I made it "down to the ice" last week and am in McMurdo Station now, the largest of the U.S. stations on the continent.

In McMurdo, as well as getting ready to go into the field, I've been hanging out with the "Moulton team" - Trevor, Todd, Pratigha, and Nelia. (from left to right) I met them in Auckland, New Zealand on our way to Antarctica. The Moulton team is going to an extinct volcano (Mt. Moulton) in West Antarctica. They're studying the paleoclimate and will be doing some ice coring there. They're what we call a deep field team - really deep field. For six weeks, their main contact with the outside world will be through high frequency radios!

The Moulton Team

Pratigha (or P-man as we sometimes call him) and Trevor are doctor wannabees. Prat is studying at Penn State, and Trevor goes to the University of Colorado in Boulder. In fact, I found out that Trevor has an office in the same building I do and knows a lot of the same people I do, but I'd never met him before!

In McMurdo, I sleep in a dorm and share a room with Margaret. Margaret is studying cold adaptations in Antarctic fish. The first time I walked into the dorm, a flyer in the hallway caught my eye. It was advertising a documentary about the 1992-93 American Women's Antarctic Expedition, the first all women's expedition to ski from Antarctica's edge to the South Pole. Anne Dal Vera, one of the team's four members, was going to talk at the movie.