't decide between themes, white trash or toga so they made different signs advertising for each one. Ron and I went White Trash. The start of my costume was really hairy armpits (drawn on ...

Winfly Excitement!
Oct 6, 2007 (11 photos)

...  work responsibilities as the population grows we also have the benefits of seeing more of the transitional side of Antarctica as it goes from austral winter to austral summer. We are able to experience the gradual stages of complete darkness to ...

Fourth of July McMurdo Style
Jul 6, 2005 (5 photos)

Happy Fourth of July! It's not quite the same here (without the summer and all) but the Rec Department did a pretty fabulous job this year. There aren't any fireworks allowed-reason being that fire is probably the most dangerous thing that could ...

I have arrived!
Oct 3, 2007 (5 photos)

... I have every been on. After about 6 hours, we finally landed on the Ross iceshelf right on the edge of MacTown (McMurdo). I was awestruck when Iwalked off the plane. The weather was absolutely gorgeous (I have no idea the temp, but there was a bite ...

The Longest Week Ever....
Sep 6, 2004 (5 photos)

I miss my Mom and I wanna go home. Well, actually I miss everything--and it's become very, very monotonous here and there are still five whole weeks left before Ron and I get out of here. The Winfly thing has been fine, I've only lost my jacket about 8 ...

Happy Halloween!
Nov 1, 2007 (7 photos)

... morning! Since we had to work that evening we unfortunately missed the costume contest, but we still dressed up anyway. Aaron was a McMurdo Super Hero called the 'Dish Assassin' and I went as a Tropical Depression! We had a great time and saw some very ...

Black Ops and Mid-Winters Dinner come and gone...
Jun 28, 2005 (8 photos)

... . I went as some sort of Star-Trekky Mcmurdo Chick. The theme is based on the conspiracy theories about Antarctica. Aliens, Military, Government...stuff like that. Basically lots of black light stuff-everyone has highlighter marks all over their faces, ...

Happy Thanksgiving!
Nov 24, 2007 (7 photos)

Happy Thanksgiving! We wish all of you a Happy Thanksgiving! We hope that you were able to enjoy this holiday with family and friends. We missed being there with our family, but we enjoyed the day with our 'Galley family'! As you can imagine ...

The Ice Breaker Has Arrived!
Jan 8, 2008 (3 photos)

The Swedish Ice Breaker,Oden, has arrived! The Oden made it's initial pass on January 7 and will spend this next week re-cutting the path for the oil tanker and re-supply vessel which will arrive at the end of the month and the beginning of ...

The rest is all downhill from here.
Jan 9, 2008 (20 photos)

... and supportive from the get go. The next weekend was a great new treat to me.  We actually have a music festival here on Antarctica. I don't know if it's the only music festival or not, but I do know it's the only one here on this side of the ...

Thanksgiving and beyond
Dec 12, 2007 (21 photos)

... the passengers to lay down the ground rules and give a little history.  I found a little blurb in my Lonely planet Antarctica that mapped out the whole place telling you where cool things were, who slept where, and even pointed out a little message& ...

Polar Plunge!
Jan 26, 2008 (19 photos)

We did the Polar Plunge!   We got to leave work for a few hours and head over to Scott Base where they had set up the official Polar Plunge site. It was a big hole the size of a kiddie swimming pool with a platform to jump off of. We were ...

Back to McMurdo for the third winter
Feb 4, 2006 (9 photos)

We're back again for ONE more winter. It's good to be "home" once again. Of course, it's not really home but it's the only place where we have a room that's our own. And all of our stuff is here too. I'm happy to be back here and I'm looking forward ...

Finally on our way!
Feb 22, 2008 (4 photos)

... yummy food...and much, much more! We are sure we will be in complete culture shock upon landing back in the "real world!" Our time in Antarctica has been legendary, but we anxiously anticipate the adventurous travel of the open road that lies ahead of us!

Life as a DA...
Sep 5, 2007 (8 photos)

... of the dining room - our very own ice cream machine! It is beyond me why anyone would want to eat ice cream in Antarctica, but Frosty Boy is very popular! We almost have riots when it is temporarily out of service! The food here is so delicious!!! The ...

Ice Runway
Nov 22, 2007 (9 photos)

... area. The fourth is located at Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station. The fifth is located approximately 120 miles from McMurdo. Each of the airfields is unique in its own way. Their structure and surrounding weather elements affect their construction, ...