Wildlife siting

Antarctica has been great but one day this week was by far the highlight of my experience down here. I took a group out onto the sea ice to do some drilling and gain some practical experience and while we were out there we got to see some emperor penguins. To my knowledge it is the first ones that have been seen this year.

At first we were just driving along and noticed something moving in the distance and decided to get a little closer. I had seen some seals but they are kind of like big blobs just laying on the ice, interesting but kind of like looking at a lion in the zoo that is sleeping on a hot day. As we got closer we could see they were penguins making there journey to the ocean after a long winter out in the middle of nowhere. There were about ten of them waddling along sometimes sliding on their bellies in single file like a they were on a mission. We stopped our vehicle about a half a kilometer away and walked to get a little closer, stopping about 200m away from them. All of a sudden one in the back of the line noticed us and changed course to check us out. Soon enough they were all on their way. About ten feet away from us they stopped and bunched up, us looking at them and us checking them out. We were only able to sit there for about 20 minutes before we had to move on but those little guys absolutley blew my mind. They had zero fear of us and wanted see what we were doing out there.

Also of note this week I got to teach a happy camper school and we had temperatures of -55 with wind chill. It was pretty damn cold out there but our students were great, working together to set up camps and learn how cook and nobody got frostbite. A few students along with myself did get a little bit of frostnip but that is how it goes in these enviroments. It happens superquick at the extreme temperatures and if nobody is looking at you to tell you that your cheeks are white you don't notice. Pretty crazy.