Stuck in McMurdo

I arrived at McMurdo yesterday late afternoon, after getting the flight from the Pole around noontime. I had high hopes that everything would work as planned, me arriving in McMurdo, having some time to see the most important sights (Scott's Hut), and then me leaving today to get to Christchurch.

It was a good plan, and it looked like it would work out. I got a bed (in a dorm, but nobody else is there right now), got dinner, went to the souvenir shop, and then packed my luggage again to do the "bag drag". That means you carry ALL you luggage to a building where they weigh it and put your checked luggage on a palette for the flight you are supposed to leave with. Then you hop on the scale with all the ECW gear and your carry-on luggage, and they record your weight. To make sure that the plane has enough petrol to transport everybody and their luggage.

So after I got rid of most of my luggage again, I wanted to walk over to Scott's Hut to have a look around. I was supposed to be at the passenger pick up place at 3am to get the flight in the morning. However, I met one other Polie who is supposed to fly out to Christchurch on the same flight as me, and we decided to drink some wine instead (instead of me going to Scott's Hut). And while we were sitting in that coffee shop here in McMurdo, drinking our wine, congratulating ourselves that our travel plan would work so well, the barista in the coffee shop tells us that the Airbus we were supposed to leave with, had to turn around to Christchurch. Because of weather issues. Which meant that our flight to Christchurch got cancelled. We heard rumors that there will be a flight with an LC-130 instead, but not all the people from the Airbus flight would be able to get on it. And they would post more details at 11pm. So we waited around until 11pm, and found out then, that we were both NOT scheduled to depart with the LC-130. Which means we are stuck in McMurdo for at least one additional day. Bummer!

Well, that gave me the possibility to sleep in this morning, and walk around McMurdo to take some pictures. Most likely I will wander over to Scott Base (the NZ station close by) in the afternoon, and have a guided tour of nice pressure ridges in the evening. And if everything works out well, me and my colleague from the Pole will be on the Airbus flight tomorrow morning. Passenger pick-up will be 2am then...