Christchurch to McMurdo

We all had high hopes that we would make it out on Friday. So we got up in time, checked our several different bags multiple times, and then waited for the shuttle bus to arrive and take us to the CDC. After arriving there, we put all our ECW gear on (or at least had it in our hands or the hand luggage), and then tried to carry/drag/push our entire luggage to the check-in counter. Yes, there actually was a check-in counter. I think it is run by US military, since they are responsible for all the flights going into Antarctica for the United States Antarctic Program (USAP). All our checked luggage (including the boomerang bag) got put on a palette, and we were left to wait with our hand luggage and our bulky ECW gear. And at that stage we learned that our flight was delayed by one hour. So we had enough time to have breakfast, and get all nervous about the possibility that we would actually, really fly to Antarctica in just a few hours.

We had to assemble about one and a half hours previous to our departure time to watch two safety videos, and get on a bus that would bring us to the military airplane that would fly us to McMurdo. At that stage I learned two things: (1) we were about 40 people who were scheduled for that flight (about 14 of them women), and (2) we would fly with a LC-130, which is unfortunately the plane that takes 8 hours from Christchurch to McMurdo instead of 5 hours. I was one of the last to get on the plane, so I did not have a lot of choice of seating. With 40 people on a LC-130 there is not much choice of seating anyway, but I was squeezed somewhere in the middle, with almost no leg room and not much space for my hand luggage. In the picture below you can see that there was not much space for anybody, actually. We got earplugs, because the LC-130 is hellishly loud, and then we waited on the runway for about half an hour before we took off. Since we were by then one and a half hours delayed, our scheduled arrival time in McMurdo was 8.30pm which was pretty late, I thought.

Most of the time during the flight I tried to read, I got up from time to time to stretch my legs, and I was allowed in the cockpit once to have a look out of the front of the airplane. That was when I saw the first peaks of the Transantarctic Mountains. So incredibly cool!

In case you wondered, there is indeed a toilet on board of that airplane! There is a small urinal in front of the airplane carefully hidden by a curtain (no running water for washing the hands, though, just the typical hand sanitizer), and there is a toilet seat in the back of the airplane, that is somehow built in the side of the aircraft. Again, a curtain secures your privacy… The toilet does flush, but there is not running water to wash your hands, just the hand sanitizer again… All together, those LC-130s are definitely no A380s!!

After 8 very, very long hours (and my patience being on dangerously low levels), we finally arrived in McMurdo. We landed on an ice runway that is built on the ice shelf close to McMurdo station. Most of the scenery around us was white! And it was by far not as cold as I had feared. Just around freezing. This meant that we were all hopelessly overdressed in our huge puffy Canada goose down jackets. We were herded into a big bus, and then it took us at least another hour to finally arrive at our destination: the Antarctic Program coordination building (aka “The Chalet”) in the middle of McMurdo. At that time it was around 10pm, and we were all super exhausted. But there was no escape: more security and information briefing before we could even think about getting our beds assigned!

During that briefing I learned that I had to do a “bag drag” that night right away because I was on stand-by for the flight to the Pole the following day (Saturday). I had no clue what “bag drag” meant, but I assumed that I would basically not sleep at all, and just go right away to the Pole. So I didn’t pay too much attention to the following presentations, which was not so smart in hindsight. Because I learned I still had to get a room key, my linen for the bed that was assigned to me, and I had to go see the doctor for a mandatory “altitude sickness” lecture, and all of that before midnight. That gave me about one hour. Thankfully, we were 4 people who were scheduled to go to the Pole the next day, so I just attached myself to two others and got most of the stuff sorted without trouble. That’s when I learned that “bag drag” actually means that you have to check in your bags for the flight the next day, and you only hold on to your hand luggage. We had to change all kinds of labels on our bags, and then finally could go and try to find our beds. But only after we learned that we would have to check on the status of our flights to the Pole the next morning at 6am. The check-in time was 6.45am, and they promised us that by 6am we would know if we would fly or not. Funnily enough, I found two emails today, sent to my gmail account, telling me about me being scheduled for the flight to the Pole on Saturday, and even an email telling me that the South Pole flight was on. Like I had time to check my emails that night!