Headed to Antarctica

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Trip Start Oct 13, 2006 Trip End Mar 2007 Next
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  Christchurch, New Zealand
Monday, November 20, 2006

I left Minnesota on Oct. 13th. Spending two nights in Denver, where I had a hotel room, in which I never slept. I spent the evenings with my sister Brenda, her husband Rick and their two boys, Brock and Beau. We had so much fun visiting, swimming, jumping on the tramp...we filled those two nights to the max. I also got to see my friends Shelley and Rune, some more family, Linda, Lisa, Rick, Casey, and yet more new friends Jamie, Renee and Zayda! It was so good, so much fun, and so touching to have all these people come to my sisters just to see me! The days there were filled with orientation, safety regulations, insurance policies and a serious struggle to stay awake!

From Denver we(myself and the group of about 50 other employees I had just spent the week.end with)flew to L.A. then embarking on the 13 hour flight to Auckland, New Zealand. After a short layover, another 1.5 hour flight to Christchurch, New Zealand, where we spent another two days

Botanical Garden Art, NZ

. We had some time to check out Christchurch, rest our jet leggs and get issued all our ECW( extreme cold weather) gear.

When we finally headed out on that final flight from Christchurch to McMurdo, all I could think of was what a miracle it really was...it was actually happening. After all the medical paperwork, physicals, phonecalls, dental appts., faxing, more paperwork, more medical appointments...it was really happening. I was about to land in Antarctica. The flight itself was pretty uneventful, other than the fact that for the entire five hour flight we had to wear earplugs because the rattle and hums of a C17 are so loud you have to shout to be heard by your neighbor. Not your typical flight, I even got to go into the cockpit and have a look around while visiting with the pilots.

When we finally landed I was expecting some big "skid to a stop" kind of landing. Afterall, we were landing on a runway which was actually a frozen ocean. We smoothly glided in, the back hatch was opened and I could see the Royal Society Mountain Range gleaming in the distance. The never.ending white was blinding, the little flags flapping viciously in the breeze marking roads, cracks, pipes, in every direction. We climbed aboard Ivan, the shuttle bus, that took us the final mile or two into Mac Town. Which, by any standard is a shanty town of metal buildings clustered into a small valley surrounded by snowy slopes.

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Botanical Garden, NZ	butt...???	Gondala, Botanical Garden, NZ	Massive Tree, NZ
Rose, Botanical Gardens in Christchurch, NZ	Secret Pond, NZ	Spring time in NZ	Twisted trees in NZ
wildflowers, NZ

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