After one more delayed flight, on the 21st of January I was getting bored of McMurdo and really eager to go home. My boredom was at least partially due to doing almost nothing, so I spent the afternoon with Annamarie. She, like me, was done work and just waiting for a flight. We went back to hut point to visit our penguin buddy (still in the most inaccessible location), and went to the McMurdo Station sign for some pictures.
While I’d been lazing about, Matt and Elio had been trying every day to fly out to BLAST for recovery. And every day they were weather delayed. Just before the beginning of a five day crew rest—in which they stood even less chance than usual of flying—Matt was told he should go home. In an incident that nobody believed was unrelated, Matt cut his hand. With Natalie’s inspiration, Tristan’s domain registration impulse, and a photo from me, we encapsulated this news in a simple website: mattisleavingandhestabbedhimself.com
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- Annamarie sports the hat she was forced to buy with a shirt she wanted. This is blurry because I’m laughing
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- Walking through arrival heights, I find a skua and the recently departed Oden
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- Then I go in for a closeup of the skua (still pretty far, with my telephoto lens)
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- Stretching its mouth. Our cue to leave
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- Another skua at hut point. They’re all over the place
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- Our penguin buddy, lying in the sun
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- Gets up briefly
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- Moving a little
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- And back to lying in the sun. This is all that happened in the hour or so we sat there
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- A pair of chaplains insist on taking our photo, when we get to the sign
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- Then Annamarie poses for some solo shots. Starting with the goofy one, of course
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- Then more serious
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- And one more for good measure
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